The Spotlight
is on Australian author Sean O’Leary. I am a fan of Asian crime thrillers and, of course, Australia, where I lived when I was young. He comes from sunny Melbourne and is also a prize-winning photographer. Let’s hear from Sean.
IN: Your new series follows Bangkok-based Aussie PI Lee Jenson. What inspired you to set your crime fiction in Southeast Asia, and how does place shape the tone and pace of your stories?
SOL: I am a huge fan of John Burdett’s crime novels that are set in Bangkok and SE Asia. Although my character is different as he is an outsider but he employs a local Thai girl and couldn’t do his job without her. And, Thailand is endlessly fascinating. The second novel in the series is The Hanoi Girl so that’s another story.
IN: You describe your protagonists as “relentless” and your plots as “fast-paced” and “action-filled.” What draws you to this particular style of crime writing, and how do you keep the momentum so tight?
SOL: I think I write the novels I would like to read. I have a three-book series beginning with City of Sin that features an Indigenous Cop and is set in Sydney. I couldn’t find anything like that, so I wrote it.
The main character is Carter Thompson, and he’s a flawed hero, the best kind.
IN: From Bangkok to Saigon, your settings are vividly atmospheric. How much time do you spend on location, and do your photography and travels feed directly into your scenes?
SOL: I’ve been travelling to that region about three times a year for the past few years, and I’m a photography nut, and there are so many opportunities for great photography, and I use them all; it all seeps into my brain. The people, places and atmosphere.
IN: What’s the biggest creative challenge in writing a series as opposed to a standalone novel—especially when your main character is constantly moving through such a high-stakes world?
SOL: As I mentioned, my first three-book series features Indigenous cop Carter Thompson, and he moves from being a cop to a private eye and ends up down on his luck and fighting to be relevant in the final book. It means you have a big palette, plenty of room for change, but each book, I think, also has to work as a standalone, and the books in the first series and this new series do that.
IN: You mention a love of walking, movies, and test cricket. How do these passions influence your writing routine—or give your brain the space to solve tough plot problems?
SOL: I write so much in my head when I’m walking and often stop and write paragraphs or even short notes on the notes app in my mobile. I get a lot of ideas from films. Films change my whole persona after watching them. I still buy DVDs and Blue Ray because I love having the physical copy of the film. The great covers and so on.
Test cricket is a passion.
It’s constant drama. You think one team is on top and then the whole thing changes in half-an-hour and it’s played over five days. How ridiculous is that, ha ha.
Bonus Question
IN: What job were or are you doing besides being a writer?
SOL: I have worked as a dish-pig, and as a night manager in a few down-market motels in Sydney’s notorious Kings Cross. I worked for a time as a Rubbish Removalist in Melbourne and for a year I had my own brick paving business. I also have schizophrenia, which has meant at times working has been difficult. Writing is best of all.
The Bangkok Girl Synopsis
Zoe, a young Australian girl travels from Bangkok to Tokyo for work. She goes missing. Trafficked by the Yakuza into sex work.
Bangkok-based, Australian PI, Lee Jenson is hired to find her. He travels to Tokyo for the first time as Zoe did. Following her timeline. He hits a brick wall, gets bashed by gangsters and finds the cultural differences hard to fathom. He is a stranger in a strange town.
One thing about Jenson though, he never gives up. But can he find Zoe as the Yakuza move her from place to place, before she’s lost forever. From Bangkok to Tokyo to Hong Kong and back to Bangkok, Lee Jenson battles his own demons and the feared Yakuza to try and bring Zoe home.
See it here>>
About Sean
Sean O’Leary is a writer of crime and literary fiction from Melbourne, Australia. He has published five short story collections, two novellas and four novels as well as over fifty individual short stories in journals, both literary and crime. He also recently signed a three-book deal with American publisher Level Best Books for a series of crime thrillers set in SE Asia featuring Bangkok-based Australian PI Lee Jenson. Outside of writing, he likes to travel, walk everywhere, take photographs like crazy, watch a lot of films and firmly believe that test cricket is the greatest game of all.