RJ Beam is a Wisconsin law enforcement professional. He has experience as both a firefighter and police officer. For most of his professional career he was assigned as an evidence technician, collecting evidence from crime scenes.
www.amazon.com/R-J-Beam/e/B00B7TJFGI/ref=dp_byline_cont_ebooks_
BMH: What’s the biggest challenge in writing?
RJB: For me often times the biggest challenge is getting a story started and truly working on it. I find I have multiple ideas for stories but can’t pick which one to work on. For instance, I have an idea for a series of cozy mysteries. I have not started to work on them, I keep working on new books for my original series. As much as I want to do the cozy series I don’t know where to start it.
BMH: How much of yourself do you write into your character?
RJB: There is a little bit of me in there. I will admit sometimes it is not so much “me” but more it is the person I wish I were. My main character is much younger than I am, so maybe he is the kind of cop I could have been given different opportunities.
BMH: Do your own personal and life challenges drive your characters?
RJB: Yes and no. Having been a police officer I pull some scene ideas from situations I or people I know have been in. A theme I tend to have with my main character arc is a fear of failure. For as long as I can remember I have doubted myself. So often times my main character feels like he is in a situation that is way over his head. Yet he plugs away and, in the end, solves the crime.
BMH: Have you ever had a character ‘take over’?
RJB: I love writing villains. In my second book it seemed like half my first draft was focused on what the criminal was doing as a POV character. So, I had to edit it to make the story focused back on the main character.
BMH: Does writing energize or exhaust you?
RJB: Most of the time it energizes me. Some people just love to tell stories, and I am one of those people. At the same time, I love police work. So, writing gives me an opportunity to tell a story and talk about police work.
BMH: What is your writing kryptonite?
RJB: YouTube and random internet research. It never fails I will want to double check a fact or a term. Then three hours later I look at the clock and wonder where the time went.
BMH: What are your hardest scenes to write?
RJB: Romantic scenes. In my first book my editor said I needed a love interest. The publisher mostly did romance books, so they expected some kind of romance, even if just one scene, in their mysteries also. Adding that character helped the book and the future books. What bothers me most sometimes is when I am writing about this female character, I feel like I am cheating on my wife.
BMH: What are your strengths as a writer?
RJB: I have been told my stories draw people in. The plot hook and pace make people want to find out how it ends.
BMH: What is the best encouragement/advice you’ve received in your writing journey?
RJB: Best advice has been to just keep writing. Get the ideas out of your head and onto the page.
BMH: What is your favorite thing about the writing process?
RJB: Coming up with ideas for plot lines and building my outline is likely my favorite parts of the process. Weaving that web of how the criminal acted and what steps (and missteps) my investigator will take to solve a crime is fun. It is sometimes a game of “if I wanted to do this crime, how would I?” followed up by “how as an investigator could I solve that crime I just planned?”
BMH: What is the most difficult part of your artistic process?
RJB: The first 5,000 to 10,000 words is something I struggle with. How do you hook a reader, so they want to dig into a book? If they don’t like the first few chapters, they will never get into the best parts of the plot.
BMH: What was your favorite childhood book?
RJB: As someone with dyslexia I was a bit late to start reading for fun. The first real book I read was The Dragon Lance Cornicles by Weiss and Hickman. I look back fondly on that series of books as opening up the idea that reading could be fun entertainment for me.
BMH: What was an early experience where you learned that language had power?
RJB: I worked a case that started as a small little local scam but turned out to be much bigger. Various federal agencies got involved. At the conclusion of the case my boss got a letter form the local US Attorney’s office complementing how well written my reports had been. Report writing was always a necessary evil of the job but after that case I realized how important the written word was.
BMH: What motivates you to write?
RJB: There is something therapeutic about writing. It gives me time to escape into a world I am creating. Also it is a lot cheaper than my other hobbies of CrossFit and SCUBA diving.
BMH: What is something you wish someone would have told you before you became an author?
RJB: It would have been nice to know editing is not proof reading. The number of errors you can make writing with continuity, head hopping a POV or anything else are astounding. I thought it was all about spelling and grammar next thing I knew I was given a list of plot holes needed plugging.
BMH: You can go back in time, meet and chat with anyone, who would it be? What would you talk about?
RJB: As a history geek I would love to go back and talk with August Vollmer. He was a police chief in the early 1900s who pushed his officers to go back to school for college educations. It would be amazing to find out what his dream for how a professional police force looked. It would also be fascinating to find out the firsthand story about how Vollmer and Dr. Paul Kirk cooked up their idea for a scientific forensic crime laboratory.
BMH: Why crime fiction?
RJB: I mostly read crime fiction and science fiction. It is easier to write what you know. Seeing how I work in police work and read crime fiction books it just feels natural to write about crime.
Someday I would like to write sci-fi. I know however I would need to do a ton of research before sitting down to even do a first draft of a sci-fi book.
BMH: How do you do research?
RJB: Mostly draw from my experience and knowledgebase. However, there are some areas I need to figure something out. Often times I can call on a buddy who can explain it. Otherwise it is a matter of looking at training manuals or professional journals to verify information or use of terminology.
BMH: How much editing do you do as you write?
RJB: Depends. I try not to. I rather get everything out of my head and then come back to edit it later. Yet sometimes I can’t help but go back to read something I wrote a few days before to refresh my memory. It never fails I will see an issue and feel compelled to fix that before writing anything new.
BMH: What comes first for you, characters or plot?
JRB: Plot first. For example, my work in progress deals with a sniper shooting seemingly random people. As I outlined it I knew I wanted the first shooting at a specific location. I did not know the shooters motivation yet, but I had an idea about how the location of the first shooting would create assumptions about his motivation. Much later when I had his motivation that I could create the character sketch for my shooter.
BMH: How about some hard-earned advice?
JRB: Don’t stop, keep going. Once you have some momentum keep putting words on the page. It seems like anytime I have taken a break from writing I can’t get started again.
