Interview With Thomas Keech
Why don’t you begin by
sharing a little about yourself.
I’m one of those
people who always wanted to write – and do everything else too. I started
a novel when I was ten in which “an eerie something” came out of the night fog and ran down
a high school football player. I gave up because I couldn’t think of any suspects except the football coach
(who was the only other character). I would have loved to have stopped writing
and lived a normal life, but even as I worked as a juvenile counselor, Legal
Aid lawyer and lobbyist, state administrative appeals judge and Assistant
Attorney General representing my state’s
medical board, I kept trying to write at night, on weekends and on vacations. I’m happy to report that I’m now retired and have been speeding up the
writing process a lot in recent years.
Could you tell us a bit about your latest book?
Doc Doc Zeus: A Novel of White Coat Crime is the story of a
narcissistic physician who sexually preys on his women patients, including
sixteen-year-old Diane, even while being pursued by the medical board’s investigator.
How long have you been writing, and how many books have you
published to date?
My first success was with The Crawlspace Conspiracy, a novel
about an old, poor, sick laborer whose dream house gets caught up in a struggle
between two warring state politicians. Prey for Love was about two suburban
teenagers from broken homes who get caught up in a web of suburban corruption.
Hot Box in the Pizza District was about three twenty-year-old guys finding
their way in life.
Why did you write this book? What was your inspiration?
I wrote this for two reasons. I wanted to dramatize the critical
work of medical boards and the many obstacles they work against to bring
miscreants to justice. Then I wanted to do something with the character of
Diane. She was a minor character in Prey for Love, but I liked her so much I
felt she deserved a novel of her own. And I couldn’t just leave her hanging out there, fourteen and
pregnant, without finishing her story.
What did you hope to accomplish by publishing your book?
I hope people will read it and enjoy it. I hope they’ll understand a little more about how
sexual predation by authority figures works and also appreciate that the
medical boards are there to help, although sometimes in a slow and clunky way.
I hope they like the character of Diane half as much as I do.
When did you realize you wanted to be a writer?
I read my first adult book, Our Virgin Island, when I was seven
and bedridden for a week with poison oak. It was about a couple who bought a
tiny island and tried to build a house on it. It wasn’t very exciting for a seven-year-old, but I knew
I was into reading then. The writing bug came soon after that.
Can you tell us about your writing process? Where do your
ideas originate? Do you have a certain writing routine?
When I’m in the middle
of a novel I write for five to eight hours a day. My plots are always complex,
and if something isn’t working out in
the last chapter I’ll go back and
change the whole thing, plot, characters, tone, whatever. And I’ll do it again and again. At the end of the
process, I go back once more and try to take out every word that is not
absolutely necessary. I’m not a great
literary stylist, so I try to make believable characters and a plot that moves
along.
What advice would you give beginning writers?
Read.
What’s your next
project? Any upcoming book secrets you care to reveal?
No secrets will be revealed here. I try really hard not to write
the same novel over and over again. I want everyone, including myself, to be
surprised.
Thomas Keech is a retired Assistant Attorney General for the state of Maryland having represented the State Board of Physicians for sixteen years in its attempt to discipline doctors who were sexual predators, perpetrators of insurance fraud, violators of self-referral laws, and many other types of misbehavior. Currently, Keech is a contractual consultant to the Maryland State Board of Physicians, where he helps write regulations, coordinate with other boards and agencies, as well as participate in investigations.
Learn more about Thomas Keech on www.realnicebooks.com or by connecting with him on Facebook or Goodreads.
