The Interview that never was…

As we all know these are unusual times, so last week I decided to combine my new home-schooling duties with the need to do something to promote this month’s launch of The Appearance of Mystery (the third book in the Rockpools series).

The idea was for our eight year old daughter Alba, who is rather sick of her fractions work (as she puts it, who needs fractions, you can just eat the whole cake?), to make a short film where she interviews me about the book, the characters and about my writing in general. The resulting video would be a win for all involved. I’d be able to post it as a subtle reminder of the book’s upcoming launch – and sell a gazillion copies. Potential readers would glean valuable insights into the book and the creative process that inspired it. And Alba would learn about filming and the challenging process of making high quality TV – a useful 21st century skill which might help her survive in the economic wasteland of all our futures. What could possibly go wrong?

There was one obvious issue to solve, which was that she hadn’t read any of the Rockpools books (she can read, but unfortunately won’t, unless it’s about Harry Potter). But I solved this by rashly posting about my plan on Facebook, and inviting readers to submit questions. Thereby also committing myself to the idea before I had time to consider if it was a good one.

So then, one lockdown afternoon, Alba and I set about arranging our ‘studio’. We pulled some chairs in front of a bookshelf, dragged across a low table and placed a jug of water on it with two glasses – late-night-chat-show style. I dug an old tripod out of a cupboard, and finally figured out how to fix it to my camera with duck tape, and then dismantled my office to get at the microphone I bought a couple of years ago when I thought dictating would be a much easier way to write books (it isn’t). Finally we enlisted our helpers: Maria would be both director and camera operator, while five-year-old Rafa had the crucial role of staying absolutely silent at all times.

And so, only slightly later than expected, we were ready to begin recording…

Before I say how it went, I should share the clear mental image I had of how I thought it would go. I envisaged Alba and myself engaged in a fascinating back-and-forth about the book, about literature in general, and perhaps straying onto other important topics of the day – epidemiology, philosophy – before Alba professionally steered us back. In my mind I saw a range of camera angles, some close-up, some wide, some perhaps showing the studio audience, engrossed and entranced as we spoke. But most of all I assumed there would be a mesmeric, on-screen chemistry that could only come from a relationship as close as that between a father and a daughter.

This is not what happened.

We lost the first hour to technical issues. In theory it was clearly possible to connect the microphone to the camera. In practice though, I simply couldn’t get the bloody thing to work. Then one leg of the tripod was rusty and stuck in place, while the other two were loose, meaning the camera would slowly tip over to one side, making it look like we were filming on a slowly capsizing ship. Perhaps, fittingly, the Titanic. Then the interviewer decided she wanted some toast. Then the interviewee decided he’d have some as well. And then Rafa decided being absolutely quiet was absolutely impossible. 

On the odd occasions that everything did come together for a few fleeting minutes, the camera operator would forget to press record. Or worse, when I was finally faced with silence, a question to answer, and a rolling camera, I would be so surprised I would find myself suddenly unable to think of a single thing to say – not a great look in an interview.

Thus we had to do take, after take, and though things got a little better, by then it was too late. Poor Alba had now heard my bumbling attempts at answers so many times that the bright, interested face she’d worn at the start was now replaced with the very-obviously bored face of an 8 year old girl who’d rather be doing anything else right now, even fractions.

This then put me off even more. The chemistry, if it had ever been possible in the first place, was gone.

Several days have now passed since we filmed, and I decided to see if there was anything that could be salvaged from the exercise (I still have a book to launch!). And I set out with high hopes. Surely there would be enough usable footage to edit together something I could use? After watching it for a while, I thought of another plan. Perhaps I could do a short interview, and then a kind of bloopers section at the end? Later this idea evolved again – perhaps there could just be a bloopers section, and no actual interview? But by the end I bowed to the inevitable. The footage was so far removed from how this had all seemed in my head, that it simply wasn’t going to work. We may try again on another occasion, but for now, I’m going to stick to writing stuff down. Who ever knew that making TV could be so difficult?

So I’m sorry about that, particularly to those who took the time to ask me questions. Below I have done my best to transcribe the few interesting parts we managed, with a bit of judicious editing.

But I hope this little lesson in not biting off more than I can chew still serves in some way to remind you that The Appearance of Mystery is out in just a few days time (there’s no point me giving an exact date, because it depends on how long Amazon takes to process the file – but it will be before the end of this month).

I am very pleased to say too, that my initial confidence in this book has been matched by the team of Beta Readers who have been looking through it catching the errors. They’ve all said they enjoyed it, and several have called it the best of the Rockpools books to date, which is really nice to hear. Thank you to all those who have gone through it correcting the mistakes, it’s really appreciated.

You can pre-order The Appearance of Mystery right now if you want to get it first, and I’ll also email again when it’s live on Amazon. For those who prefer to read a physical copy, or to listen to the story, both paperback and audio are on their way.

So finally, thank you for reading this, and I am sorry that you can’t be watching (but it really was very bad!!!)

Gregg (and Alba)