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WRITERS MEAN BUSINESS 
Tell us about your latest book, FIRST CONTACT.
FIRST CONTACT is an adventure thriller about a young couple who get lost in a deadly rainforest on the other side of the world. When the book opens they have been missing for twenty-eight hours, and we find them without food, water or hope. Then they stumble across a couple of skeletons in a crashed helicopter and the fun begins.
For readers who loved DOUBLE CROSS, what can they expect in your new book?
There are a number of features that are common to both books, which are part of the brand identity that I’m trying to create with my novels. Foremost among these are the exotic locations. DOUBLE CROSS begins in the Caribbean and moves to Malaysia via Amsterdam, London and Singapore. FIRST CONTACT oscillates between Papua New Guinea, London and Cambridge. With both books there’s plenty of opportunity for armchair travel. Secondly, my heroes are ordinary people rather than cops or detectives, and it’s their ability to overcome extraordinary circumstances that sets them apart. I hope this makes it easier for the reader to build a relationship with them. Thirdly, I would suggest that there’s a “feel-good” element to my novels. There’s plenty of violence and some extremely vicious villains – but you also get loads of fresh air, sunshine and escapism. Ultimately, the resolution of the mystery should bring a satisfied smile to the reader’s lips. Finally, there are a number of other similarities, which you’ll hopefully find in any book I write: feisty heroines, dangerous wildlife, graphic fight scenes and a hook at the end of every chapter.
Why did you decide to go down the adventure thriller route?
Two reasons: one personal, the other commercial. As a kid, I always loved adventure stories. I was captivated by Treasure Island and The Jungle Book. I even started writing my own adventures at the age of six. You can read one of these on my website (www.patrickwoodrow.com). From there it was a natural progression to Willard Price and Wilbur Smith, whose early novels still set the standard for any adventure writer. Like many authors, I simply write the same sort of stuff that I like to read. The second reason has more to do with what I perceived to be a gap in the market. I wanted to do something a bit different – draw back the curtains, throw the windows open and let some air in. Wilbur Smith and Clive Cussler own this space at the moment but there’s definitely room for one or two more.
What made you decide to write standalones?
I did toy with the idea of making Ed Strachan [from DOUBLE CROSS] a series character but I thought that his job as an underwater photographer was a bit too niche. I would’ve had to ingratiate him with some sort of law enforcement agency, otherwise him stumbling on adventure after adventure was going to look a bit contrived by the third or fourth book. And, as anyone who has read DOUBLE CROSS will know, Ed is now retired. He’s quite happy, thank you, lying in his hammock, sipping cold beer, listening to reggae and watching the girls walk by in their bikinis. A lot of people assume that sticking with the same character is somehow easier than starting afresh each time but I’m not sure that’s true. There’s a lot of skill involved in making the same character as real and as interesting in your eighth book as he was in your first. Lee Child is the master of this.
Your books are full of non-stop adventures and danger - where do you get your ideas and inspiration from?
Much of the action is driven by the setting. The sea and the jungle both offer endless scope for interaction with the environment and its wildlife. So too, the mountains, desert or ice-caps. Fact is always stranger than fiction so newspaper articles can also be a great source of ideas. I’ve been fortunate enough to visit the places I write about, so often it’s just a case of imagining what could go wrong while I’m there.
How do you decide on a title?
With great difficulty and usually by process of elimination. FIRST CONTACT was originally called COLD SWEAT but my publisher felt that “sweat” wasn’t a very attractive word and might put people off. So then it became CRASH POINT, which wasn’t bad but perhaps a little anodyne. Next, it spent a month or so as ABSOLUTE RISK, which is a medical term. The hero’s a doctor so this worked quite well. Right up to the point when a friend of mine said it sounded like I was trying to sell insurance. I eventually settled on FIRST CONTACT, which is an anthropological term used to describe the discovery of a new people. One of the main characters in the novel is an anthropologist so this made it very apt. And “contact” is a dynamic, energising word, which demands attention.
What is one piece of advice you’d give to new authors?
If I had to pick one, it would be get a good agent. Seriously. How else are you going to get your manuscript in front of the world’s leading publishers in such a short space of time? And how on earth are you going to negotiate translation rights in Bulgaria, Taiwan and Latvia? Someone once told me that agents are a necessary evil – but that’s nonsense. Writing commercial fiction requires teamwork just like any other business. You’d be a fool to think that you could do it all on your own. To get a good agent you need talent, a thick skin, and clear understanding of who you’re trying to appeal to. When I meet unpublished writers they very often struggle to give a concise summary of their work. If you can’t pitch your book in a maximum of two sentences then you’re probably doomed.
What books do you read when you are not writing?
Not as many as I’d like, is the short answer. My wife and I have recently had a baby and I can’t see myself settling down with a good book any time soon! Having said that, there are a number of authors that I find it hard to overlook: Wilbur Smith, Lee Child, Boris Starling, Carl Hiaasen and Gerald Seymour all form part of my staple literary diet.
Your books feature incredible countries and cultures, where would you most like to go?
The Middle East and Africa are the two parts of the world that I’m least familiar with but I’m hoping to address that with my fourth book. In the meantime, I’d love to explore the Arctic Circle and see the northern lights. Greenland is somewhere I’ve always wanted to visit but I’m going to have go soon otherwise everything will have melted.
What one book would you take on a desert island?
It would have to be Rudyard Kipling’s Just So Stories. Another childhood favourite, they’re a unique blend of imagination, wisdom and humour. And like all good children’s literature they’re often quite dark. Some of them read like adventure stories, others like parables, and some of them are still profoundly enigmatic. As well as entertaining me, they might have some practical value too. Each story demonstrates Kipling’s incredible lateral thinking, which might inspire me to find an ingenious way off the island. Then again, if the diving was any good, I’d probably stay.
And finally, what can we expect next from Patrick Woodrow?
I’m currently working on a third novel, provisionally called HIGH RISK or COLD BLOOD. I can’t decide which is better. Or worse. Having written an underwater thriller and a jungle thriller, we’re off to the mountains next. The story features an experienced alpinist with a short fuse and a thirst for revenge. We start in the Pakistani Himalayas and then move to a secret (and extremely remote) location in the southern hemisphere, via London and Buenos Aires. It’s already shaping up to be my most action-packed book to date. Hopefully it will make The Eiger Sanction look like Snugglepot and Cuddlepie.