Episode #79: Jake Needham on Crime & Character

Books and Brews: the place where beer and literature meet! Jake Needham is an American lawyer who became a screen and television writer through a series of coincidences too ridiculous for anyone to believe. When he realized how little he actually liked movies and television, he started writing crime novels. Jake has lived in Asia and Australia since 1980, first in Sydney, then in Hong Kong, and from 1992, in Bangkok. He and his wife, an Oxford graduate and prematurely retired concert pianist, have been married for thirty-two years and have two adult sons. Jake has published seventeen novels that have collectively sold over a million copies. You see? The great tradition of the American expat novelist isn't entirely dead yet. We talked about masks (psychological, not covid), childhood trauma, plastic surgery…and Aquanet wiggling into tight pants in the 80! (And more!)  00:00 START 05:30 Drink 1: Mango Cinnamon Margarita 08:11 Reading 1: Charlie and the Dogs 13:48 From law to writing for film & TV 24:27 Character-driven fiction 25:05 Drink 2: Singapore Sling 28:24 Reading 2: A Hot Day in Singapore 33:31 Misbehaving Characters: Plotting and Pantsing 41:20 Cultural differences and life in Singapore  44:40 Drink 3: The Zombie 48:18 Reading 3: Charlie Trust 56:16 Living next door to Farrah Fawcett 58:01 Law, the legal system, and justice   Visit our PATREON for our extended AFTER HOURS with Ashley and Andrea Www.booksandbrews.net www.lauravosika.com www.gabrielshornpress.com www.glenmirrilfarms.wordpress.com Www.jakeneedhamnovels.com  ~ ~ If you enjoy our interviews or have benefitted from them, we invite you to help us continue our work. It takes a great deal of time and money to produce Books and Brews. We've been doing interviews since January 2017 as a free service to authors. We continue to promote those authors on our social media for years after their interviews. Subscribing, following, liking, commenting and sharing all help us to keep doing what we do. A $5 tip helps us pay for our many expenses: Libsyn hosting, web hosting, Google meets, providing the drinks for the interview and the many hours of preparation and editing that go into each episode. Patreon: patreon.com/BooksandBrewswithLauraVosika  Tip Jar: paypal.me/booksandbrewsMN * Books and Brews products: https://www.zazzle.com/store/books_an… (more to come) Sponsor an episode to promote your product or service: contact us [email protected] COMING NEXT MONTH:  Kristie Wolf, thrillers UPCOMING EVENTS: Gabriel's Horn is accepting submissions for its anthology NEW THEMES: CHILDREN  See Laura's interview at Central Valley Talk Our theme music is from www.bensound.com. Subscribe to our YouTube Channel to get notifications of all our new videos. We have now interviewed more than 115 authors! Would you like to be featured? Leave a comment. https://www.youtube.com/@booksandbrews