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This week I’m in a far off country of violent history and exotic beauty, in a city over which looms the spires of an exquisite mosque. I’m in the old part of Istanbul, in a tiny electronics store owned by Mazhar Kadir and his young son. The din of traffic and nearby demolition is softened by the discordant instrumentals floating from the battery powered radio on the dusty counter. On a saucer in front of me are two cubes of glistening sugar and a glass of black Turkish tea. Secure in the knowledge that Mazhar will warn of imminent danger, I’m here to meet talented suspense writer Rachel Amphlett to discuss her latest release Before Nightfall. Join us, if you dare!

RH: Rachel Amphlett, welcome to Writers’ Block. I hope you don’t mind meeting in Mazhar’s store. This part of Istanbul is noisy and dusty and perhaps not as safe as it could be, but at least it’s a respite from a southern hemisphere winter. Mazhar assures me we are quite safe, for a while at least. He’s been kind enough to source us some tea and baklava. Care for some?

RA: Thanks, don’t mind if I do. Better grab some of that baklava for yourself too, before Osman eats it all – I swear that kid’s got hollow legs!

RH: Good to know *grabs two pieces just in case*

RH: Congratulations on the release of your action-packed new suspense Before Nightfall! You’ve previously published two Dan Taylor thrillers, each garnering great reviews, and this is your first stand-alone novel. Before Nightfall looks like being another winner with early reviews all five star. Your work has been described as an “engaging story that keeps you guessing”, “an exhilarating roller coaster”, “a gritty, gripping thriller” and “fast paced and hard to put down”. It must be very gratifying to receive such great responses.

RA: Thank you. It’s extremely humbling, that’s for sure.

RH: Tell us a little about the self-belief it took to get your work into the hands of readers.

RA: It’s always a bit scary when you let loose something you’ve spent months creating on an unsuspecting audience, so to get five star reviews right from the start and see it become a bestseller in a couple of its categories from day one has been very special.  I fail miserably at self-belief sometimes, but it’s the sheer joy of writing that keeps me going – I love it too much to stop.

RH: *licking fingers* A bit like me with Baklava! The heroine of Before Nightfall is Kate Foster, a regular girl who’s nursing a broken heart and a need for adventure. When we first meet her she has her hands tied, a hessian bag over her head and is being menaced by an unknown man. That’s quite an opening! Yet this is all part of a three day hostage course that she must pass in order to take up her new job with high-profile Hart Industries, which among other things develops weapons technology. Kate doesn’t really believe she will ever need the skills she learns on the course, but in a very short time they will be essential to her survival. Tell us a little about Kate and why you put an ordinary girl in such extraordinary circumstances.

RA: That opening scene is what kicked the whole project off – it popped into my head one day, and then I had to find out why she was tied to a chair with a bag over her head!  Being the twenty-first century, I didn’t want to portray her as a helpless heroine – I wanted her to be gutsy in her own way, without suddenly whipping out a karate kick which wouldn’t have been her style. She had to be believable to me, in order to develop her character and, in turn, her side of the story.

RH: You certainly give her plenty of opportunity to be gutsy. At the hostage training course she meets Finn Scott, an alpha male, tough and determined, made hard by the field and a tragedy that has marked his life. He’s also very vocal about his opinion of Kate’s inability to cope with the possible dangers of her job. Sparks fly and though there is a physical attraction, there is too little time for them to settle their differences before each goes their separate ways. The situations you put Kate in during the training course, and the knowledge Finn shares about surviving a kidnapping, ring very true. I certainly learned a lot! Share with us the type of research you undertook to make the training course, and subsequent action, so realistic.

RA:  I’ve been very lucky with the writing of the Dan Taylor thrillers to meet some wonderful people who do this sort of work for a living (or have done in the past) who haven’t minded sharing their experiences with me. I soak up their stories and their advice.  I’ve often been accused of having an over-active imagination, so it hasn’t been too difficult for me to put myself in their shoes. I think if you research thoroughly, the storytelling from that becomes a natural spin-off – I certainly find it inspiring.  Before Nightfall was an amalgamation of past conversations I’d had with various experts, plus some additional research into hostage survival courses.  It’s strange, but whenever I’m working on a new project, the right information comes to me at the right time – I’m a firm believer in synchronicity when it comes to writing!

RH: When Kate is taken hostage, no one knows why she was targeted or by whom, and Finn’s worst fears are realised. As the stakes increase, the point of view switches between Finn and Kate, and though we learn about other characters you are very adept at keeping the reader guessing about why Kate was taken, where she is being held and why. How did you determine it was best to keep the point of view predominately to that of Kate and Finn? How did this point-of-view structure influence your story development? For example, were you always certain of the events and clues that Kate and Finn would experience or did these surprise you as the characters established themselves?

RA: I was afraid if I branched out and introduced viewpoints other than Finn and Kate’s that the pace of the story would suffer. It had to be kept at a brisk pace to convey to readers the urgency of the situation and the timeframe within which Finn was forced to work.  There’s also a lot of information to get across, and again, I didn’t want to lose the reader by having all that information come from various sources – I’d have felt bombarded myself if too many characters were trying to get their voices heard! I definitely had a few surprises thrown my way as the characters developed. The moment where Finn confesses his feelings for Kate about a quarter of the way in just flew from my fingers one day and it never changed through the whole editing process because it worked so naturally – I love moments like that when I’m writing, it’s really special. Although I do plot out the story before I begin writing these days, I only sketch out each scene – I still give the characters a bit of wiggle-room to do their own thing, but the plotting ensures they’re kept under control and I don’t have to go racing after them with a baseball bat to get them back under control!

RH: The kidnap and subsequent action takes place in Istanbul, Turkey, and as Finn moves about the city looking for clues to Kate’s whereabouts your descriptions of the typography, the buildings and the impact of past insurgency are almost photographic. The details around the life of her wealthy boss are also well-rendered. It was easy to visualise the apartments, the shops and the contrast between the wealthy and disadvantaged sections of town. It also struck me that this event could happen in a number of Eastern European cities where a weapons engineer might situate his business. Share with us why you chose Turkey particularly, and how you are so familiar with the landscape and culture in which you set Before Nightfall.

RA: I’ve been very lucky to visit Turkey twice – it’s a wonderful place, and the people are so friendly. From the perspective of the story, I wanted somewhere that melded the old traditions with the new; a city going through massive upheaval, so that a person from the more Westernised world would feel out of their comfort zone most of the time. I love travelling, so I enjoy any excuse to pore over maps and guidebooks to get my bearings. I do use Google Earth a bit, to make sure I don’t send characters the wrong way up dead-end streets, and the rest of it spills from photographs of street views, food (any excuse!) and other people’s recollections of holidays spent there.

RH: Yes, thank Google for Google Earth! *laughs*

RH: I’d like to ask you about theme and whether it is a consideration for you as you write. The idea that anything avoided must eventually be faced seemed to cycle through many of the character dilemmas. Kate takes the job with Hart Industries because she wants to prove she is strong, but she doesn’t really take the possibility of danger seriously. Finn would rather ignore the trauma of his past and won’t even discuss it with his closest friend, yet the situation forces him to confront it. Ian Hart’s wife pretends not to know about his affairs and Hart himself thinks he can get out of a bad deal by avoiding the man with whom it was made. How much was this theme – or another – part of the development of the story? Is theme something you consciously consider when writing, or do you feel theme is something readers bring to the story?

RA: I loved this question when I first read it because you’ve picked up on something I didn’t even know I was doing! It’s something I must do subconsciously by following my characters’ journey through the story, so you’re absolutely right in what you say – that the theme is therefore open to translation by readers.

RH: Before Nightfall is a fast-paced, thrilling read that deals with subjects usually the domain of male writers. This is also true of your Dan Taylor novels. Tells us a little about why this genre appeals to you and why strong male characters are so important to your stories. Have you written in other genres? If so, when (and how) did you decide this was the genre you wanted to pursue – does the writer chose the genre, or the genre chose you?

RA: First and foremost, thrillers are what I enjoy reading so I guess it was inevitable that I’d end up writing in this genre. It is really difficult to convince male readers that I know what I’m talking about when it comes to the action scenes, especially with the Dan Taylor series. The most common question I’m asked is “How can a female author possibly know this stuff?” Again, that all comes from ensuring I do my research, without slowing the pace of the novels. However, in all fairness, the guys are also the most complimentary when they read the books and realise I can write convincingly about the subject matter of the stories. Moving forward, I probably will write some stories which will fall into other genres, but at the moment, thrillers and suspense novels are where my heart is – and the ideas don’t seem to be stopping any time soon!

RH: That’s good news for us *grin* So what’s next for Rachel Amphlett? Is there another Dan Taylor novel in the near future, or will you work on another stand-alone novel?

RA: Yes, there’s a third Dan Taylor book on its way. I daren’t put a release date on it because I’ve only started researching it recently, but I can’t wait to develop the opening scenes that I’ve got sketched out! I’m working on another standalone thriller at the moment, which simply couldn’t be ignored – if I didn’t write it first, I wouldn’t be able to concentrate on the Dan Taylor one. Hopefully I’ll have the first draft of that finished by September, if all goes well. Finally, there are a two more standalone ideas bubbling away where I’ve got some scenes sketched out in various notebooks and things, but they’re definitely on the back-burner for the next twelve months, together with a couple of screenplays I’d like to develop.

RH: It has been great getting to know you and your writing a little better, Rachel. I hope you’re as fit as Finn Scott, because you’ll need some energy for your …

RH: What is your all-time favourite book/movie?

RA: Raiders of the Lost Ark. I never get bored watching that movie.

RH: What are you reading now?

RA: Kill and Tell by Linda Howard

RH: What is your favourite word?

RA:  Superfluous 

RH: What is your worst writing habit?

RA: Having too many ideas – I’ve started keeping a notebook for each “major” idea and a separate notebook for miscellaneous jottings so that I can scribble down what I’m thinking and then get back to the project in hand. I’d never finish anything otherwise!

RH: What is the best bit of advice you ever got (about writing or life in general)?

RA: My Dad told me years ago that if you put your mind to it, you can achieve anything. Thanks Dad!

RH: Seems you took that advice to heart and then some. Thanks for joining us today, Rachel, Where can we find Before Nightfall and your other works?

RA: Thank you too, Rowena – I’ve loved the questions! You can find all my books at  Booktopia, Kobo, Amazon and read about them on Goodreads

Author Bio:

Rachel Amphlett previously worked in the UK publishing industry, played lead guitar in rock bands, and worked with BBC radio before relocating from England to Australia in 2005.
After returning to writing, Rachel enjoyed publication success both in Australia and the United Kingdom with her short stories.
Rachel’s “Dan Taylor” thrillers WHITE GOLD and UNDER FIRE reached Amazon’s bestseller lists in January 2014 for both Technothriller and Action & Adventure categories.
A new standalone suspense novel, BEFORE NIGHTFALL was released in June 2014, while two further independent projects and a third Dan Taylor thriller are currently being researched.

You can keep in touch with Rachel via her Website: http://www.rachelamphlett.com/

Or follow her on Facebook and Twitter