Hypnotized follows an Army veteran, a missing teen, an aspiring actress, and a retired detective who become entangled in a decades-old disappearance. What was the inspiration for the setup of your story?

Hampton’s character grew out of a short story I wrote back in the late 60s about draft dodgers. He was hanging out in a pool hall when he met a Whittier woman named Margo who attempted to convince him to burn his draft card. Also, legends about Hell’s Gate and Turnbull Canyon Road are numerous, and I wanted to use them to provide an atmosphere that would hopefully intrigue my readers. 

Nick’s reflective narration gives the novel a distinctive personality. Why did you choose him as the primary voice rather than the detective?

Detective Roach was introduced in my previous book, Surf and Sand, The Girl in the Seaside Hotel, wherein he’s seen considering his upcoming retirement in Whittier. See, I was already thinking about Hypnotized then. But when I actually started writing it Nick was the first character that came to me, and I soon realized I wanted to tell most of the story from a first-person perspective and let the novel become a kind of memoir. I’d just reread Charles Portis’s novel, True Grit, and was inspired by the narration of his character, Mattie Ross. She’s an elderly woman looking back on something that happened to her when she was young. I wanted to try and capture that feeling. (And by the way, everyone’s seen the films, but if you haven’t heard Donna Tartt‘s narration of the audio book, well, you ain’t heard nothin’ yet!)

Identity, performance, and self-deception appear repeatedly throughout the novel. Why do those ideas interest you?

Identity is kind of a big deal these days, but I wasn’t trying to make any statements about that, I just want my characters to live in other people’s heads besides my own. I worked on this book for about 7 years, on and off. Eventually the characters take over and can even become kind of demanding. And when we look at real life, people are always performing, aren’t they? Trying to do their best, or to be as good as someone they admire, or to be “like” someone they look up to. Self-deception too, is common, just look at my not so healthy diet! But performance is something else when it’s used to deceive others. 

Without giving anything away, what do you think continues to haunt Turnbull Canyon long after the final page?

Memories. Wishes. Hopes. Desires. And a few deadly curves! 

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