Talking to Finn Bell about crime writing and publishing

After reading The Killing Ground, and then looking up Finn Bell out of curiosity, my curiosity got worse! It seemed a bit incomprehensible to me that after four books, Finn was still self-publishing. Sure, other people like Hugh Howie had started self-publishing but then were offered contracts by traditional publishers. On the other hand, writers who'd started with trads had turned back to self-publishing for various reasons.

I was really pleased when Finn agreed to an email interview, and this is it!

Why novel writing? Why crime? Has it been a longtime aim or something fairly recent?

I couldn’t, with any measure of certainty, really tell you why my mind does any of the things it does when left unattended and writing is no different. It started as a way of coping (mostly with myself and my previous career) and has slowly grown into something bigger.

I probably write crime fiction because crime is what I’ve known and when I sit down in front of a blank page that’s what comes out of its own accord. But I don’t think it’s a distinguishing feature of what I do – any story – in any genre – will have something of wrongness, sickness, or brokenness that changes through the pages, I think that’s why reading has utility, has use for the reader, doesn’t matter which genre you’re in. (That’s the point of stories, though right? If a book doesn’t change anything, or make itself (or you) better for reading it, why bother?)  

  

What do you enjoy most about the writing?

There’s almost nothing about it that I don’t like. What do I enjoy most? Probably the sense of completion, a sense that things could have been better, ended better, and the story is how. Or maybe that there is a way of understanding something you don’t want to be real but is. All my books are based on my past career (so old case files, court reports, prison interviews and so on) and all of them involve actual unsolved crimes (at the time of writing a given book). 

That’s where my writing started - from diaries, journals and notes of unsolved crimes that lead to writing plausible (but fictional) endings to real unfinished stories. I guess it’s a way of trying to reach across from how things are to how they ought to be (it’s part make believe but it’s still hope even if only a worn, dirty kind). 

You’ve set The Killing Ground in Riverton – is it a problem using a real small town in NZ? Have your neighbours read the books?

All my books are set in the South Island of New Zealand in real locations, like the crimes and events the stories are based on, almost everything is real or as near to true as I can legally make it. It hasn’t been a problem yet. 

Did you decide to self-publish right from the beginning? Or did that come after some rejections? What led to you doing it yourself?

I didn’t intend to do anything as a writer of any kind. I started writing to cope, to help me sleep (there was no plan behind it). All of the publishing questions came later, my partner talked me into publishing the first few books as ebooks only, and I looked at the content and decided on self-publishing because I honestly didn’t think what I was doing was mainstream enough for traditional publishers to be interested in, I never even approached any before releasing the first 2 books. 

This was back in 2016. Since then I’ve been lucky enough to win some awards, gain some fans and sell a few books and have gone from self-publishing ebooks to self-publishing audiobooks, but still nothing on paper. After about a year we did approach agents in traditional publishing but there was no interest (which hasn’t surprised me).  (My note - it surprised me!)

 

How did you go about getting the books ready to publish? Did you have an editor? What help did you get (if any)?

For the text I employ a professional copy editor (for correcting grammar, spelling and punctuation only) and a professional voice artist for the audio books but everything else is me. Plain and simple.

How did you tackle the marketing? What worked for you? What didn’t work?

That’s a big question and one that so many people can answer much better than I can. There’s nothing original or special about what I’ve done. And at first, I did very little, I wouldn’t look to me as a good example, I think almost all my success has come from a strong response from readers and isn’t down to anything I’ve done.

What did you do about reviews and entering awards?

Nothing much really (again I’m not a good example to point at). I got asked online whether I would like to enter the Ngaio Marsh Award a few months after published my first 2 books (the thought hadn’t occurred to me before then) and then I was lucky enough to win the Best First Novel Category. That led to other competitions either contacting me or being referred to me. The same has been true of reviews, it has mostly grown because of word of mouth from reader to reader and has had very little to do with my own efforts as far as I can tell.  

After reading The Killing Ground, I was astounded that you haven’t found a traditional publisher or agent. What's happened with this?

As I mentioned earlier, it hasn’t changed. I’m releasing my fifth  book soon and there’s been no interest from traditional publishers or agents. I’m ok if it does happen one day and I’m ok if it doesn’t.

Do you feel it’s worth it? Are you selling enough to feel it’s working? (I think you should put the price up but that’s just me!)

Do I think it’s worth it? Yes. Am I selling enough? No. Should I put the prices up? All my books are (at the time of writing this) the lowest price I can make them on Amazon.com (which is 0.99 US $). I did this to support (in a small way) all the people stuck in the pandemic lockdown around the world. (If you read as much as me, cheap ebooks make a difference and I wanted to help, not profit). I’ll raise the prices (probably back to 2.99 US $) once we’re out of the woods and the world gets back to normal.

What next?

We’ll see. My fifth book is done and heading to my editor. After that, probably book 6.

My note - so far I've only read The Killing Ground (have bought the next one and looking forward to reading it), but I suspect Finn's growing readership, despite his lack of super-duper marketing skills, is because the novels are damn good. That's why I wanted to do this interview and let you know about them.