Hi Charles, welcome to Psychotic State Book Reviews!
Thank you for taking the time to chat with me and my readers.
Let’s talk about your new book, Death on a High Floor.
Did you get the idea from true events or did the idea come to you in a dream, etc.?
CR: The idea was generated, not by real events, but by
thinking about what it would have been like had I stayed in a single law firm
from age twenty-five to age sixty (which is Robert Tarza's age when the novel
starts). So it was, in a sense, a projection of the likely psychological
state of a comfortable "lifer," as Robert calls himself in the
opening sentence. Of course, I didn't stay in the same firm myself.
I left my partnership in my first firm during my twelfth year there. So
it's a projection of a path not taken.
How much of yourself did you write into the character of
Robert?
CR: That's always a hard question. Robert has my
"voice," certainly and, I like to think, a certain degree of my humor
about the world of law and the world in general. He also,
inevitably, has a lot of my knowledge about how law firms and the court
system work. But he's much stuffier and more formal than I could ever be.
What would you say is Robert’s greatest strengths and
greatest weaknesses?
CR: His greatest strength is his ability to assess things calmly
and rationally and to act rationally (he does it for his clients all the
time). His greatest weakness is his inability to act rationally when
he is not personally in control of the situation -- which is
exactly what happens to him when he becomes the target of a murder
investigation. The result is a series of bad decisions.
Did your background as a script consultant come in handy when
writing Death on a High Floor?
CR: Yes, over the years I got to read more than 400 dramatic TV
scripts, with great dialogue written by great script writers. So, in what
is perhaps a reverse for first-time fiction writers, I found it initially
easier to write dialogue than to write description, although I quickly learned
to write description, too. The result, I think, is that Death on a High
Floor has a lot of crisp, fast-moving dialogue. Which helps
make the novel move very quickly, despite covering a lot of ground.
I also learned a lot about plot structure and what it takes
to make a scene dramatic.
Your previous books have been nonfiction - - The Trial of
O.J. Simpson: How to Watch the Trial and Understand What’s Really Going On and
as a contributing author to Lawyers in Your Living Room: Law on Television.
Is writing fiction more difficult or easier than writing nonfiction?
CR: I don't think one is easier or harder than the
other. They're just different. In writing non-fiction, you need to be
extremely careful to make the facts you're describing pristinely
accurate. In fiction, you still need to pay close attention
to reality, but you have a good deal more leeway to bend reality
slightly to suit the needs of drama.
You have a busy legal career in addition to your writing
career. How do you balance the demands of a busy law practice, teaching,
writing and your personal life?
CR: It's sometimes difficult to achieve the balance. But I
think what happens is that you learn to prioritize. In my own case,
personal life and law practice come first. Then teaching and then
writing. That's because in the first three, I have obligations to other
people. In writing, the obligation, prior to publication, is only to
myself. So sometimes writing needs to get put on the back burner for
awhile.
Please share with us details about where you write. Do
you have a dedicated office space? Are you neat and organized or do you
have your own “system”?
CR: I don't have a dedicated home office space. I tend to
write whenever/wherever I have the time and the inclination -- at my
law firm, at home, on an airplane, on vacation, etc. But I'm aware that
that approach is a very modern one made possible by a relatively
light notebook computer (I use a Sony VAIO). With the notebook nearby, the
latest draft is always available to work on with the click of a mouse. In the
age of typewriters the wherever/whenever approach would have been much more
difficult. On the other hand, I've thought about the fact that most of the
great 19th century novels were written with a pencil, a dip pen with
steel nib, or a fountain pen. And before that, with a quill pen. It's
amazing to me anyone got it done, although I think there are still writers
today who write in longhand on paper.
Do you have any quirks or peculiarities while you write that
are absolute necessities?
CR: Not really, although I find it very useful to be able to use
Google Street View to look at places I'm describing, even if I've personally
been there. It helps both to refresh my recollection and to make sure what
I'm describing hasn't changed since I was last there.
What is the single best piece of advice you can offer a
struggling writer?
CR: Just finish it!
I understand you are working on a second novel. Care to
share some details with us?
CR: I've written about 70% of a thriller/murder mystery that is
partly set in the White House and other venues in Washington , D.C. ,
plus partly in France
and Italy .
It's not a sequel to Death on a High Floor, but is a more classic
thriller. Nor is it about lawyers or the courts, although there is a
lawyer character who makes a brief cameo appearance. Unlike Death
on a High Floor, it's written in the third person. I've also been
thinking about a sequel to Death on a High Floor, using some (but not
all) of the same characters and introducing a couple of new ones.
Do you have time to read yourself? If so, what authors
do you enjoy?
CR: I read a lot. I recently finished the novel Cutting
for Stone, by Abraham Verghese, which I liked quite a bit.
Before that, I read Ann Patchett's State of Wonder . On a recent vacation, I
read Joel Goldman's legal thriller, Cold Truth and the sci-fi
novel Twin-Bred, by Karen Wyle. Both quite good. On the
non-fiction side, I just finished the Steve Jobs biography by Walter Isaacson
and am now making my way through The Emperor of All Maladies, A Biography
of Cancer by Siddhartha Mukherjee.
What is a normal day in the life of Charles Rosenberg like?
CR: It really depends on the day. Mostly, it involves
doing the many things lawyers do a lot that don't involve courtrooms:
talking with clients on the phone, writing and responding to emails, meeting
with people (clients, partners, staff, other lawyers, friends) and writing
whatever else needs to be written. One thing I've noticed is that on some days
I tend to drive around Los Angeles
a lot for various meetings. That may be why several scenes in Death on
a High Floor take place in cars moving on the Freeways. Another thing I've
noticed is that the Curse of the Smart Phone (instant access to email,
texts, phone calls, the Net, etc.) makes my days much more chopped up
than they used to be. No more waiting for the mail to come, having the
leisure to draft a reply and waiting a couple days for the response.
And now for some random questions . . .
Baseball or football?
CR: Baseball.
Chocolate or vanilla?
CR: Chocolate chip.
At the movies, popcorn or candy?
CR: Popcorn.
The beach or the mountains?
CR: Mountains.
John Grisham or John Lescroart?
CR: Neither. Scott Turow.
If you could represent one infamous/famous defendant, who would it
be and why?
CR: Mary Surratt, who owned the boarding house in Washington,
D.C. in which John Wilkes Booth and the other conspirators plotted the
assassination of Lincoln and the attempts on the lives of other members of the
government. She was convicted of being a co-conspirator and hanged. I would
want to represent her because I think she was likely not guilty, and the period
at the end of the Civil War would have been an interesting time to be a citizen
and a lawyer.
And lastly, if you could use one word to describe Death
on a High Floor, what would it be?
CR: Intimate.
Thank you so much, Charles, for taking the time to
answer my questions. Best of luck to you with Death on a High Floor!
My review of Death on a High Floor to be posted on Friday, December 9!
Readers, here is a question for you. . . what famous trial would you have liked to attend? I think I would have liked to attend the trials for silent film star Roscoe Arbuckle. Not only was there little hard evidence against him and some very questionable character witnesses but I would have loved to have seen Hollywood and San Francisco in the Roaring Twenties!
About Charles Rosenberg
Charles B. (”Chuck”)He has taught extensively as an adjunct law professor, including at
A graduate of the
His latest novel is Death on a High Floor.
Visit his blog at http://charlesrosenberg.wordpress.com. Connect with him on Facebook at www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=820177073.
About Death on a High Floor
No one is surprised when Simon Rafer, the much-despised managing partner in the large international law firm, Marbury Marfan, turns up dead – with an ornate dagger buried between his shoulder blades. Rafer, an abusive boss, had many enemies, but the prime suspect becomes firm senior partner Robert Tarza, at least according to one Detective Spritz. With Jenna James, his friend and colleague, Tarza sets out to find the real killer or killers before Spritz assembles enough evidence to put Tarza away for life.That’s the supercharged premise of attorney-writer-legal analyst Charles “Chuck” Rosenberg’s first novel, DEATH ON A HIGH FLOOR. But wait, there’s more. The plot also revolves around an infamous ancient Roman coin, the “EID MAR” (Ides of March) denarius, which Brutus struck, complete with double daggers on the back, and handed out to his troops to celebrate his assassination of Julius Caesar. The question becomes, is it real or fake? Call it “Presumed Innocent” meets “The Da Vinci Code.”
Rosenberg, who has extensive experience as a legal script consultant to prime-time TV legal dramas, has been inspired by best-selling legal thriller writers like Scott Turow and John Grisham, but equally by TV producers like Stephen Bochco (“L.A. Law,” “Hill Street Blues,” “NYPD Blue”) and David E. Kelley (“The Practice,” “Boston Legal,” “Ally McBeal,” Harry’s Law”), as well as old time detectives like John D. MacDonald’s Travis McGee. He also provided full time legal analysis for E! Entertainment Television’s live coverage of the O.J. Simpson criminal trial as well as commentary for E!’s coverage of the Simpson civil trial. He started writing DEATH ON A HIGH FLOOR in the mid-2000s.
“The novel was in some ways an attempt to integrate several parts of my life – working as a lawyer, covering the Simpson trial for TV, consulting on dramatic TV scripts, etc.,”
The novel’s title stems from the fact that glitzy, high-end law firms, such as the one
The appeal to readers of DEATH ON A HIGH FLOOR is simple,
Giveaways, Contests & Prizes!
In
celebration of Charles Rosenberg’s new release, he will be appearing at
Pump Up Your Book’s 1st Annual Holiday
Extravaganza Facebook Party on December 16. More than 50 books, gifts and
cash awards will be given away including a paperback copy of of Death on a High Floor! Visit the official party page here!
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