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Friday, Oct 10, 2008
The thriller-master talks about Bob Dylan, working with Ross Perot and why he prefers the creature comforts of a luxury hotel to the perilous terrain of his heroes.
Dec 2, 1998 | Bestselling thriller author Ken Follett recently sat down to chat about his new book, "Hammer of Eden." It's about a terrorist group that threatens to level San Francisco with a man-made earthquake. Follett, a friendly, trim Englishman in his 50s, made himself available during a visit to Manhattan, where he resided in splendor in a 35th-floor luxury hotel suite.
I hear you're heading out to San Francisco after this. If fate is kind to you there will be an earth tremor when you arrive.
A little one, that would be nice. A big one would be not. [He laughs. Note: Follett's laugh is a simple, straightforward, "Ha ha ha."]
You're pretty safe in New York. Apparently there are no earthquake fault lines here.
Somebody told me that there's a fault line that runs right through the middle of Manhattan. I don't believe it is true. We don't have the edge of a tectonic plate here, do we?
Did you spend a lot of time out west researching "Hammer of Eden"?
Not a lot of time. I spent probably in total three or four weeks.
Do you do a lot of research? Do you have a staff to assist you?
No. No. I use Dan Starr, a professional researcher here in New York who does all the legwork, all that stuff which would take me days and weeks of calling, waiting for people to call back. Dan does all that. Finds books. Makes reading lists. Finds maps. I say to him, "I need a seismologist." So he'll find one who is good at explaining their work, and is willing to read the manuscript and catch errors.
I also wanted to spend some time with the FBI, so Dan called the San Francisco FBI and got ahold of the agent in charge of media, and set up an appointment. I have to do the actual interviewing myself -- you can't have somebody else do that because you don't know in advance all the questions you'll want.
Did people in San Francisco get nervous when you started talking to them about man-made earthquakes?
Yes. I went to see Gov. Pete Wilson. I told him what my story was and said, "Just try to imagine for a minute, if there was a terrorist threat of an earthquake and something happened that made you believe they could really do it, how would you deal with it?"
He gave the answer I anticipated. He said, "No mater what the threat, you couldn't give in because if you did, then next week there would be another threat."
How real is the idea of an earthquake bomb?
I hope it isn't real. Some of the seismologists told me, "There's no way this could happen." But others gave sad little shrugs and said, "It's hard to say. Who knows? Maybe. It's within the realm of possibly."
Is every book the same pattern -- research, outline, write it?
Generally. That has been the pattern for several books. "Pillars of the Earth" was different because it was so long. It took much longer to write it. Over three years. Otherwise for a long time now I've been on these two-year cycles -- a year of preparation and a year of writing.
Do you have a lot of writer friends in London?
Probably my best friend among writers is Hanif Kureishi. He writes novels about the experience of being Asian in London. [In London, "Asian" means Indian and Pakistani rather than Japanese and Chinese.] A novel of his was filmed and was quite successful, "My Beautiful Laundrette." He's probably my closest friend among writers. I know the thriller writers. I see Frederick Forsyth, Jack Higgins. I see Jeffrey Archer. Who else? Ruth Rendell. I see some of the feminists. Fay Weldon. In America, Erica Jong. She is probably my oldest friend. I've known her for 20 years now. Known her through several husbands.
You care about Bob Dylan?
Yeah. Very much.
Have you heard his new album? There's an 18-minute song on it where Dylan mentions to a Boston waitress that he's read Erica Jong.
Oh really? I don't know if she knows about it. The last album that I got of his was "Good as I've Been to You," which was really raw, but terrific folk songs. Just before I came to America I was playing "Highway 61." That album must be 30 years old.
Where were you when Dylan went electric in the '60s?
I was in university. From 1967 to '70. I used to play guitar, and I used to play Bob Dylan songs. I'd play "Blowin' in the Wind." And all those numbers. "Hard Rain's a-Gonna Fall." "Bob Dylan's Dream." "The Times They Are a-Changing." I can still play all those songs.
And I've really been enjoying "Highway 61." Those surreal lyrics. "You can hear the penny whistles/You can hear them blow/If you lean your head out far enough/From Desolation Row." That's terrific. God knows what it means. But it's just wonderful. They stay in your head, those words.
Is this the first time you've gone public as a Dylan freak?
No one has ever asked me.
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