Mike Lawson

Mike Lawson's third DeMarco novel, House Rules, will be released in June 2008. Back when the first DeMarco thriller, The Inside Ring, was published, Luan Gaines interviewed Lawson for Curled Up With a Good Book. Their opening exchanges:

What was your inspiration for this novel?

I can’t recall a specific or particular inspiration for The Inside Ring. My novels usually start with an idea or a what-if question: what if the Secret Service was involved in an assassination attempt on the President? My second novel deals with sexual harassment involving a Presidential contender and in that case I suppose the Clarence Thomas-Anita Hill hearings or even Bill Clinton’s problems could have contributed to my thinking. But there was also a what if question for that novel, but telling it sorta reveals the plot.

Did you base the Washington personalities on real people or are they composites?

Both. The Speaker in The Inside Ring is physically very much like Tip O’Neill, a popular Speaker of the House back in the late 80’s – and, and this is a total coincidence, because I wrote the book before Dennis Hastert – the current Speaker of the House became Speaker – but my Mahoney bears an amazing physical resemblance to Mr. Hastert – although I think my guy would be a lot more fun than Mr. Hastert and I doubt Mr. Hastert has my Mahoney’s sinful proclivities. There are other characters in the book that were also inspired somewhat by real people. For example, in the book there’s a retired army colonel, Bryon Moore, who is based very much on a Navy admiral I worked with. In the main, however, the characters are imaginary, or composites, if you will.

Read the full interview.

Visit Mike Lawson's website.

--Marshal Zeringue