At Murderati, novelist Brett Battles asked Parks a few questions, including:
So I’m told you’re the first person to win a Shamus and a Nero Award for the same book…. Has that helped you get any respect from your friends and family? Or is it business as usual?--Marshal Zeringue
Yeah, every once in a while my wife wanders by the Nero Award -- a very handsome brass bust of detective Nero Wolfe -- and mutters, "Couldn't they have given you a check instead?" No, seriously, it was very gratifying to win those awards. And I think it has given me a little extra credibility, not so much with friends (who pretty much know how full of crap I am), or with family (who taught me how to be full of crap in the first place), but with booksellers and librarians and folks of that ilk. It's a very crowded marketplace, as you know, and awards help you stand out a little bit. Besides, I like how the Nero Award looks on the mantel.
Give us a little lowdown on EYES OF THE INNOCENT. Was there anything specific that inspired the story?
Yes and no. As a journalist, I did a lot of reporting on the subprime mortgage crisis, and the story starts with a character who gets in trouble in part because of a subprime mortgage. I also did reporting about house-flipping and political corruption, and those are in there, too. But it's not so much anything specific -- like one particular story I covered, as was the case in my first book -- and more an amalgam of real-life things, which I then...[read on]