Suckers - J.A. Konrath

INTERVIEW
Jeff Strand interviews Joe Konrath
Strand says: Calling Jack Kilborn an exciting new voice in horror is sort of a cheat, since it’s
the pen name for J.A. Konrath, which is the “I could totally be a chick if you want to buy a book
by a chick” pen name for Joe Konrath. But Jack Kilborn is the dark, dark, dark side of Joe
Konrath, and his first novel Afraid is one of the most relentless horror novels in…well, maybe
ever. If you’re a fan of authors like Richard Laymon, then Afraid will have you wetting yourself
and the people around you with glee. He’s usually known for incorporating lots of humor into his
books, but Afraid plays it straight.
Therefore, I conducted a serious interview with him. Then Joe suddenly was all like “D’oh! We
should’ve done a funny interview!” and I was all like “I did it this way on purpose to better
match the tone of Jack Kilborn” and he was all like “No! No! No! This is wrong! Can we do
another interview?” and I was all like “Do you think I have nothing better to do than keep
interviewing you over and over? Get a friend, for God’s sake!” and he was all like “I’ll give you
a [favor omitted]” and I was all like “Sure.” So here’s an interview with JA/Joe/Jack, who, for
the convenience of this interview, will go by “Jack”…
Jeff: You once signed books at over 600 bookstores in a single summer. I think that a truly
successful author could’ve just signed at the same store 600 times and made the readers come to
him. Please comment.
Jack: My new novel, Afraid, is being released on March 31, 2009. Run out and buy it. In fact,
everyone reading this, and everyone they know, and everyone then don’t know, needs to buy a
copy. Oh, and that’s an excellent point you’ve brought up, that I’m going to ignore.
Jeff: Uh, okay then. We’re 0 for 1 so far. How about you ask me a question, even though the
whole point of this was to promote Jack Kilborn’s upcoming novel Afraid?
160