![]() ![]() ![]() He was supposed to be the comic relief in a fairly dark book, but he had the knack of walking on to the page and making things happen. ![]() When I first wrote him, in Dead Before Dying, he was never supposed to become a major character. Some might say that Griessel, your troubled but brilliant alcoholic detective, is a bit of a cliche. And as a novelist I am fascinated with the deadline, with the role of time as a mechanism to increase the tension. The cold case was the basis of the book the sniper developed as a way to ratchet up the tension, and the pressure on Griessel. I mostly follow the dictum “conflict is the mother of suspense”, so I’ll be looking at as many sources of conflict for the protagonists as possible within the parameters of verisimilitude. What gave you the idea to have Griessel racing against time to solve an old case, after the police are told they will be picked off one at a time by a sniper, every day until the murderer is arrested? ![]() Meyer pointed out the limitations of crime fiction in providing a true reflection of South Africa, saying that, “Crime fiction can never be a panoramic window on society, it can only be a small window with a restricted view.” He also explained why he chooses to write in Afrikaans instead of English: The Observer‘s Alison Flood interviewed Deon Meyer about his forthcoming crime-thriller, 7 Days, in which Detective Benny Griessel has to race against time to solve an old case. ![]()
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