Ed Protzel Interview

Q: How long have you been writing and what other careers or jobs have you had?
A. I’ve been writing on and off, full and part time, for much of my adult life, with an extended period of writing screenplays for feature film. I’ve been writing novels exclusively since retiring from my professional career in investments management – and loving it!

Q: Would you tell us about your current book release HONOR AMONG OUTCASTS?
A: Honor Among Outcasts centers on a Southern abolitionist who forms a “colored” cavalry regiment with a group of escaped slaves to fight for the Union in Civil War Missouri. When he is suspected of spying for the Confederacy, his friends must decide whether to save him or themselves. The story is inspiring, at times horrific, yet heartening. It’s the second book in my Civil War-era DarkHorse Trilogy, the first being The Lies That Bind, set in antebellum Mississippi.

Q: Where did you get your inspiration for this story?
A: I’ve always been fascinated by Southern literature and wanted to do an aspirational, American Dream twist on the genre, with my characters as outsiders, even outlaws, trying to survive against society’s powerful forces. Moreover, I’ve read a lot of history and wanted to portray the struggles of people who aren’t generally recognized from their point of view, making them multi-dimensional, rather than merely stereotypes.

Q: What is the main thing you hope readers remember from this story?
A: Honor Among Outcasts illustrates that no matter how unjust society may be, love and friendship can enable men and women, black and white, to stand together and to prevail, and that evil deeds and the lies upon which they depend can, and will, eventually collapse of their own weight.

Q: How do you choose your settings for your books?
A. For this novel, I chose the Missouri/Kansas guerrilla war because I’m from Missouri and wanted to include some of the historical events that actually took place in the book. Plus, the guerrilla war along the border was the nastiest, dirtiest ever fought in America, requiring no embellishment. Prime examples include Quantrill’s massacre of the male population and burning of Lawrence, Kansas, and, in reaction, the Union army’s General Order Eleven, depopulating four Missouri counties of loyalists and secessionists alike. Depredations, murder and mutilations were the norm, including scalping and other horrors – if you can call such hostilities “normal.”

Q: Do you base your characters on people you know or are they totally made up?
A: I make up my characters to fit the situation and their dramatic function. That said, the characters in my novels are inspired by a combination of people I’ve known, the idealization of people I’d like to know, and elements of me, too. Who says men aren’t introspective?

Q: Would you share with us what you are working on now?
A. Currently, I’m busy completing Book 3 of the trilogy, Something in Madness. The title comes from a Faulkner quote in Absalom, Absalom!: “…not madman, no: since surely there is something in madness, even the demoniac, which Satan flees, aghast at his own handiwork, and which God looks on in pity – some spark…which we call human man.”

Q: If money were no object what vacation would you like to take and why?
A. If money – and time – were no object, I’d like to return to London and Paris because I love them both and there are still things I’d like to see and places I’d spend more time visiting. Also, I’d like to spend time outside those cities in England and France, plus tour Ireland, Berlin, Budapest, Poland, and Vienna.

Q: What is the silliest thing you have ever done?
A. There would be a crowded field and stiff competition for the silliest thing I’ve ever done. I just can’t answer that with any certainty-for more reasons than one.

Q: What is the hardest thing you have ever done?
A. The hardest thing was not giving up in my search to find the right agent, not getting demoralized by the rejections, and rewriting drafts after draft of each manuscripts over a period of years. Getting that first novel published is a big mountain to climb (I never wanted to self-publish), and you’ve got to believe that your work will be good enough to overcome the odds against you – just like my characters did.