'Burn Notice': The Novel
Does a real writer accept a gig doing books spun off from films or TV shows? A real writer found the answer to his own question.
YOU COULD spend your entire life sitting in Starbucks next to people hunched over laptops, and you'd never hear a single one of them divulge that their dream is to write a television or movie tie-in; you know, those novelizations that magically appear in the airport bookstore rack with the screen stars on their covers.
Me? I've published two novels and a collection of stories that have afforded the kind of notoriety one rarely reads about: I've lost all the awards I've ever been nominated for, my most ardent fans number in the tens of hundreds, and I'd need the Jaws of Life to pull me onto the bestseller list. In short, a career in the literary fiction trenches, where acclaim is something you hang your hat on, since you haven't made enough money to buy a hat rack.
Then I received a midnight call from my brother, Lee, asking whether I might be interested in writing original novels based on "Burn Notice," the popular show on USA about a blacklisted spy named Michael Westen, who uses his training to help people out of bad situations (with the mob, drug dealers, pimps, etc.).
My first reaction was muted. I was finishing a short story about very depressed people doing very depressing things and trying to figure out another word for "desperation." My brother, in addition to writing and producing television shows, has written 14 tie-ins, including the current spate of "Monk" books. He was approached by his publisher, Penguin, to see whether he'd be interested in doing "Burn Notice" too, but he declined, saying he knew just the right person.
Lee had called before with similar opportunities, and I always demurred, mostly because I don't work particularly well with other people, don't really care for a lot of television shows and consider myself far too literary to ever do such a commercial thing. Why, I've even lost the Los Angeles Times Book Prize!
The difference this time was the show itself: I am a huge fan of "Burn Notice." It's smart, funny, visually arresting and has the tone and style of my favorite Elmore Leonard novels.
Plus, the show was created by Matt Nix, a person I'd known casually since college, who I felt shared a similar creative aesthetic. My brother was right: I was the perfect person. The only problem was my advanced sense of artistic self. I had long, twisting conversations with my agent, my wife and the kid who makes my sandwiches at Quiznos about the literary equity I'd accrued, about how writing a tie-in might somehow sully my career and other topics concerning my navel. My agent told me to take a deep breath, get lucid and call her back after I did some research.
