Todd Borg’s private eye Owen McKenna has been acclaimed as a hero who walks in steps of classic gumshoes like Sam Spade, Phillip Marlowe and Lew Archer. But his best-selling  - and award winning - Tahoe series has one attraction its predecessors lack – and that’s Owen’s side kick – a good natured Great Dane called Spot who’s become a big hit with readers.

Hi there, I’m your host Jenny Wheeler and today Todd talks about how he came to have “the best job in the world,”  why Tahoe is a great locale for a mystery series, and the reasons readers keep coming back for more.

Six things you’ll learn from this Joys of Binge Reading episode:

How Owen McKenna is different from his famous predecessors

The unexpected success of side kick Spot

The 'feel good' factor in successful writing

Self pub versus trad pub - and where he sits

The importance of multiple books 

Todd's pick for the classic detective series of all time

Where to find Todd Borg: 

Website: toddborg.com/

Blog:  http://toddborg.blogspot.com/

What follows is a "near as" transcript of our conversation, not word for word but pretty close to it, with links to important mentions.

Jenny: But now, here’s Todd. .  Hello there Todd and welcome to the show, it’s great to have you with us.

Jenny: Beginning at the beginning - was there a “Once Upon A Time" moment when you decided you wanted to write fiction?  And if there was a catalyst, what was it?

Tahoe mystery author Todd Borg

Todd: You know what? There wasn't any great "once upon a time" moment; I had no epiphanies or anything exciting like that. I got serious about writing in my late twenties. I always felt I came to this whole novel business late, and I remembered when I started writing novels that when I was twelve years old, my best friend said to me once "you know what? I think I'd like to be a novelist when I grow up". I actually thought that was the stupidest thing I'd ever heard!

It seemed obvious to me that writing a novel would be far too much work, and you'd have to have some kind of specialised imagination. I could never do such a thing. So when I started writing seriously in my late twenties, I thought back on that.

But with time, I remembered back in the sixth grade I wrote a mystery play and we performed it in front of the parents of the kids. When I was in fifth grade I wrote a little short story. I have a younger sister, and when my family would go on car trips and she would sort of get a little restless, she and I would sit in the backseat of the station wagon and I would tel her a story- I'd just make stuff up.

It was literally a "once upon a time" kind of thing. Of course all those stories were probably ridiculously stupid, but clearly as I think back on it, I always kind of had it in my blood you know. I was probably a good liar as a kid, making up stuff but I don't remember that very well.

Jenny: And tell me, that friend who said he was going to become a novelist- did he ever become one?

Todd: No! No, he didn't. It's so funny the way those things work! For me, it always seemed like the idea- when I started to get serious about it- at that point as I got older I was like "if you could actually do this and pull it off, it'd be the greatest job on earth!" Because you could sit around drinking coffee, making up stories. You would have no boss, and you could sleep in for as long as you want, for as late as you want. It seemed like a pretty good way to go through life, and I had a lot of imagination! So I just dived in.

Jenny: And has it turned out to be the best thing you could possibly do? Is it like that- do you sit around drinking coffee?

Tahoe Deathfall - Book One Owen McKenna series