The Book That Changed My Life (2): Douglas Jackson

I’ve got this feeling that Not In The Script (NITS) has stumbled on a game-changer – challenging really interesting writers to come up with one book that changed their life. Most of us would like to list a whole library’s worth, so it’s not easy.

Way back in 2009 when I was prepping my first novel for the brave new world of publishing, a successful author by the name of Douglas Jackson gave me an encouraging leg up with some kind words about what I had written. I’ve never forgotten that. So when I launched this series, I immediately asked him to pile in.

Here’s what he wrote for NITS:

In the summer of 2004, while I was working at The Scotsman newspaper in Edinburgh, I had a surprise lunch invitation from my friend Nicola Barry, a freelance feature writer seeking to extend her list of contacts in the east of Scotland. We ended up talking about the M.Litt creative writing course Nicola had just embarked on at Glasgow University and which she hoped would launch a new literary career. At one point she said to me, ‘Dougie, you should write a book, I bet it would be really gritty.’ And so a seed was sown.

As I drove home that night I began to think about the novel I might write. I knew the advice was ‘write what you know’, but I’d spent the last 30 years working in journalism and raising a family, nobody would want to read about that. A little further thought brought ‘write what you love’.

But what did I love? As it happened, I was listening to Simon Schama’s History of Britain series in the car on CD which answered my question in a satisfyingly serendipitous fashion. Okay, but there’s an awful lot of history. How does one choose? At that very moment, the voice of Timothy West intoned from my speakers: ‘And the Emperor Claudius rode in triumph on his elephant at Colchester and took the surrender of eleven British kings.’ A lightbulb clicked in my head and a book called The Emperor’s Elephant became a twinkle in my eye.

Of course, things looked a little different when I sat down at my keyboard around midnight. I knew a bit about the Romans, but it was a drop in the bucket in comparison to what I’d need to know. And worse, how on earth could someone like me think they could get into the heads of people who lived two thousand years ago and become their voice?

As it turned out the answer lay in a chunky little book on the shelf to my left. As I flicked through Herodotus: The Histories I had what might be described as an epiphany. His pages are populated by ancient Greeks and Persians, but the thought processes he describes are timeless. I realised that the men and women described in the book had the same hopes, aspirations, urges and fears as we do today. As long as I could immerse myself in the society my characters inhabited I could create something close to reality.

The first sentence I wrote as an author was – ‘My father was a great man, he tamed the wild beasts and made them do his bidding’ – and I thought it was pretty darned good. It never occurred to me that night that I might be writing myself into a hole that would take about a month to get out of, but that’s another story.

Douglas Jackson is a prolific writer of gripping historical fiction. He’s the author of 13 historical novels set in ancient Rome, including the critically acclaimed nine-book Valerius Verrens series, plus four mystery thrillers (as James Douglas). He is a journalist by trade. His latest novel is The Barbarian, published by Bantam Press in June 2023.

CHUCKLE TIME

I am compiling a list of amusing quotes from the world of books, especially (but not limited to) historical fiction. Here’s lol quote number two: Templar Rollo praying for divine assistance before battle with Saladin, from ‘Brotherhood of Wolves’ by Daniel Colter:

"... and God, please come yourself, don't send Jesus, for where we ride today is no place for children." 

Needless to say, I’ve asked Daniel to tell us about the book that changed his life and why an American author is so inspired by the politics, culture and terrain as backdrop for such informed writing about the Crusades. Watch this space.