Arts Alive San Antonio

By JASMINA WELLINGHOFF, Editor –

Brandon has been a lawyer for almost as long as he’s been a successful novelist, specializing in mysteries and legal thrillers that have won critical praise and a wide readership. His latest book, From the Grave, came out this month from Severn House Publishers. It’s a sequel to Against the Law, which introduced the disbarred lawyer Edward Hall who, due to complex circumstances, finds himself defending his sister in a murder trial. Edward is back in the new book, facing again an extremely challenging predicament.   

From the Grave is your 20^th novel. It’s quite a milestone. How does it feel?
(Writing and publishing) has been such a constant in my life; my first book appeared 35 years ago. So, 35 years, 20 books… it feels really good!  Whenever I see a new one come out, I feel a sense of accomplishment. In fact, so much so that I thought about quitting. Twenty seems like a nice round number but the publisher said they wanted another one. So, I’ll be starting another one.

How do you personally evaluate From the Grave in comparison with your other thrillers?
Oh man! (laughs) There were so many.  I loved the first Edward Hall book.It was the first legal thriller I had written in more than ten years, and it felt good to come back to familiar grounds. To be honest, I didn’t enjoy writing the sequel nearly as much because it didn’t seem as fresh to me. But then, everyone who read it loved it, including my editor and publisher. I have had this experience more than once in the course of my writing career, and I have learned that how I feel while writing something has absolutely nothing to do with the quality of the finished product. I am not a good predictor.

As an assistant DA, you have been in courtrooms many times. Have any of your real-life cases been as dramatic and intricate as your fictional ones?     
There’s one case that I have been involved in for the last six years or more, which definitely qualifies as intricate. I am in the appeals section, so I come in after someone has already been convicted. In this particular case the defendant was convicted of murder and the appeal lasted four to five years. It went up and down, and finally got reversed and had to be retried this past spring.  I got to know the victim’s family and they wanted me to stay on the case. The accused murderer was a woman, which made it unusual.

She and the man she killed had a baby together. The father, who wanted his son to be taken care of in case something happened to him, took out a large life insurance policy. He made a mistake of telling her about it. And she immediately started concocting schemes to have him killed. And she succeeded, using three other people, while she flew away to establish an alibi. That one was a lot more complex than your usual murder case.

One more legal question! There have been well-publicized cases of individuals who were convicted and spent years in prison before new evidence proved them innocent. It sounds like one’s worst nightmare. How often does that happen and are those unfortunates compensated in some way after release?
That was my occupation for two years. When we got a new district attorney in 2015, he started what was called the Conviction Integrity Unit, which is a growing trend in criminal law. He asked me to start it and I ran it for two years. So, I reviewed a whole lot of cases, and there was one person that I almost immediately got out of prison on a PR (personal recognizance) bond after he had spent 23 years in prison for a crime, I was quite certain, he didn’t commit. So, I know it does happen. There was also the case of the San Antonio Four (four women accused of abuse by a child), and again I feel quite certain they didn’t do anything because I saw them testify up close. They were very convincing. And again, we got them out. They were compensated. They got a flat rate of, I believe, $80,000 for every year they spent in prison, plus $80,000 for life. But not many people qualify for such compensation.

Back to your writing career: why and how did you become a writer?
I started writing when I was about nine years old. I loved reading and I would try to figure out how a story was going to come out, and sometimes I liked my ending better than the actual ending. That’s when I started writing. I once told an interviewer that I stared writing in 5^th grade, and this being San Antonio, soon after, I ran into my 4^th grade teacher who said “No, you started writing in my class.”

I did not set out to be a mystery writer. After graduate school I wrote a very literary novel but the agent I sent it to could not sell it. I read at that time that it’s easier to get the first novel published if it’s in a genre, like mystery/thriller. So, I wrote two suspense novels pretty quickly and my new agent sold them pretty quickly, too. I didn’t think that suspense would be my career. But once you have had some success with a certain type of book, that’s what publishers want from you. And I am fine with it. Within the context of these books, I can write about whatever interests me.

What was the best advice you ever got about writing and a writing career?
 Hm. I don’t remember getting any specific advice. Mostly, I developed my own ideas. The main thing is, if you want to be a writer, you have to write. I’ve known a lot of people who said they wanted to be writers but they never got around to actually writing something. It’s like any other exercise. If you do it you develop your skills.

What has been the most exciting experience of your life?
I have three children. Helping to raise them was exciting. Aside from that, in October 2018, I went to Paris. I had never been abroad before that. Well, it was just wonderful. As soon as I got there, I felt like I had come home. Nothing felt foreign to me except in a good way…And being nominated for the Edgar Award, which is the big award for mystery writers, was very exciting.

How do you define happiness?
Happiness is spending most of your time doing something you love. I don’t see how you can be happy if you don’t enjoy your work.

And what makes you angry or annoyed?
So much!!! Other drivers would be number one. Cruelty and injustice really upset me. I can’t even watch violent movies. And I dislike laziness, especially lazy thinking.

If you could change something about San Antonio, what would it be?
I would like to see fewer people come in here. And I would like to see a higher standard of living for everybody because this is one of the poorest major cities in America. But mainly, I would like San Antonio to be less crowded, and I would get rid of scooters!

Do you ever Google yourself?
I used to do that regularly but I haven’t done it in quite a while. It can get weird. I found a mention of myself on some German website that I can’t do anything about. I did sign up for Google Alerts but it hasn’t done me any good because half of them are about other people with the name Brandon.

If you were to address a graduating college class, what would you tell them?
That perseverance is more important than talent. And I would tell them that kindness goes a long way in dealing with people.

What is your New Year’s resolution?
My resolution this year is to get ready to retire from my lawyer job. There’s so much else I want to do, traveling, writing other types of novels, also a play. And having a job really gets in the way (laughs)!
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A book signing will take place at the Twig Book Shop (Pearl Brewery complex; 306, Pearl Pkwy, # 106) Jan 29, 5-7 p.m.