Sleuthing for the Summer: Chris
Knopf’s Sam Acquillo is back!
17 June 2009
Fans of Chris Knopf’s series of Hamptons thrillers
will be happy to know that this summer, the lovable loser Sam Acquillo is
back and once again, mired in a heap of trouble.
“Hard Stop” is Knopf’s fourth book in the series and this
time, Acquillo, an amateur detective with a troubled past and questionable
future, finds himself sleuthing for a missing person in exchange for a potentially
big payday. From confronting intruders in his bayfront cottage, to doing a
little breaking and entering of his own, and downing vodka and burgers at the
Pequot — an imaginary seaside bar and restaurant in Sag Harbor, those
who have come to love Acquillo’s rough edges won’t be disappointed.
For Knopf, it is the rough edges of life on the East End
that he finds most captivating — the parallel universe that exists
largely north of the highway where the people who keep this place humming
live their year round existence.
Knopf, a Philadelphia native, first got to know this place
through his wife, Mary Farrell, who spent summers in North Sea as a child
in a cottage her father built back in 1952. And North Sea is where the fictional
Sam Acquillo lives — in
his late parents’ cottage on Peconic Bay with his Wheaton terrier, Eddie
and a cast of characters — some legit, some not — who add spice
to what would otherwise be a lonely existence at the edge of the sea. Readers
might suspect that the setting and main character for Knopf’s books came
from envisioning what type of person would live year round in a tiny cottage
on the water.
“I imagined someone in that house, some poor burnout staring out the
window, and a porch looking out on the bay,” says Knopf. “I’m
a very aquatic person, going to the Jersey Shore all my life. I was a life
guard for four years and a competitive swimmer. The seashore is my natural
habitat. I love the beauty and the light in the air, the water. Imaging myself
sitting in that cottage, it grew from there.”
Knopf and his wife live in Connecticut where his day job
is as chairman and executive creative director at Mintz & Hoke, an ad agency. The couple also
have a home in Southampton and they come down practically every weekend to
help Farrell’s 94 year old mother, who still lives in the North Sea cottage.
Several of the characters in his books are an amalgamation of the local people
Knopf has met via his wife’s contacts over the years. In many ways, Knopf’s
books reflect an East End of a couple decades ago. Anyone who’s been
here for more than a few years knows it’s getting harder and harder to
find bars like the Pequot with patrons who make their living from the sea or
quiet, secluded places where the summer crowds never venture.
“The dirty secret about the Hamptons is it’s really become a suburban
world,” says Knopf. “People make their money other places and come
out here. The locals are still around, but they’re a dying breed.
Which is what ultimately makes his books so much fun. Knopf’s East End
is a universe just slightly askew of reality —like a dream version of
this place. Accurate, but not quite right. Names have been changed and locations
altered to protect the innocent and keep readers guessing.
“I’m taking reality and messing around with it,” says Knopf. “I
think there’s a real trick to that. It’s real, but not real. I
have Sam showing up at the Golden Pear in Southampton, but I call it the coffee
place on the corner. I also talk about the hardware store and the big restaurant
on Main Street – which is 75 Main.”
And in Sag Harbor, the Pequot is a shady drinking hole by the water that sits
not far from the bridge. Think you know the place? Chances are you probably
did at one time.
“I got to see Sag Harbor when it was still seedy,” says Knopf. “When
I first saw Sag Harbor, it was rag tag, but looked more genuine and authentic.
Everyone drove their cars back and forth on Main Street, like ‘American
Graffiti.’”
Setting counts for a great deal, but that’s just part of writing a compelling
thriller. Devising plot twists and turns to hold readers’ interest through
four books is quite a talent, and one that Knopf admits didn’t come naturally,
but rather he learned through experience.
“You have to create mini-mysteries within a mystery,” he says. “All
mysteries are a succession of solutions. It maintains suspense, but gives the
reader satisfaction of learning things all along.”
“If there’s a knife lying in the middle of a house with a blood
on it, you ask whose blood is it? It gives the protagonist velocity,” he
adds. “I like to have a couple of these things going and have them converge.
It’s the narrative arc. You build, but not forever. Then there’s
a plateau — a set piece, with real drama. It’s an exciting moment
that gives the reader some satisfaction and fun. That sort of general pattern
is standard for all action books.”
Knopf’s publisher is The Permanent Press, a Sag Harbor based company
run by husband and wife team Martin and Judith Shepard. Despite his many literary
enemies, a lot of people obviously have taken a liking to Sam Acquillo. All
three previous books made the prestigious Book Sense Picks List, the top 20
titles selected monthly by independent bookstores of The American Booksellers
Association. Knopf’s last Acquillo book, “Head Wounds” was
voted best mystery of 2008 by the Independent Book Publishers Association.
“I’m an indy darling,” grins Knopf whose books are read
across the country and around the world, having been published in a variety
of other languages. Sam Acquillo’s not the only one getting attention.
In early 2010, Jackie Swaitkowski, Sam’s tough talking lawyer, will spin
off with a book series of her own through St. Martin’s Press.
“They seem to hold up outside of here,” says Knopf of his books. “There
is fascination with the Hamptons that doesn’t hurt. Another great base
is people who used to live here and don’t anymore.”
Written by: Annette Hinkle |
