Interview with Rolf Hitzer, author of “Hoodoo Sea”

NASA’s team of scientist’s has developed the capability to travel at the speed of light. Through a selection process, four astronauts are chosen for a test flight of the new technologies. Lift-off is text book perfect, until the ship, its crew, goes missing in the Bermuda Triangle.

This where the plot takes a dreadful twist, if I happen to say anymore at this stage of the novel, I would be giving away what the book is really about.

Did something specific happen to prompt you to write this book?

I turned forty. At this juncture of my life, I began to do some soul searching. One of those life moments where, “what have I done and what am I going to do from here?”

My Bucket List was created and writing a novel became a short term goal. In fact, it was my intention to write the book as a keepsake for my family. At the time, getting published was not in the plans. In the end, getting older gave me the nudge to sit down in a quiet place with a pen in hand.

Who or what is the inspiration behind this book?

Being a decisive person can be a blessing, or a curse. Now that I had made a commitment to write a book, I couldn’t keep this information to myself. Oh no, I had to announce this to my family. Being a man of my word, I now had self-induced pressure to see this goal come to fruition. The only problem was I had no idea what I would write about?

One night I was channel surfing. With remote control in hand and my aggressive thumb seeking to find anything of interest, I stopped on the Discovery Channel. The documentary captivated my interest and spawned the idea I needed to begin writing my novel.

Who is your biggest supporter?

My wife, Irma. Never writing a novel before, I didn’t realize how much work went into completing a book. Every night I would arrive home from work, gulp down dinner so I could saunter down into our basement office to keep writing. After several months of this disciplined routine, I began to call my spouse a book widow.

A little over a year had passed by when I finally finished my first draft. My wife yanked the manuscript out of my hands. One hundred and twenty thousand words later, she turned the final page over and declared she loved the story.

This was when she insisted I find an agent to represent the novel. Hoodoo Sea is published because of the belief and persistence from my life partner. I am forever grateful as she is my biggest fan.

Your biggest critic?

That’s me! Don’t get me wrong, I’m proud of being published, but I am harsh on myself. I could keep rewriting my scribble if I had been allowed.

What cause are you most passionate about and why?

Protecting our habitat and eco-system, we live on such a beautiful planet. If we all pitch in to help sustain clean air, clean waterways and maintain our forest’s with all it’s living creatures, we save ourselves and our future in the process.

In the last year have you learned or improved on any skills?

I hope so. I believe with every word we write in our craft we become better. Providing you continuously strive to be the best you can be. Every time we fail as writers, if we persevere, we reach one step closer to success with our words.

Do you have any rituals you follow when finishing a piece of work?

When I finally finish a piece of work, and it feels like I had just scaled Mount Everest, I take a break.

My wife is an avid reader, she reads one to three novels a week and I hand off my work to her. I’m hungry for her opinion. I want to know what she liked about the story, and of course, what she didn’t like. I soak up her thoughts and that isn’t easy to do.

Then I let my project collect dust for a month before I tackle my second draft. I find this really helps me have renewed energy and look at my work with eyes wide open.