The Costco Connection - December 2017

Page-turner Patterson

James Patterson wants to keep people reading

BY SHANA MCNALLY

WHEN HE SITS down to write a book, James Patterson likes to picture telling a story to someone sitting across the table. His hope? That person won’t get up until he’s finished the story.

“I really think about the fact that there’s an audience and I don’t want to bore them, because I am easily bored,” Patterson says in a recent telephone interview with The Costco Connection.

There’s little chance of Patterson being bored, considering everything he has on his plate. His idea file is ; inches thick, and at any given point he has ;; to ;; books in progress. Writing in longhand ;;; days per year, he churns out kids’ books in five to six months and adult books in nine months to a year.

The son of an insurance salesman and a schoolteacher, Patterson was a copywriter at J. Walter Thompson when he began writing stories. During his rise to advertising executive he won the Edgar Award for Best First Novel—for The Thomas Berryman Number in ;;;;—after being turned down by ;; publishers.

His ;;;; novel Along Came a Spider, his first novel to feature Alex Cross, a homicide detective and psychologist, also was his first New York Times best-seller in fiction. For his current best-seller, The People vs. Alex Cross, the idea of putting Cross on trial for murder was irresistible.

“It’s a wild ride,” Patterson says. “The police are under fire in this book; people need to remember how hard their jobs are.” Patterson also does numerous collaborations, the latest of which is the upcoming June ;;;; release The President Is Missing. Co-authored with former President Bill Clinton, it is the story of a president who goes missing while in the midst of being impeached.

“It should be the most authentic novel about a president, since a president is deeply involved in the writing,” Patterson says.

He notes, “My characters are compassionate and family-oriented, and I think that appeals. They want to be family first, even if it doesn’t always work out.” This is true of his series characters, whether it’s Michael Bennett in the Private series, Lindsay Boxer and friends in the Women’s Murder Club series or Alex Cross.

“I identify with Alex—he wants to be a
really good cop and a really good father,
and I want to be a really good writer and a
really good father,” Patterson says. “I just
play and get paid to do it. It’s not really
work; I still get family time since I work
from home.”
The longtime Costco member and
Palm Beach, Florida, resident also makes
time for golfing, watching movies and
traveling. Of late he has reveled in writing
kids’ books, and he is outspoken about
helping kids become passionate readers
and advancing his philanthropic efforts.

It all started when he discovered his son, much like Patterson when he was young, was not a big fan of reading. To Patterson, kids who don’t like to read just haven’t found the right book.

To help encourage young readers,
JIMMY Patterson, his children’s book
imprint, focuses on turning kids into life-
long readers. It provides resources, strate-
gies and programs to serve teachers,
parents, librarians and booksellers.

Proceeds go to pro-reading initiatives.

He also started the website Read KiddoRead.com for parents, teachers and librarians. It features reviews of books from a variety of genres and age ranges, a Facebook community and contributions from other authors. Patterson has given away more than ; million books to students (and ;;;,;;; books to U.S. soldiers at home and overseas).

Additionally, the Patterson Family Foundation has endowed over ;,;;; college scholarships for teachers and currently funds more than ;;; James Patterson Teacher Education Scholarships at more than ;; colleges and universities.

“It’s an incredibly important thing to
do. The goal is to have kids finish one
book and then be ready to start another
one,” Patterson says. “If we don’t keep
kids reading, there’s going to be fallout. If
they are engaged, then they’ll want to
keep reading.”
If his legacy is Alex Cross and getting
kids to read, Patterson is absolutely fine
with that. C