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WORK TITLE: Hot Pursuit
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WEBSITE: http://stuartwoods.com/
CITY: Key West
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COUNTRY: United States
NATIONALITY: American
LAST VOLUME: CANR 280
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Publishers Weekly vol. 270 no. 35 Aug. 28, 2023, review of Obsession: A Teddy Fay Novel.
Kirkus Reviews Aug. 15, 2023, review of Woods, Stuart: OBSESSION. p. NA.
Stuart Woods
USA flag (1938 - 2022)
Stuart Woods was the author of more than sixty novels. He was a native of Georgia and began his writing career in the advertising industry. Chiefs, his debut in 1981, won the Edgar Award. An avid sailor and pilot, Woods lived in Florida, Maine, and New Mexico.
Genres: Mystery
Series
Will Lee
1. Chiefs (1981)
2. Run Before the Wind (1983)
3. Deep Lie (1986)
4. Grass Roots (1989)
5. The Run (2000)
6. Capital Crimes (2003)
7. Mounting Fears (2008)
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Stone Barrington
1. New York Dead (1991)
2. Dirt (1996)
3. Dead in the Water (1997)
4. Swimming to Catalina (1998)
5. Worst Fears Realized (1999)
6. L.A. Dead (2000)
7. Cold Paradise (2001)
8. The Short Forever (2002)
9. Dirty Work (2003)
10. Reckless Abandon (2004)
11. Two-Dollar Bill (2005)
12. Dark Harbor (2006)
13. Fresh Disasters (2007)
14. Shoot Him If He Runs (2007)
15. Hot Mahogany (2008)
16. Loitering With Intent (2009)
17. Kisser (2009)
18. Lucid Intervals (2010)
19. Strategic Moves (2011)
20. Bel-Air Dead (2011)
21. Son of Stone (2011)
22. D.C. Dead (2011)
23. Unnatural Acts (2012)
24. Severe Clear (2012)
25. Collateral Damage (2013)
26. Unintended Consequences (2013)
27. Doing Hard Time (2013)
28. Standup Guy (2014)
29. Carnal Curiosity (2014)
30. Cut and Thrust (2014)
31. Paris Match (2014)
32. Insatiable Appetites (2015)
33. Hot Pursuit (2015)
34. Naked Greed (2015)
35. Foreign Affairs (2015)
36. Scandalous Behavior (2016)
37. Family Jewels (2016)
38. Dishonorable Intentions (2016)
39. Sex, Lies & Serious Money (2016)
40. Below the Belt (2017)
41. Fast & Loose (2017)
42. Indecent Exposure (2017)
43. Quick & Dirty (2017)
44. Unbound (2018)
45. Shoot First (2018)
46. Turbulence (2018)
47. Desperate Measures (2018)
48. A Delicate Touch (2018)
49. Wild Card (2019)
50. Contraband (2019)
51. Stealth (2019)
52. Treason (2020)
53. Hit List (2020)
54. Choppy Water (2020)
55. Shakeup (2020)
56. Hush-Hush (2020)
57. Double Jeopardy (2021)
58. Class Act (2021)
59. Foul Play (2021)
60. Criminal Mischief (2021)
61. A Safe House (2022)
62. Black Dog (2022)
63. Distant Thunder (2022)
64. Near Miss (2022) (with Brett Battles)
65. Smolder (2024) (with Brett Battles)
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Ed Eagle
1. Santa Fe Rules (1992)
2. Short Straw (2006)
3. Santa Fe Dead (2008)
4. Santa Fe Edge (2010)
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Holly Barker
1. Orchid Beach (1998)
2. Orchid Blues (2001)
3. Blood Orchid (2002)
4. Reckless Abandon (2004)
5. Iron Orchid (2005)
6. Hothouse Orchid (2009)
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Rick Barron
1. The Prince of Beverly Hills (2004)
2. Beverly Hills Dead (2008)
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Teddy Fay
1. Smooth Operator (2016) (with Parnell Hall)
2. The Money Shot (2018) (with Parnell Hall)
3. Skin Game (2019) (with Parnell Hall)
4. Bombshell (2020) (with Parnell Hall)
5. Jackpot (2021) (with Bryon Quertermous)
6. Obsession (2023) (with Brett Battles)
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Novels
Under the Lake (1986)
White Cargo (1988)
Palindrome (1991)
L.A. Times (1993)
Dead Eyes (1994)
Heat (1994)
Imperfect Strangers (1994)
Choke (1995)
Barely Legal (2017) (with Parnell Hall)
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Non fiction
Blue Water, Green Skipper (1977)
An Extravagant Life (2022)
Stuart Woods
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From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
This article's lead section may be too short to adequately summarize the key points. Please consider expanding the lead to provide an accessible overview of all important aspects of the article. (July 2022)
Stuart Woods
Woods at the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books in 2008
Woods at the Los Angeles Times Festival of Books in 2008
Born January 9, 1938
Manchester, Georgia, U.S.
Died July 22, 2022 (aged 84)
Washington, Connecticut, U.S.
Occupation Novelist
Education University of Georgia (BA)
Period 1977–2022
Spouse Jeanmarie Cooper
Website
www.stuartwoods.com
Stuart Woods (born Stuart Chevalier Lee; January 9, 1938 – July 22, 2022)[1] was an American novelist,[2] known best for his first novel Chiefs and his series of novels featuring the Stone Barrington character.
Early life
Stuart Woods was born in Manchester, Georgia, and graduated in 1959 from the University of Georgia, with a Bachelor of Arts in sociology. After graduation, he enrolled in the Air National Guard, spending two months in basic training before moving to New York City, where he began a career in the advertising industry.[3] Towards the end of the 1960s, Woods emigrated to England and lived in Knightsbridge, London while continuing to work in advertising. After three years in London, Woods decided to write a novel, based on an old family story that had been told to him when he was a child, and moved to Ireland.[3] He moved into a converted barn on the grounds of Lough Cutra Castle near Gort, County Galway, and lived a near-solitary existence, except for spending two days a week in Dublin writing television commercials and print advertisements.[3]
Sailing
Soon after settling in Ireland in 1973, Woods took up a new hobby of sailing, an activity that had interested him since the summer of 1966 in Castine, Maine, when friends had taken him on their boat.[3] He joined Galway Bay Sailing Club, and learned to sail in one of the club's Mirrors.[4] Woods purchased a Mirror for himself and named it Fred, after his dog.[5] After tiring of cruising around bays, he entered novice competitions around Galway Bay. Unable to find a reliable person to form his crew, Woods recruited any passing teenager to join him.[6] He entered the week-long National Championships at Lough Derg, and finished 39th out of a fleet of 60. It was Woods' best result of the season.[7]
The following year, Woods sailed in as many races as he could leading up to the Mirror National Championships in Sligo. After retiring from the first race, he finished in 25th place out of 70 boats in the second race, and finished eighth in the third race. The fourth race was cancelled due to high winds and the number of teenaged entrants. He finished the event 29th out of 70 boats, and his crewmate and he were given a special prize for being the oldest and heaviest crew.[8] For the rest of the season, he sailed around Ireland with a friend on a Snapdragon 24, and decided to compete in the 1976 Observer Single-handed Trans-Atlantic Race (OSTAR).[9]
In the fall of 1974, Woods's grandfather died and bequeathed him enough money to buy a yacht suitable for the race. He ordered a Golden Shamrock-based yacht from Ron Holland, and worked with him on designing the interior suitable for single-handed racing and Woods' personal needs.[10] Since his previous sailing experience consisted of "racing a 10-foot plywood dinghy on Sunday afternoons against small children, losing regularly",[11] Woods spent 18 months learning more about sailing and celestial navigation, while his yacht was being built in Cork.[12] He gained more boating experience by sailing from Ireland to England as part of the crew on STY Creidne, a training ship purchased by the Irish government for the Irish Naval Service, Irish Mist II, Ron Holland's Golden Apple, and as many other yachts that would accept him, amassing 1200 miles of offshore experience.[13] He entered the August 1975 Multihull Offshore Cruising and Racing Association (MOCRA) Azores Race and asked fellow Galway Bay Sailing Club member Commander Bill King to join him.[14]
To finance his MOCRA Azores Race and the OSTAR, Woods met with publishers about writing a book about his experience in the OSTAR,[15] organized sponsorship for the races, and sent invitations and press releases about the launch of his yacht to the local and national Irish media, RTÉ, The Observer, and Yachting Monthly.[16] Golden Harp was launched June 4, 1975. "Golden" was chosen so the boat followed the naming tradition of Ron Holland's other designs, the Golden Apple, Golden Shamrock, and Golden Delicious, and "Harp" as it has long been used as a symbol of Ireland.[17]
Woods, King, and their third crewmember, Shirley Clifford,[18] left from Portsmouth, England, for the Azores in August 1975.[19] Clifford, who had complained of feeling ill the day before the race began, continued to feel worse, so Woods and King dropped her off on a coast guard boat near Plymouth, England, on the second day of the race.[20] They arrived in Horta after sailing 1400 miles for 151⁄2 days.[21] They were the smallest and last boat to finish, other than four boats that had retired from the race, but were disqualified for not competing with the full crew complement that had begun the race.[22] King returned to Ireland almost immediately, but Woods spent a month in Horta before sailing Golden Harp the 1300 miles back to Ireland single-handedly to meet the OSTAR's qualifying cruise requirement of a minimum of 500 miles.[23]
Upon his return to Ireland in the late fall of 1975, Woods appeared on the Irish version of To Tell the Truth with Ron Holland and John McWilliam. All three men claimed to be Woods, and a panel had to guess who was lying. Only one of the four panelists guessed correctly.[24] Preparing for his OSTAR race, he petitioned the OSTAR Committee to be considered an Irish entry, as although he was an American, he had been living in Ireland for some time, had learned to sail from Irish yachtsmen on Irish boats, and his yacht was Irish designed and built. The committee agreed to allow him to be entered under Irish colors.[25]
Becoming a published writer
Woods wrote an account of his OSTAR experience, and was introduced to Stanford Maritime, a London-based publishing house specializing in nautical books, by Ron Holland. Blue Water, Green Skipper was published in 1977. The American publishing rights were sold to W.W. Norton.[26]
Woods' second book was to be written about the 1977 Round Britain Yacht Race, but the book was cancelled because of light winds and calms during the race. He persuaded his publishers to allow him to change the scope of the book, and spent the summer driving 12,000 miles around Great Britain and Ireland, writing a guidebook to country restaurants, inns, and hotels.[27] He visited over 150 establishments, and included 138 in the book; 91 establishments in England, 13 in Scotland, eight in Wales, and 26 in Ireland.[28] The two places in the British Isles that he did not visit were Northern Ireland, saying that he did not feel comfortable recommending any place where he was afraid to visit, and the Channel Islands due to a lack of available time.[29] Originally titled A Lover's Guide to the Country Inns of Britain and Ireland Woods realised married couples may feel alienated, and changed it to A Romantic's Guide ...,[28] defining a "romantic" as a person " who is susceptible to charm" in addition to The Concise Oxford Dictionary's definition of someone "given to romance, imagination ... visionary ... professing grandeur of picturesqueness or passion or irregular beauty to finish and proportion."[30]
Woods' first novel, Chiefs, was published in March 1981. The story was inspired by a police chief's badge Woods had found in his grandmother's home. The badge was stained with blood and pockmarked by buckshot. It had belonged to his grandfather, who died wearing it 10 years before Woods was born.[31] He submitted the first 100 pages and an outline to three publishers, all of whom turned him down, before Norton bought the publishing rights for $7,500.[26] He later stated it was a mistake to sell the book unfinished, as he could have gotten much more money had it been completed.[26] About 20,000 copies of the book were printed in hardback, but Norton did little to promote it.[26] He contracted with Bantam Books to print the paperback edition. In 1983, Chiefs was adapted into a television miniseries of the same name, starring Charlton Heston, Danny Glover, Billy Dee Williams, Stephen Collins, and John Goodman. CBS broadcast the miniseries over three nights, and it was nominated for three Emmy Awards and one Eddie Award.[32][33] Its success sparked interest in the paperback,[26] and Woods was awarded the Edgar Award in the "Best First Novel" category from the Mystery Writers of America.[34]
Woods' most prolific series of novels focus on Stone Barrington, a former NYPD detective turned lawyer, who is of counsel to a prestigious law firm and handles sensitive cases for the firm's prominent clients, but cases with which the firm nonetheless does not wish to be publicly associated. As such, Barrington commands exorbitant fees, and a strong cast of recurring characters such as his ex-partner Dino Bacchetti, frequent use of the restaurant Elaine's on the Upper East Side of Manhattan in New York City as a setting, and Stone's frequent exploits with women, travel, and fine dining. Stone, like Woods, was also an experienced pilot and frequent references are made to his aircraft.[citation needed]
In addition to Stone, Woods authored several other character-focused series, including Holly Barker, a retired Army major and Florida police chief recruited to become a CIA operative; Ed Eagle, a Santa Fe defense lawyer; William Henry Lee IV, a United States senator from Georgia who is elected President of the United States; and Rick Barron, a police detective who becomes a security officer and later chief of production for a Hollywood movie studio in the 1930s. All of Woods' novels take place in the same universe, and characters frequently appear in other series.
Woods has published a memoir, a travel book, and 44 novels in a 37-year career, and had 29 consecutive The New York Times best sellers in hardback. Two completed novels were awaiting publication in January and April, 2011, and he then signed another three-book deal with Putnam. At one time in his literary output, Woods wrote two novels a year and subsequently increased that to three novels a year, at the request of his publishers.[35] In 2014, he started publishing four times a year, in January, April, June/July, and October.
Personal life
Woods was a licensed, instrument-rated private pilot and bought a new Cessna Citation Mustang, his first jet airplane. He was the launch customer of the Cessna Citation M2, taking delivery of the plane in December 2013.[36] He owned a Hinckley T38 R power boat and was a partner in an 85-foot antique motor yacht, Enticer, built in 1935 and fully restored. Married to Jeanmarie (née Cooper) in January 2013, the couple lived with a Labrador Retriever named Fred in Key West, Florida, on Mount Desert Island, in Maine, and Santa Fe, New Mexico.[37]
Bibliography
Will Lee novels
Chiefs (1981) (Edgar Award Best First Novel) – A 229-minute TV miniseries, starring Charlton Heston, John Goodman and an all-star cast. (Woods has a role in miniseries)
Run Before the Wind (1983)
Deep Lie (1986)
Grass Roots (1989) – A four-hour TV miniseries, starring Corbin Bernsen and Mel Harris.
The Run (2000)
Capital Crimes (2003) (First appearance of villain Teddy Fay)
Mounting Fears (2009) (Teddy Fay appearance #4) (Holly Barker also makes an appearance)
Stone Barrington novels
New York Dead (1991)
Dirt (1996)
Dead in the Water (1997)
Swimming to Catalina (1998)
Worst Fears Realized (1999)
L.A. Dead (2000)
Cold Paradise (2001)
The Short Forever (2002) (First appearance of CIA agent Lance Cabot)
Dirty Work (2003) (First appearance of Herbie Fisher)
Reckless Abandon (2004) (Also stars Holly Barker, Lance Cabot, and Ed Eagle) (Continuation of a storyline in Blood Orchid) (Herbie Fisher makes a cameo)
Two Dollar Bill (2005)
Dark Harbor (2006) (Also stars Holly Barker)
Fresh Disasters (2007) (Herbie Fisher Appearance)
Shoot Him If He Runs (2007) (Also stars Holly Barker) (Teddy Fay Appearance #3)
Hot Mahogany (2008) (Also stars Holly Barker)
Loitering With Intent (2009) (Chuck Chandler from Choke makes a cameo)
Kisser (2010)
Lucid Intervals (2010) (First appearance of Strategic Services and Mike Freeman)
Strategic Moves (2011) (Also stars Holly Barker, cameo appearances by Todd Bacon and Lance Cabot)
Bel-Air Dead (2011) (Cameos by Ed Eagle, Barbara Eagle and Rick Barron)
Son of Stone (2011)
D.C. Dead (2011) (Also stars Holly Barker and Will Lee) (Teddy Fay Appearance #7)
Unnatural Acts (2012) (Also stars Herbie Fisher)
Severe Clear (2012) (Also stars Holly Barker and Will Lee)
Collateral Damage (2013) (Also stars Holly Barker and Will Lee, Continuation of story line Severe Clear)
Unintended Consequences (2013) (Also stars Holly Barker and Lance Cabot, timeline starts immediately following events in Collateral Damage. References events in Deep Lie)
Doing Hard Time (2013) (Teddy Fay Appearance #8, Continuation of story line Unintended Consequences)
Standup Guy (2014)
Carnal Curiosity (2014) (Cameos by Holly Barker, Lance Cabot, Teddy Fay, Will Lee and Kate Lee)
Cut and Thrust (2014) (Also stars Will Lee, Kate Lee, Ed Eagle, Barbara Eagle and Teddy Fay (Billy Burnett))
Paris Match (2014) (Also stars Lance Cabot & Holly Barker, Continuation of story line Doing Hard Time)
Insatiable Appetites (2015) (Cameos by Will Lee and Kate Lee)
Hot Pursuit (2015) (Also stars Holly Barker,Lance Cabot, Will Lee and Kate Lee)
Naked Greed (2015) (Cameo by Holly Barker)
Foreign Affairs (2015) (Stone's escapees take him to Rome) (Cameos by Holly Barker, Kate Lee, & Lance Cabot)
Scandalous Behavior (2016) (a continuation of Foreign Affairs, takes place mostly in England, with an appearance from Teddy Fay)
Family Jewels (2016) (a cameo from Ed Eagle, Kate Lee, Will Lee, Lance Cabot, & Holly Barker)
Dishonorable Intentions (2016) (a cameo from Ed Eagle, Kate Lee, Lance Cabot, Holly Barker and an appearance from Billy Burnett (Teddy Fay))
Sex, Lies, and Serious Money (2016) (Stars Herb Fisher) (cameos from Ed Eagle, Holly Barker and Billy Burnett (Teddy Fay))
Below the Belt (2017) (Stars Holly Barker, Lance Cabot, Will Lee, cameo by Kate Lee)
Fast and Loose (2017) (a continuation of Below the Belt, cameos from Billy Burnett (Teddy Fay), Kate Lee, Will Lee, Lance Cabot & Holly Barker)
Indecent Exposure (2017) (Stars Holly Barker, Will Lee, & Kate Lee)
Quick & Dirty (2017) (Cameo by Holly Barker)
Unbound (2018) (Stars Billy Burnett (Teddy Fay) & cameo from Ed Eagle)
Shoot First (Think Later) (2018) (Cameos from Lance Cabot and Holly Barker)
Turbulence (2018) (a continuation of the villain from Shoot First, stars Holly Barker and Lance Cabot)
Desperate Measures (2018) (Stars Herb Fisher)
A Delicate Touch (2018) (Cameo by Holly Barker)
Wild Card (2019) (A continuation of A Delicate Touch, cameos from Holly Barker and Lance Cabot)
Contraband (2019) (Cameo by Holly Barker)
Stealth (2019) (Stars Holly Barker & Lance Cabot)
Treason (2020)
Hit List (2020)
Choppy Water (2020)
Shakeup (2020)
Hush-Hush (2020)
Double Jeopardy (2021)
Class Act (2021)
Foul Play (2021)
Criminal Mischief (2021)
A Safe House (2022)
Black Dog (2022)
Distant Thunder (2022)
Near Miss (with Brett Battles) (2023)[38]
Holly Barker novels
Orchid Beach – set in the fictional town of Orchid Beach, FL (1998)
Orchid Blues (2001) (Stone Barrington makes a cameo)
Blood Orchid (2002)
Iron Orchid (2005) (Teddy Fay Appearance #2)
Hothouse Orchid (2009) (Teddy Fay Appearance #5)
Ed Eagle novels
Santa Fe Rules – set in Santa Fe, New Mexico (1992)
Short Straw (2006) (Rick Barron makes a cameo appearance)
Santa Fe Dead (2008)
Santa Fe Edge (2010) (Teddy Fay Appearance #6, Holly Barker makes a cameo and Agent Todd Bacon from Mounting Fears returns)
Rick Barron novels
The Prince of Beverly Hills (2004)
Beverly Hills Dead (2008) (Stone Barrington makes a cameo)
Teddy Fay novels
-These novels also feature Stone Barrington-
Smooth Operator (with Parnell Hall) (2016)
The Money Shot (with Parnell Hall) (2018)
Skin Game (with Parnell Hall) (2019)
Bombshell (with Parnell Hall) (2020)
Jackpot (with Bryon Quertermous) (2021)
Obsession (with Brett Battles) (2023)[39]
Herbie Fisher novels
Barely Legal (with Parnell Hall) (2017) (Features Stone Barrington)
Stand-alone novels
Under the Lake (1987)
White Cargo (1988)
Palindrome – set in Cumberland Island, GA (1991)
L.A. Times – set in Los Angeles, California (1993)
Dead Eyes – set in Los Angeles, California (1994)
Heat – set in a fictional town in Idaho (1994)
Imperfect Strangers (1995) (Grand Prix de Littérature Policière)
Choke (1995)
Non-fiction
Blue Water, Green Skipper: A Memoir of Sailing Alone Across the Atlantic (1977, reissue August 2, 2012)
A Romantic's Guide to the Country Inns of Britain and Ireland (1979)
An Extravagant Life (June 7, 2022) [A new memoir that will incorporate Blue Water, Green Skipper with new material]
Book reviews
Unintended Consequences
New York Journal of Books reviewer Carolyn Haley called Unintended Consequences ". . . reliably fun and intriguing."[40]
Stuart Woods was born in the small Southern town of Manchester, Georgia, and attended the local public schools, then graduated from the University of Georgia with a BA in sociology. He doesn’t remember why.
After college, he spent a year in Atlanta and two months in basic training for what he calls “the draft-dodger program” of the Air National Guard. Then, in the autumn of 1960, he moved to New York in search of a writing job. The magazines and newspapers weren’t hiring, so he got a job in a training program at an advertising agency, earning seventy dollars a week. “It is a measure of my value to the company,” he says, “that my secretary was earning eighty dollars a week.” He spent the whole of the 1960s in New York, with the exception of ten months, which he spent in Mannheim, Germany, at the request of John F. Kennedy. The Soviets had built the Berlin Wall, and Woods, along with a lot of other National Guardsmen, was sent to Germany “to do God knows what,” as he puts it. What he did, he says, was “fly a two-and-a-half-ton truck up and down the autobahn.” He notes that the truck was all he ever flew in the Air Force.
At the end of the sixties, he moved to London and worked there for three years in various advertising agencies. In early 1973, he decided that the time had come for him to write the novel he had been thinking about since the age of ten. He moved to Ireland, where some friends found him a small flat in the stableyard of a castle in south County Galway, and he supported himself by working two days a week for a Dublin ad agency while he worked on the novel. Then, about a hundred pages into the book, he discovered sailing, and “everything went to hell. All I did was sail.”
After a couple of years of this his grandfather died, leaving him “just enough money to get into debt for a boat,” and he decided to compete in the 1976 Observer Single-handed Trans-Atlantic Race (OSTAR). Since his previous sailing experience consisted of “racing a ten-foot plywood dinghy on Sunday afternoons against small children, losing regularly,” he spent eighteen months learning more about sailing and celestial navigation while his new 30-foot yacht, a Ron Holland design called Golden Harp, was being built at a yard in Cork. He moved to a nearby gamekeeper’s cottage on a big estate on the Owenboy River, above Cork Harbor, to be near the boatyard.
The race began at Plymouth, England, in June of ’76. He completed his passage to Newport, Rhode Island, in forty-five days, finishing in the middle of the fleet, which was not bad since his boat was one of the smallest. How did he manage being entirely alone for six weeks at sea? “The company was good,” he says.
The next couple of years were spent in Georgia, writing two nonfiction books: Blue Water, Green Skipper, an account of his Irish experience and the transatlantic race, and A Romantic’s Guide to the Country Inns of Britain and Ireland, a travel book, done on a whim. He also did some more sailing. In August 1979 he competed on a friend’s yacht in the tragic Fastnet Race of 1979, which was struck by a huge storm. Fifteen competitors and four observers lost their lives, but Stuart and his host crew finished in good order, with little damage. (The story of the ’79 Fastnet Race is told in the book Fastnet, Force 10, written by a fellow crewmember of Stuart’s, John Rousmaniere.) That October and November, he spent skippering his friend’s yacht back across the Atlantic with a crew of six, calling at the Azores, Madeira, and the Canary Islands and finishing at Antigua, in the Caribbean.
In the meantime, the British publisher of Blue Water, Green Skipper had sold the American rights to W.W. Norton, a New York publishing house, which also contracted to publish his novel, on the basis of two hundred pages and an outline, for an advance of $7,500. “I was out of excuses to not finish it, and I had taken their money, so I finally had to get to work.” He finished the book and it was published in March 1981, eight years after he had begun it. The novel was called Chiefs.
Though only twenty thousand copies were printed in hardback, the book achieved a large paperback sale and was made into a six-hour television drama for CBS-TV, starring Charlton Heston, at the head of an all-star cast that included Danny Glover, Billy Dee Williams, and John Goodman. For the twenty-fifth anniversary of Chiefs in March 2006, W.W. Norton published a special commemorative replica edition of the hardcover first edition.
Chiefs established Woods as a novelist. The book won the Edgar Allan Poe prize from the Mystery Writers of America, and he was later nominated again for Palindrome. He was also awarded France’s Grand Prix de Littérature Policière for Imperfect Strangers. He has since been prolific, having published more than ninety novels.
After publishing fifteen novels before appearing on the New York Times best seller list, he has since had more than seventy best sellers.
He was a licensed, instrument-rated private pilot, with 3,400 hours total time. His wife, Jeanmarie, earned her private pilot, instrument, and multi-engine ratings. Stuart enjoyed sailing on other people’s boats, owned a Hinckley T38 power boat (hinckleyyachts.com), and was a partner in an 85-foot 1935 Trumpy motor yacht, Enticer (which can be seen at woodenyachts.com and on the cover of Loitering with Intent). The yacht was recently restored to like-new condition.
Stuart Woods passed away in 2022.
Interview
Q. Why did you decide to do this interview?
A. Because I get a lot of email from readers, and many of them ask the same questions. Since I am very lazy, I thought it would be a lot easier to answer them in an interview, instead of answering the same questions over and over again in my replies to their emails. That’s why I would be very grateful if my readers would read this interview before asking me questions. To answer a question asked by many, Chiefs is now available from Netflix, I hear. I can’t guarantee it.
Q. First of all, a lot of readers have asked questions about your writing intentions for the future. What are they?
A. My publishers have asked me to write five books a year, including one cowritten novel, so there will be five new books every year for as long as I can stand it.
Q. A number of readers want to know, who kidnapped Holly in Dark Harbor?
A. I never explain my novels, but so many of you have asked, I’ll make an exception in this case. Holly was kidnapped by the people who kidnapped and murdered all the other victims, but Caleb kept her alive in order to help them. Don’t ask about the vacuum cleaner, and before you ask questions about the plots of any other novels, remember: I never explain! It’s all in the book, figure it out!
Q. Shane, from Omaha, and a great many other readers want to know where you get your ideas.
A. I have a fevered imagination and a rich fantasy life, which helps with the sex scenes. I’ve never really had any trouble coming up with ideas; they just grow, like weeds. The weeding is the hard part.
Q. Jim, from New York, asks: “Stone Barrington is, by most readers’ standards, filthy rich. I’m not sure a writer’s lifestyle should leak into his work.” Comment?
A. Stone didn’t start out rich. In New York Dead he was a homicide detective struggling to find the money to renovate a house he’d inherited. After he left the NYPD there is a clear track through the books of how Stone earned his money. Since being widowed, he’s a lot richer, but he’s very uncomfortable with it. Why do you think Stone’s lifestyle and mine are the same? They’re very different. It seems to me that most people are interested in reading about characters who are richer than they are. It’s not much fun reading about somebody who’s having trouble paying his bills, though Stone has frequently had this problem, until recently.
Q. Brenda, from Madisonville, wants to know: “Did you base Stone Barrington on someone real, or is he entirely out of your imagination?”
A. Stone is a fictional character. I know only one NYPD detective, and I didn’t meet him until after the first Stone novel, New York Dead, had been written. I don’t know any lawyers like Stone, either, and he really is not me, although there are a few similarities.
Q. What are the similarities between you and Stone?
A. We share a tailor and a love for Elaine’s osso buco, and there are a few others, but I’m not going to tell you what they are.
Q. Do you still live on the Treasure Coast of Florida?
A. No, I sold my house in Vero Beach in June of 2004, and a couple of months later I bought another in Key West, where I had previously lived for four years during the nineties. During the time between houses, the warehouse in Vero Beach where I had stored all my belongings was hit by two hurricanes, destroying nearly everything, so I spent the winter of ’04-’05 furnishing the new house. I enjoy spending the winters there, if another hurricane doesn’t blow the house away.
Q. Where do you get your characters’ names?
A. When I wrote Chiefs, I knew I would need a lot of names, so I wrote down the names of all the merchants on Main Street in my hometown, then mixed up the first and last names. I got many compliments on their authenticity. Now I use friends’ names or just make them up. Sometimes, charitable groups auction the right to have characters named after the highest bidder. Somebody paid $5,000 to have his name used in L.A. Dead! No, I won’t name a character after you, unless you follow the above procedure.
Q. Deborah, from Jacksonville, Florida, asks: “Do you find it easier or more difficult to maintain a recurring character’s identity than to start with a new character?”
A. I suppose it’s easier, since I don’t have to start from scratch each time. Early in my career, I resisted suggestions from my publishers that I write a continuing character, but now I find myself with five—Will Lee (though he is unnamed in White Cargo), Stone Barrington, Holly Barker, Rick Barron, and Ed Eagle. I still try to make each book as different as possible from all the others. Too many writers have worn me out as a reader by, essentially, writing the same book again and again. I try hard to avoid that, even in books with continuing characters, since I don’t want to wear out any readers.
Q. Will you write another novel featuring Rick Barron, of The Prince of Beverly Hills?
A. I wrote Prince as a stand-alone novel, one with all new characters, so I had no plans to make him a continuing character. (Of course, I didn’t intend Stone Barrington to be a continuing character, either.) However, I’ve had so many requests from readers for more of Rick Barron, that I wrote a sequel, Beverly Hills Dead, which came out in January 2008. It’s set in the late 1940s, and the very young Vance Calder is an important character, too.
Q. Rosalie, from Pasadena, wants to know if you’re coming there for a book signing anytime soon, and she also wants to know if you have a family and a dog.
A. A month or two before each book comes out I publish a tour schedule on the website, so you can click on Tour Dates now to see if I’ll be in Pasadena. As for family, I have been married to Jeanmarie Woods since 2013, and we share our life with my fourth Labrador retriever, named Fred. (I name all my dogs Fred.) If you want me to sign books in your town, please ask a local bookstore to call their Putnam representative, several months in advance, to make the request, or email kgrinch@penguinrandomhouse.com. She arranges my schedule.
Q. Maria, from Philadelphia, asks for the recipe for vodka gimlets.
A. Pour 6 ounces from a 750-ml bottle of vodka (you’ll think of something to do with it) and replace with Rose’s Sweetened Lime Juice and a tiny bit of water. Shake and put in the freezer overnight. The water will create ice shards and all you have to do is pour some into a martini glass. You can also make an excellent martini by using 5 ounces of vermouth in a 750-ml bottle of gin. Enjoy!
Q. A lot of readers want to know how they can get a signed copy of a book if you’re not coming to their town.
A. All they have to do is look at the tour schedule, and if they can’t make it to a signing, just call one of the bookstores on the list, order a copy, and when I arrive there, I’ll personalize and sign it. At the end of every signing, I always sign the store’s remaining stock, too, so they will have signed copies until those are sold. The Vero Beach Book Center, in Vero Beach, Florida, at (561) 569-2050, usually has signed copies of several novels in stock. I’m sorry, but I can’t have readers sending me books for signing; I move around a lot, and it gets too crazy.
Q. Clint, from Gainesville, Georgia, wants to ask: “What inspired you to become an author?”
A. My mother taught me to read the year before I went to school, and she did a good job. I became a voracious reader as a child, reading Mark Twain and Dickens and a lot of horse and dog stories from the Junior Literary Guild, then I moved up to my mother’s Literary Guild selections. That has to be the basis of my career. One learns to write by reading, and by the time I was nine or ten, I wanted to write.
Q. Rene, from Berlin, Germany, wants to know: “How much time does it take you to prepare, write, and revise a novel?”
A. When I finish a novel, I ship the manuscript off to my editor, and while she is reading it, I begin a new one. I write half a dozen chapters and a brief synopsis—just enough to get my publishers hooked—then, as soon as I get the first check, I throw away the synopsis and let the book lead where it will. (My publishers have never complained about this.) I tend to think a book ahead. My publishers have asked me to write four books a year and cowrite a fifth, which means I have only a few months to write each book.
Q. Are your books heavily edited?
A. No, I’ve always been lightly edited; it’s never taken me more than a few hours to address my editor’s notes. On several occasions my editors have told me they have no notes at all. I like hearing this. Some parts of the publishing process overlap from book to book. While I’m writing a new novel, I’ll be working with my publishers on the jacket design and copy for the last book, and I’m always thinking ahead a book, so that when I finish one, I can start another immediately. I write on a computer, using WordPerfect (for Windows, though I much prefer DOS, but it’s hard to update the graphics and printer drivers). I begin the day by reading what I wrote the day before and making small corrections, then I write a new chapter, which is usually five to seven pages. This takes an hour (but I’m thinking all the time!). I seem to have a gift for keeping the story in my head. I don’t usually reread the book when I’ve finished; I just send it to my editor. Recently, though, I was afraid that I may have made some errors in the plotting, so I reread one of my books before sending it to my editor. The only significant change was to add two paragraphs.
Q. A lot of readers want to know why there are so many errors in a published book.
A. There are two kinds of errors—those of spelling, punctuation, etc., and those that the writer makes in plotting or in fact. The publisher employs, in addition to the book’s editor, a copy editor, whose job it is to deal with the minute details of the book, correct mistakes of both kinds, and make sure the plot and timeline track well. By the time the book goes into production, it should have been read by several people, but, unfortunately, errors still slip through. I know that errors annoy readers, but there does not seem to be any economic way to avoid all of them.
Q. Why do you ask, in the introduction to the email function on your website, that readers not write to you with corrections?
A. Because, by the time the readers read the book and write to me, the process is already out of my hands, and I will already know about it. If you find some large, important error and send it to my publishers, perhaps a correction can be made for the next printing, but that doesn’t often happen. The book is going to remain pretty much as it’s first published, errors and all. Also, readers who like to report errors to me always seem to think they’re the first to notice, when, in fact, I may have already heard from hundreds of others on the same subject. (I must have had a hundred emails from helicopter pilots commenting on my description of Stone’s helicopter flying in Two-Dollar Bill. My point was, Stone knows nothing about flying helicopters.) I sometimes make errors such as changing a character’s name from book to book, something which no one needs to point out to me, since that has been done many times already. God help me if I make a mistake about a firearm. I’ll get a ton of email from gun folks about it, and most of them volunteer to be my firearms consultant. Too many readers seem to belong to the AHA! Police. In short, save time for yourself and me, and PLEASE DO NOT write to me about errors and corrections. If you do, I’ll simply refer you back to this interview, and I’ll probably yell at you.
Q. At the end of one book, Arrington has given birth to a girl, but at the beginning of the next, it’s a boy. Why?
A. See the above answer.
Q. I keep seeing the airplane registration number N123TF used in your books. Why?
A. It’s my airplane’s registration number, and I use it to avoid accidentally using somebody else’s. In Orchid Blues I inadvertently used it on two different airplanes, and I’ve had a lot of readers email about it. I apologize.
Q. Terry, of Orlando, Florida, wants to know: “How much time do you spend in Florida, Santa Fe, and Maine? And which do you prefer?”
A. Here’s a clear-cut answer, Terry: It varies. I’m a Florida resident, but generally speaking, I go where the weather is best. That means Florida during the cold months, Maine in summer, and Santa Fe in the spring and fall, when I’m not traveling. And I love them all.
Q. Sherry, in Oklahoma City, asks: “I’ve read just about all your books except for Run Before the Wind, and it’s hard to find. Sometimes it appears on Internet auctions, but it’s always $30 or more. Why is that? Is it out of print?”
A. All my novels are in print, which means that if a bookstore does not have one in stock, they can order it and have it in your hands within a few days. It may not be a hardcover copy, but the paperback will be available. When all the hardback books have been sold, they’re gone and usua
Obsession: A Teddy Fay Novel.
Citation metadata
Date: Aug. 28, 2023
From: Publishers Weekly(Vol. 270, Issue 35)
Publisher: PWxyz, LLC
Document Type: Book review; Brief article
Length: 224 words
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Obsession: A Teddy Fay Novel
Stuart Woods and Brett Battles. Putnam, $29 (308p) ISBN 978-0-59-318848-4
The breezy sixth Teddy Fay outing from Woods and Battles (following 2021's Jackpot) sees the former CIA operative and master of disguise switching between his true identity and those of Academy Award--winning actor Mark Weldon and film producer Billy Barnett, both holdovers from old cases. While Teddy works borh in front of and behind the camera on the latest action thriller from director Peter Barrington (son of Teddy's friend Stone Barrington, who holds down his own Woods series and appears here), the opportunity arises for Ben Bachetti, head of the studio producing Perer's movies, to partner with a company helmed by Croatian tech billionaire Carl Novak. Just before Carl and Ben meet, Carl's wife Rebecca disappears. A short time later, Carl receives messages indicating that his wife's kidnapping is payback for an old grievance. With film production hanging in the balance, Stone enlists Teddy to help find Rebecca; amid that investigation, an obsessive fan fixated on one of the film's stars makes his way to the set and threatens production further. Though this is familiar territory for Teddy, Woods and Battles provide reliable thrills and a smoother ride than in the previous installment. Series fans will celebrate this return to form. Agent: Anne Sibbald, Janklow & Nesbit Assoc. (Oct.)
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2023 PWxyz, LLC
http://www.publishersweekly.com/
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"Obsession: A Teddy Fay Novel." Publishers Weekly, vol. 270, no. 35, 28 Aug. 2023, pp. 87+. Gale General OneFile, link.gale.com/apps/doc/A765086129/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=bookmark-ITOF&xid=d57bc8e6. Accessed 11 Feb. 2024.
Woods, Stuart: OBSESSION.
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Date: Aug. 15, 2023
From: Kirkus Reviews
Publisher: Kirkus Media LLC
Document Type: Book review; Brief article
Length: 296 words
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Woods, Stuart OBSESSION Putnam (Fiction None) $29.00 10, 10 ISBN: 9780593188484
Teddy Fay steps up to deal with felonious complications on the set of Centurion Studios' aptly named new project,Storm's Eye.
Tech billionaire Carl Novak is only just starting his own production company, so he has no reason to know that Billy Barnett, the producer of Storm's Eye, is actually Teddy, a former CIA agent who also moonlights as Oscar-winning actor Mark Weldon. But it's a lucky thing for him that Teddy's on hand when Carl's wife, Rebecca, is kidnapped by Croatian gang leader Zoran Janic, since Teddy's even more at home hunting down vermin like Janic than he is in the Hollywood scene. Janic claims he's holding Rebecca for a hefty ransom, but Carl thinks he's really out for bloody revenge, since he's convinced that Carl was responsible for his brother's death. That means both high stakes and a short timeline. As if the abduction weren't drama enough, Matthew Wagner, a fan who's been stalking Oscar-winning actor Tessa Tweed Bacchetti, finally succeeds in insinuating himself onto the set, where he plots to make Tessa his own by eliminating her husband, Centurion head Ben Bacchetti. Because he's Teddy Fay, Teddy picks up the bad vibe from Matthew almost as quickly as he realizes that the kidnapping depends on a contact in Carl's inner circle. Calculating that he can't afford to put off dealing with either bad guy because of the imminent (though unrelated) dangers they pose, he resolves to take care of them both on the same night, and does so in a neat one-two punch that leaves one of them sitting in a car outside the other one's lair before the closer.
Battles effortlessly apes the late Woods' fleet pace and trademark lack of depth.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2023 Kirkus Media LLC
http://www.kirkusreviews.com/
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MLA 9th Edition APA 7th Edition Chicago 17th Edition Harvard
"Woods, Stuart: OBSESSION." Kirkus Reviews, 15 Aug. 2023, p. NA. Gale General OneFile, link.gale.com/apps/doc/A760508375/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=bookmark-ITOF&xid=3fef3c6e. Accessed 11 Feb. 2024.