Recently, I traveled to Tennessee to work at a charity benefit at a women's expo. I was asked there to help with the children's literacy program in that state. Dolly Parton has a program in her home state that provides books to children free of charge, so I was happy to attend.

While I was attending a dinner for romance fans and writers I noticed a guy who looked like a fish in a sea of estrogen. Testosterone is in the minority at romance functions and he looked a bit lost. I went over to him and introduced myself. I appreciated that he didn't make a comment on the costume I was forced wear that made me look like a complete moron. They asked me to perform in an after dinner "whodunit" murder show. The guy looked like a preppy college English professor, with leather elbow patches on his blazer, wire rimmed glasses and long hair. The kind of professor that makes the coeds go gaw-gaw and take his class "just because he was hot". Turns out he was a rising suspense-thriller writer, Barry Eisler. He was there getting his feet wet meeting his fans and do a book signing the next day. Needless to say, the women were swarming all over him before long. Barry turned out to be a funny and gracious guy. He consented to let me introduce him to my readers.

CJ: I have to start with some of the obligatory questions, like your marital status, that sort of thing....Pets?

Barry: I'm married. We have an eight-year old daughter, and currently no pets. Although, recently I was subjected to an exquisitely-orchestrated two-prong emotional attack, lost my will to resist, and agreed that we could get a dog. I gather the canine acquisition will be happening soon.

CJ: Where did you meet your wife?

Barry: I met my wife when we were undergrads at Cornell.

CJ: Would she consider you romantic? ( Sorry, they make me ask these questions! It's on the first page of the "Romance Novel Cover Model Interviewer" handbook)

Barry: Would she consider me romantic? Sometimes...like when I make a move as we're getting ready to leave the house, and she says, "Barry, we need to leave in 5 minutes," and I say, "Cool, this will only take 3..." I mean, if that's not romantic, what is?

CJ: I'll supply the humor from now on if you don't mind, Barry! LOL What was the most romantic thing you've done for her?

Barry: I don't know if this will qualify (as though my response above would!), but on the night I proposed, I took Laura to a candlelit restaurant not far from where we were living at the time. A few minor things went wrong along the way, and she was getting uncharacteristically uptight. I said "Hey, relax, what's the big deal?" She said "I have a feeling you might...ask me something tonight, and I wanted everything to be perfect." I laughed and said, "Don't worry, I'm not going to ask you anything." It worked! She relaxed and she had a great time. And she was actually surprised later in the evening when I broke out the ring...

CJ: Awwwwwwwwww... Yea, I think that would make you a "romantic", dude. What was your major in college?

Barry: I majored in psychology, but by the time I graduated I was taking mostly history and literature classes. I got interested in the intelligence world when I was in law school ('86-'89). At the time there was no Internet (can you believe that?), so I went to the Cornell Career Center, picked up a brochure , and called a number. One thing lead to another...

CJ: You worked for the CIA. What made you leave, and if you tell me will you have to kill me?

Barry: I got irritated with the shenanigans of one of my "superiors" and expressed my disdain for him...with a certain degree of physically. Rather than deal with our confrontation directly, he complained to the higher-ups (See, not all CIA types are as tough as you would imagine). They told me they might not be able to send me to Japan on schedule. So, I said "No problem, I'll find my own way to Japan." and I did. It was a good outcome and a good experience.

CJ: How long have you been writing?

Barry: I've been writing something or other since I was a kid. I used to spend a couple weeks every summer at my grandparents' house on the Jersey shore. I would bang out short stories about vampires and werewolves on my grandmothers' typewriter. Glad no records have been kept.

CJ: You really should have kept them. Vampire and werewolf novels are "in" and very popular now. How did you start writing?

Barry: I have a long-standing interest in what I like to think of as "forbidden knowledge:" methods of unarmed killing, lock picking, breaking and entering, spy stuff and other things the government wants only a few select individuals to know. When I was a kid I read a biography of Harry Houdini, an in the book a cop was quoted as saying "It's fortunate that Houdini never turned to a life of crime, because if he had he would have been difficult to catch and impossible to hold." Anyway, since then I amassed a small and unusual library on some of the foregoing and on other esoteric subjects, I spent 3 years in the CIA, I got pretty into a variety of martial arts....

And then I moved to Tokyo to train in Judo. While I was commuting to work one morning, a vivid image came to me of two men following another man down Dogenzaka street in Shibuya. I still don't know where the images came from, but I started thinking about it. Who were these men? Why were they following the other guy? Then, the answers started to come: They were assassins. They're going to kill him. What will he do? It felt like a story, somehow, so I started to writing, and that was the birth of John Rain and my first book, Rain Fall.

CJ: How long did it take you to get published?

Barry: I guess it took 8 years to get my first book published, counting the initial idea to first sale of rights. I've been writing a new book every year. I'm on #7 now, and I'm pleased to say I think each is better than the one before it.

CJ: What do you like about writing?

Barry: That's a tough one because there are so many aspects that I love: the research, including reading, travel, and interviews with experts; the writing itself; the revising and polishing. I love the mystery of trying to express a feeling , and seeing that it's not quite right, it's not quite right...and then, bam, that's it! Exactly, what I was going for. Where did those words, where did that recognition, come from? Is there some template inside my mind against which I'm measuring the output? I don't know...

CJ: How do you develop your characters or like so many authors have told me "they write themselves?"

Barry: Ask a lot of questions... When I have an idea for a character, I ask, what does this person want? What does she think she wants? What is she afraid of? What were her formative experiences? What is her view of the world? Etc. If you stay with these questions, answers will start to come, and compelling, three-dimensional characters will begin to emerge. And, of course when I'm unsure of something as what a woman would wear of how she might behave in certain circumstances, I always check with my wife and woman friends. I love my research!

CJ: Is there any romance or do you just stick to sex?

Barry: Oh, there's plenty of both. In fact I'm surprised that there's so little sex in most thrillers and have taken it upon myself to single-handedly correct this terrible deficit...

CJ: You go Boy! How do you write the sex scenes?

Barry: As for the scenes themselves, mostly I prefer more of a full monty approach, driven as I am by my enduring inner 14-year old. But, here's the rule of thumb, I think, at least when your inner 14-year old isn't calling the shots: does it matter only *that* the characters had sex? Or does it matter *how* they had sex? If the only thing that matters is the fact of the sex itself, showing it is unnecessary and will add nothing to the story. But, if the characters make love is what matters to the story, then not only should you show it, you actually have to show it, or the story will suffer.

Regardless if they are going to be effective, the sex scenes have to drive the plot. In fact, in a good book there shouldn't be a single scene that can be removed without unraveling the story, you didn't need the thread in the first place-and there's no exception to this rule for sex scenes.

In romance, readers expect good sex scenes, so romance writers have more of a tendency to make the scene the objective and work backwards to plot and character. I tend to think of sex as just another action scene. But, regardless of how you arrive at any scene, sex, action, you name it, that scene has to be both the catalyst for other forces in the story. In other words, it ought to be some kind of turning point: emotionally, thematically or logistically.

I'll tell you something else I love about writing sex scenes- the chance to really imagine being someone else.....

CJ: I'd like to be Brad Pitt for a while....Do you always write the scenes from a male perspective?

Barry: Up until "Requiem For An Assassin", which is the sixth Rain book, all my books were from the male POV. By my fourth book, "Killing Rain", I started adding segments from the POV's of other characters. In "Requiem", I realized the reader could best understand the changes in Rains' character, and chemistry that bound him to Delilah, if those changes were told from Delilah's POV. Naturally enough, that lead to a sex scene from Delilah's perspective. Writing it was awesome!

CJ: How did you do the research?

Barry: The research was a blast: a lot of imagination, a lot of Q & A sessions with my wife, a lot of "I get paid to do this?!" moments. And the result for me was one of the hottest scenes in all the Rain books.

CJ: I may want to talk to your wife! Are there any aspects of YOU in John Rain?

Barry: Well, I used to be a lawyer, which a lot of people say is like being an assassin...

CJ: I have some friends who are lawyers, so I will plead the fifth on that....Any other qualities?

Barry: There are some similarities. We both love jazz and judo. But the differences might be more telling. Rain has had some experiences I haven't, chiefly war, combat, and killing. As a result, he's far more capable with violence than I, and also a good deal more cynical.

CJ: Seriously? You've never killed anybody? Well, you're still young. You've got time. I'm sure there's been an editor/publisher in the past you'd like to have whacked...Moving on...If your Rain books were made into movies, who would you like to play the lead?

Barry: Well, the role is difficult, because Rain is both completely American and completely Japanese. But, I do think either Sanada Hiroyuki or Ken Watanabe from The Last Samurai could do a great job. So could Keanu Reeves. Both would have to work on their American accents and Reeves would have to learn Japanese.

CJ: Help a brother out and write a long haired, blonde guy character in your next Rain book. He could be John Rain's hot, comic sidekick. Think about it....OK, back to SEX...Where do you get your "inspiration" for you sex scenes in your books?

Barry: Probably it's what excites me and what makes sense for the characters. I couldn't or wouldn't want to write a sex scene that I didn't find exciting. It's funny how controversial some of my sex scenes have been.

CJ: Now we're getting somewhere! Controversy always sells books. Do tell!

Barry: I try to tell people it's not me - it's the character - but people view things through their own preconceptions. The strange thing is, Rain kills a lot of people in these books- some with guns, some with knives, some with his hands and no one batted an eyelash about any of that. Count on the sex scenes to arouse people's passions, I guess....

CJ: How was your experience in Tennessee at the women's expo? Do you do a lot of book signings?

Barry: It was great! Can't wait for the next one. I do more events than most authors, I think - typically twenty or so formal signings during the tour, and two or three hundred informals, and then eight or ten library events and conventions throughout the year.

CJ: Are you planning to come to the RT convention in Pittsburgh this year? I know the women will love you. I saw how they got around you in Tennessee. You may need a bodyguard!

Barry: Absolutely! It's my first one (RT convention) and I'm really looking forward to it.

CJ: Well, I guess I will see you there then! Barry, you have been great! Thanks so much for doing this interview. The first drink is on me in Pittsburgh!

Barry's web address is www.barryeisler.com and he also has a discussion board at www.barryeisler.com/forum Check him out......