The Operation Guardian Angel Military Thriller Series:
Interview with the Author
Question:
Your series could be classified as a historical novel. You deal with many characters and events from the past in the novel. How true to history are they?
Author:
There are a great many historical individuals of the 1960 and 1970s in this novel series, from Bobby Rayford, Saloth Sar, Prince Hasan as-Senussi, President Nixon’s Cabinet members, to the Soviet Union Politburo executive members. Quite a bit of time went into researching the actual historical characters portrayed in the novel. Also, great attention was given to keeping the correct chronological order of the events, technology, and surroundings in the novel. Obviously, the historical accuracy is altered once the OGA team enters the scene and changes things.
In the chapter where Alvarez and his team are in Kampala to assassinate Major Chernoff and General Amin, the Mulago Hospital and the National Stadium are actual buildings of that time. Using a late 1960s aerial map of the Kampala, I determined that it would be possible for a skilled sniper to shoot from the Mulago Hospital, situated on a hilltop, into the outdoor Nation Stadium. President Obote’s non-tribal cousin actually did head the Ugandan GSU secret police, and General Idi Amin’s love of rugby are all accurate.
Donald Gaskins, the gruesome serial killer, was real.
The television announcer dialogue in the Munich Olympiad and the Superbowl XIII scenes are verbatim.
Initially, I planned to have many of the actual historical photographs of the characters, events, and military equipment as they appeared in the OGA books, but unfortunately, it was not possible due to the cost that would have been incurred in the Amazon publishing format.
Chernoff, Senator Peterson, Abdul, and the OGA team are fictional.
As a baby boomer, I grew up in the 1960s and was familiar with these characters and events in the novel. Also, having lived as an American in Caracas, Venezuela until the age of 15, I was exposed to much of the international events of the time. Readers of a younger age will be introduced to this interesting part of history and people that they were most likely previously unaware of.
Many years ago I began thinking about how so many of today’s world’s intractable geopolitical problems could have been averted if things had gone differently in the past. If there was time travel into the past, what changes would fix today’s persistent problems? How would a team of professionals prevent such events as the 911 attack and its resulting quagmire, the AIDS pandemic, the Islamic Revolution in Iran, the Palestinian Homeland crisis, and many more? The question was, what changes would have actually had a reasonable chance of success to make for a good and long-lasting outcome? Of course, the assassination of tyrants was one solution, but much thought was given to new ingenious methods, such as the OGA solution to the Palestinian state, the Iranian monarchy, and Iraq’s ethnic divisions. It is interesting to note that I had already written in this novel about a self-proclaimed Caliph and his formation of an Islamic State, much before it actually happened in the present day. Also, the idea of going back in time to preempt the global devastating disease of HIV/AIDS certainly would be appropriate, back-dropped with the recent terrible Covid-19 pandemic.
Question:
What inspired you to write this novel?
Author: I would surf through the movies and shows on TV and couldn’t find anything I found captivating. It seemed like a great many of them were repeats of old shows and there weren’t many new ideas. I missed the originality of the stories I’d found in books such as the Tom Clancy and Michael Crichton novels. I felt that I had a better story brewing in my mind than what I was seeing on screen. I had never written any kind of novel before but I decided to put my ideas down on paper. I googled a chronological list of all of the significant global historical events that happened during the 1960s and 1970s. After picking out from stock photos what I envisioned my characters to look like, I wrote down their personal history and characteristics. Then, I just started writing the story down. I put in the elements and diverse layers that I liked in a story— global history, interesting characters, action, military technology, adventure, sex, time travel, diverse cultures, and world geography.
I tried to think what U.S. government strategists would want to do if this type of one-way time travel into the past was possible. I feel that this novel would be a good template for missions if presented with this technological opportunity.
After my initial draft of the story, I read a lot of books and took seminars on writing novels, learning more about character development, plot structure, punctuation, and all the elements that go into writing a good novel—and there’s a lot. Then I edited the novel, and re-edited, and . . . re-edited. I then had it professionally edited twice, and continued to re-edit (which is unfortunately how writing goes).
What most people don’t realize is that it takes guts to write a novel, especially one that covers topics such as different historical and ethnic positions, religion, military procedure, sex, etc. The author and the novel get opened up to potential criticism from all angles and for different reasons. But, aside from the considerable thought and research put into the writing, it is, after all, just a fictional story to enjoy . . . or to not indulge in. Life is short and one can’t always worry about what others might think, otherwise one gets regretfully frozen into inaction, and potential creation never happens.
Question:
That leads to the next question—the explicit sex in this novel series. They’re pretty steamy and avant-garde. I imagine they could be classified as erotic romance. Aren’t you pushing the limits somewhat there?
Author:
I must say I was hesitant to publish this novel and concerned about offending certain people due to some intense sex scenes in the series. While the books are listed with Amazon as adult content, to be sold only to 18 years and older, I went a step further. To inform prospective readers that might be adverse to this, right off the bat in the Notations and Acknowledgements page, I made it a point to make known that the book series contained explicit adult content. That way, the prospective reader has been forewarned and can elect to proceed with the novel or not.
Well, back to the evolution of writing the sex scenes. After starting this endeavor, I read a lot of books about writing novels. One book emphasized that an exciting novel should deliver “powerful emotional experiences.” This is especially critical in the military thriller and action-adventure fiction genres. I set out to deliver that “experience.”
Part of the novel deals with the romantic relationship between Ricardo Alvarez and Christy Peterson. Their initial connection is mainly sexual—intensely sexual, as happens in many new couples, especially with driven and very physical individuals. Their fiery relationship and daring personalities are expressed in their intense visceral passionate lovemaking. They live aggressive, dangerous, and intense lives—forged by indelible experiences and knowing that tomorrow they could be gone.
After writing one of the early drafts of Book 1, I had a test reader review it. I asked him what he thought of an Alvarez/Christy sex scene, which was not at all as intense and erotic as it is now. He said, “It was okay.” “Okay” is not okay, when writing a novel. Obviously, I had not fulfilled the “powerful emotional experience.” So, I set out to make it so. I read romance writing books and actually had help in writing the sex scenes from a woman who writes romance novels. It’s actually quite difficult to write a great passionate scene, even more so several—each individual scene has to be somewhat unique and has to be more intense than the previous to keep it interesting and exciting. Otherwise, it’s dull and redundant. The scenes have to be written with both the female and the male reader in mind. Also, nobody wants to read about ordinary sex—the reader wants to be vicariously immersed into something they don’t get at home—steamy, passionate, dark-side, over-the-top visceral fantasy sex. This requires explicit content gives searing intensity to the relationships of the couples and the story-line.
After numerous rewrites, I had a second professional editor, a woman, review the series. She commented that the sex scenes in the book were some of the best that she had ever read. Sex and romance sell, as evidenced by the fact that romance novels are the largest segment of the book industry—about the size of the mystery novel genre and science fiction/fantasy genre markets combined. This novel is an action adventure, not just in its military content but also in its romantic content. While romance novels are mostly written for women, and many can get pretty steamy, there is no equivalent for men—I figured that I’d make an ambitious pioneering attempt to do that.
Also, I found as one gets married, has children, grows older, and finds that life is too busy, there’s a strong reminiscing and yearning for the wonderful blissful romance and rapturous passionate sex we had as carefree young adults, which we will never have again. The steamy scenes allow the reader to vicariously experience that lost intense passion. I think that this is why romance novels are so popular, especially with women. Interestingly, I found that of my test readers for my novel, the older women enjoyed the sex scenes the most, even more so than the men. I guess that’s good, since seventy percent of the book-reading population are women.
For a long while, I was hesitant to release the series, concerned about negative public opinion. I considered watering down the sex scenes or eliminating some altogether, but that would have gutted much of the passionate and visceral experience of the novel. I decided to have the courage to put my work out there. Obviously, there will be some readers where the boldness of this writing style will be too much out of their comfort zones, and they can easily elect not to read it. It should be as simple as that.
But, before we leave this issue, I’ve always had a problem with the way society, certainly American society, views sex in movies and books. Why is it okay to show the viewing public absolute evil carnage, murder, and mayhem, like in slasher movies, but, showing sex is considered taboo? Is American society telling us that it’s okay to murder and mutilate each other, but God forbid that something as wonderful and natural as lovemaking be explicitly shown or described?
Actually, less than nine percent of the novel consists of sex scenes, and yet, I wouldn’t be surprised if this comprehensive multi-topical story gets labeled as just a pornographic novel due to these uniquely intense, controversial scenes. The upside, however, I guess, is that a controversial avant-garde writing often gets chatted about and then becomes noticed. Fifty Shades of Gray is an example of that.
Question:
There are some disturbing violence upon women scenes. This is a very sensitive subject matter and is very discouraged in present-day writing.
Author:
First of all, this novel depicts the dark, brutal, cruel world of infamous individuals that the OGA team is tasked with terminating. It’s not written to be a study in political correctness. The story is written to be realistic. Rape and violence against women and men were a very real thing in history, especially in the savagery of the third world setting. Many of the vile characters in this novel are taken from actual characters. These monsters routinely tortured, murdered, maimed, and raped people. Their deeds shouldn’t be sugar-coated. Violence against women is a terrible crime. It shouldn’t be hidden as if it doesn’t occur. That does a disservice to those affected. Tragically, such is the real nature of this dark and evil world. Interesting to note, however, is that the brutal violence and torture that occurs against the men in the novel won’t draw much attention or protest.
Question:
Much of your novel is dark. What does that say about your own psyche?
Author:
Heck, Steven King’s stuff is very dark, but I don’t see him going out and eating children. At least I hope not.
While I’ve always been captivated by military history and tactics, which glorifies death and destruction, I would find it very difficult to harm another person—I don’t even like to fish because it’s violent to the innocent creature. I strongly believe that the male gender is genetically hardwired to be fascinated with warfare, which is definitely evidenced by mankind’s persistent history of it. At least man seems to have progressively tempered his unrestrained inhumanity toward his fellow man with the passing of time, albeit unconscionably slowly. Thankfully, we are a long way from when Genghis Khan ruthlessly murdered 66 million people in his megalomaniac quest for glory.
Question:
Why did you decide to use shorter books in the series instead of a few larger books?
Author:
Initially, the series was three books. But, as I continued my edits, the book content expanded and I needed to form a fourth book. I looked over the most appropriate and impactful places to end one book and to start another in the series and came up with six books. They are all about 200 pages long, except the last one which is longer.
Question:
Do you have any other comments about this novel?
Author:
Sure, a movie director acquaintance of mine once told me, “When writing good fiction, make it credible.” I feel that I did that. Everything in the novel, except of course, the time travel, is plausible. Obviously, time travel is an essential part of the story. And, when thinking about time travel, it makes sense that it would be only possible to go into the past and that it be a one-way ticket. If one could create a black hole, then it would conceivable that it could be accomplished as it was done in the novel and have the side effects as described.
Military veterans, please forgive me if I’ve made any errors in the military equipment or anything, since I’ve not served in the military. But, I have tried to be accurate with the knowledge that I have and did have some military experts to help edit sections of the books. I was honored to have a USAF helicopter pilot, a US Army tank commander, and a USAF F-15 instructor review pertinent chapters.
Also, I may have made other mistakes in the novel, such as possibly in the grammar of the different languages. Please feel free to leave comments at richjonesauthor2021@gmail.com or on this website’s blog so that I can correct any errors.
Question:
So, are you working on any other novels?
Author:
Actually, I’ve got other two novel series that I’m working on. Each is a completely different story. Now that I’m retired from my full-time work, I’ll be able to work on them more consistently.
One novel series is titled “Visitor.”—Duran, a laid-off NSA analyst for the White House, now working temporarily as a newspaper investigator reporter in Miami gets befriended by an immensely wealthy Frenchman who has just returned to his home in Miami, Florida after a long departure. When visiting the Frenchman’s old mansion on Key Biscayne Island, Duran is astonished by the vast collection of actual historical artifacts inside. Duran finds out that this man is much more than he could have imagined. Both become deeply immersed into the escalating probability of a World War 3.
The other novel series is titled “Bronze.”—Early bronze age Athenian Captain Iris is in charge of an expedition to resupply a struggling remote mining village on the western coast of the Greek peninsula. However, the world is a very harsh and hostile one . . . because the dominant species that rule the earth are the dinosaurs, which never died off during the previous geologic periods.