The final installment of The 39 Clues author interviews

We’re back for one last epic interview with 39 Clues fan favorite author and interviewer, Jude Watson. Jude is an author of six 39 Clues books and has been interviewing the next three authors in The 39 Clues: Doublecross series this week. If you missed the past two author interviews, you can check out the interview with C. Alexander London here and Jenny Goebel here. Today Jude will be interviewing Sarwat Chadda, the author of the fourth book in The 39 Clues: Doublecross series arc.

Take it away Jude and Sarwat!

Greetings, OOM Readers!

Word is out and the dancing in school libraries everywhere has commenced. Coming next March is The 39 Clues: Doublecross, the latest installment in the adrenaline-charged adventures of the Cahill family.

I’m Jude Watson, a veteran 39 Clues author, and I’m writing the first book in the Doublecross series. I’m here today to introduce Sarwat Chadda, author of the Ash Mistry books, who will write the fourth and final installment of DOUBLECROSS. Sarwat, I hope you’re ready for the hotseat.

You live in the UK. Does this mean that Ian Kabra is your favorite character? Do you consider yourself “Brit fuff-fuff?”

I might as well admit I belong to the Lucian branch so yes, Ian Kabra is a man after my own heart. After all, we are both extremely good-looking and have impeccable fashion sense.

Brit fuff-fuff? If that means having lightning-speed wits, a demeanor of Arctic coolness, and always, always, knowing which piece of cutlery to use when eating oysters then yes, I am ‘Brit fuff-fuff.’

Brit fuff-fuff. What an awful term.

Can you tell us a bit about the Ash Mistry series? Do you think it has prepared you to write The 39 Clues?

When doing research for the Ash books I visited India, Tibet, Nepal, and Hong Kong. Previously I’ve been to Russia and into the prehistoric caves of Lascaux.

I love writing about strange and exotic places but want to make sure, as best I can, the reader gets the true flavor of what those places are like. And the best way to do that is to go there and walk the streets your characters will walk. It gives you a total immersion into the world and allows you to add those small details that can transform a story. It can be as little as an unusual smell or sound or the way smoke drifts across an alleyway. It can bring in the magic.

You’ve been a world traveler who has visited Mongolia, Nepal, Guatemala, and Brooklyn. Which would you rather be, a writer or a spy?

Why not both? It worked for Ian Fleming, Arthur Ransome, and it’s well known (in spy circles) that the code hidden in The Cat in the Hat by Dr. Suess helped defeat Hitler.

There are plenty of modern writers who are also spies. I could tell you who they are, but then I’d have to kill you.

Who, or what, influenced your love of reading and writing?

The list is long, long, long. One of my earliest memories of school is being read the Hobbit. Day after day the teacher would read the next chapter while we all sat on the floor, totally captivated by Bilbo, the trolls, the dwarves, and the great Smaug. I really do think that teacher was the person who put me on the path to becoming a writer. Certainly inspired my reading. I love comics and have a great passion for superheroes.

The list of authors who created my love of reading and desire to write is long, but here are a few: Tolkien, Moorcock, Philip Reeve, Philip Pullman, John Connolly, Robert E. Howard, Bernard Cornwell, Richmal Crompton, to name but a few.

Can you keep a secret? If not, can you reveal anything you might know about the new DOUBLECROSS series?

It will be insanely AWESOME. What more do you need to know?

Which are more fun to write about, heroes or villains?

Villains. But the best villains are people who, except for one fault, could have been great heroes. And the best heroes are the ones who know if they slip up or stray off the path, will become the very things they fight against. Grey is a better place to create in than black or white.

You were once chased by a rhino. Do you intend to incorporate wild animals in The 39 Clues?

Hmm, I don’t really want to give the game away but I have only just had an experience of fighting a wild animal that will probably end up somewhere in the book.

That said, I have also recently been up a volcano and as every writer knows, you shouldn’t waste a good volcano…

Thanks for joining us 39 Clues fans. We’ve had a blast learning more about more about writing and which branch each author belongs to. The countdown to Doublecross begins!