| clerk's eye view |
BY SUZETTE LALIME | Brad Meltzer, author of "The Tenth Justice," has packed a lot in for a first-time novelist who is 27 years old. Before entering law school, Meltzer was a speech writer for Americorps, President Clinton's national service program. He wrote "The Tenth Justice" while at Columbia Law School and sold the film rights before he graduated. Salon caught up with Meltzer in San Francisco. So how much of this book is based on the real Supreme Court? I had to do a lot of research at the court and a lot of talking to Supreme Court clerks. You can't even write in the court. I had to break pencils in half and write little notes on Post-It notes to get the physical description. I found a Supreme Court clerk who was willing to talk. I gave her the plot and said, "Tell me what you think." There was this long pause on the other line, and she said, "The scariest thing is that it could happen." Then I knew I had a viable plot, that realism is the most terrifying thing you could do. Are the Supreme Court justices in your book based on the real judges? There are two conservative justices who lead the court, so you make your own parallels from there, and there is a new justice who is always trying to impress the older ones. I just played with different stories and stuff I had heard throughout the years of how justices interact. The clerks could give you some information on it, so I tried to use that. When you started writing, did you start with an image or a premise? Did you know the solution first and work backwards? I started with a premise. I was sitting in class and -- it was like a lightning bolt from God -- I wrote "supreme court, clerk." I circled it in my calendar and I wrote "book idea" on top. That was all I had. When I start a book, I spend about the first two to three months working on the characters. In my mind, the minutiae of life is what makes us who we are. I write down silly little details about them: what foods they are allergic to, what bones they have broken -- these details that will probably not show up in the book. So once those characters tell me who they are, I can really start a skeletal plot around them. I have to know the ending any time I start, because if you don't know where you are going, then you are not in control of your novel. I rarely sit down and say, "I'll just write and see what happens." Some people can do that. For me, I am not in control of that scene. When my wife reads those scenes, she always says, "I don't like this part," and she just happens to pick out the parts where I do that. You have your protagonist, Ben, and his roommates use their positions in ethically questionable ways. I think the characters are human. What they do at their jobs wasn't meant to show any kind of conspiracy in the government. It was meant to say that we all make human mistakes. Ben's mistake at the beginning of the book is a very human one; we have all been in the situation where we wish we could take it back. We have all had a moment where we have wanted to impress, to say something so someone would think more highly of us. His friends are just doing something to help him. Does it play with the system? Yes. Should you use a pen-signing machine to help your friend's investigation? No. But would you? I think a lot of people would. Ben and his roommates are also highly competitive with each other. In my mind, we all have friends: old friends who we know and who know us, friends who we've just met and we are not sure if we can trust them yet. And, like it or not, we all have competitive friendships. I think they exist more than people like to admit. Most people don't like to talk about it -- it's taboo. Sometimes you don't love your friends as much as you say you do, or sometimes you go head to head with a friend. The book is about how friends interact. The question of the book, to me, in many ways is, "Do you trust your friends when push comes to shove?" That is a hard question, harder than people admit, sometimes. Did you read a lot of other thrillers to prepare -- John Grisham? Scott Turow? I don't read much while I write, because I feel it gets in the way of my creative process. I want to keep my voice as true as I can, as original as I can. So I switch genres and read a lot of Neil Gaiman, who did the "Sandman" series. And Alan Moore. What movie thrillers are you attracted to? I think in many ways I am probably more influenced by Albert Brooks and Woody Allen than I am by any writers because that is just how I was brought up. If I had to name favorite movies, I'd say "Annie Hall" is one of my all-time favorites. "Heathers." "Raising Arizona." Neil Simon is much more my voice than others whom I have read, even though that is a different genre. With thrillers, everything is in the execution, and sadly, so many thrillers today are executed poorly, very blah. I definitely like a well-written comedy/drama that fleshes out some good characters. That is what appeals to me. You're a new, young writer -- do you think your book is in danger of having a "flavor of the month" moment and then disappearing? I don't dabble in literary circles. I don't really want to be a part of that. I am 27 years old, my editor is 31 years old. You are kind of asking people to kick you in the head a bit. My belief is: You put out the best work that you can, don't worry about what anyone writes. If you are honest with your reader, you don't lie to your reader, and you don't insult your reader's intelligence, then the rest will take care of itself. I had a review from a Supreme Court clerk, which was very interesting. She went on a tirade on the little details that I got wrong, even though I thought a lot of them were right. She said, "You should know that Supreme Court clerks do not have antique desks, they have government-issue desks." If I got that one wrong, it is all hers -- she's right, I am wrong. What was it like to write speeches for Clinton about Americorps? I wrote for Americorps itself. I co-wrote the oath of service, that Clinton actually delivered, you know, "Raise your right hand ..." And it is very exciting to be in a part of government that is actually trying to do something different. They are my words, but they are said by someone else. Writing speeches is not nearly as exciting as writing a novel, as taking a character, watching them develop, grow, make mistakes and learn. Everyone says, "Why doesn't Clinton write his own stuff? He is the president, he should." He does. He speaks off the cuff. For the big flowing speeches, you want something good. Getting the facts right also takes a lot of research. Sometimes that fact-gathering is just as important as the big, flowing grand stuff. It is just not as sexy.
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