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Thriller Author Michael Wallace On The Righteous Series interviewed by J.F.Penn

729 views · Published 12 July 2013 · 31:59 · Indexed 24 October 2026

Channel: The Creative Penn · 2013 · Education

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Sometimes you find a series that you can't put down, and for me, The Righteous books by Michael Wallace fall into this category!
I love books that weave thriller stories into a fascinating religious background, and Wallace's polygamist cult of Blister Creek is a brilliant setting for the violent adventures of Jacob and Eliza Christianson.In this interview I talk to Michael about the series. 
http://michaelwallaceauthor.com/righteous.html
In the interview, we discuss:

    How Michael got started writing, and how his Mum put an early dinosaur book on the shelf at the local library. An early inspiration to be a writer! He's had unusual 'day jobs', worked as a programmer for simulators on nuclear submarines as well as owning an inn in Vermont.

    The Righteous series is set in a polygamist cult in the deserts of southern Utah. Michael grew up in a small town in Utah, raised in a mainstream Mormon family, so he has a lot of background in that history. It's roughly based on some groups that do exist, but is a fictionalized world. There are doubters in the community, as well as many sympathetic characters, plus some brilliant bad guys!

    Michael talks about his own feelings about spirituality and how they are mirrored a little in Jacob's doubts. Personally, I find the books respectful of people with faith, but also raises questions about belief, which makes the books even more interesting to read.

    The family situations are very complicated in the books, weaving two major families with many inter-relations. The main protagonists are Jacob and Eliza, siblings, which is unusual in thrillers. Michael comes from a very large extended family so that is his own background, but the relationships of a small community also bring complications, which adds conflict to the books. The two characters also span the worlds of the male side and the female side of the patriarchal system, with a rising feminism in the books.

    Thriller readers won't be disappointed in the conflicts between the families, which spills over into a lot of violence, murder and mayhem! This isn't just happy Mormon families in the desert :) Michael talks about Miriam, who infiltrated the community as an FBI agent, but soon became enmeshed into Blister Creek and becomes a pivotal character, always ready to use a gun.

    The apocalypse and a hint of what's in store for the next book, coming in 2014.

Michael talks about his other books -- he has techno-thrillers, historical novels and he also mentions The Devil's Deep series, which involves crimes related to Locked In Syndrome. [Fascinating!]

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