James Patterson has sold more than 425 million books worldwide. The Connection recently caught up with the prolific author to talk about his career.
A job working nights at a psychiatric hospital may be the reason we have James Patterson’s books to enjoy. After Patterson finished high school, he needed to raise money before attending Manhattan College in the Bronx on a four-year scholarship. Enter the psychiatric hospital, providing funds and an ample amount of free time, which he began to fill with books.
“When I was working there, I often had the 11pm to 7am shift, and I would just read, read, read. I got up to a novel a day,” Patterson says. “Then I just started scribbling these stories, and I loved it,” he continues. “Somebody said you’re lucky if you find something you like to do, and it’s a miracle if somebody will pay you to do it. I found something that I love to do.” For Patterson, who has written, co-written and published over 300 books, this may be the understatement of the century.
From ad man to novelist
After graduating from college, Patterson attended Vanderbilt University, where he earned a master’s degree in English, then headed into advertising at J Walter Thompson. When not at his advertising job, he began writing fiction. Patterson’s first book, The Thomas Berryman Number, was rejected 31 times before it was picked up by Little, Brown, where it won the prestigious Edgar Award given by the Mystery Writers of America.
Although buoyed by the success, Patterson remained in advertising. He continued to write books, but Patterson says they came up short. “None of them are very good. I really didn’t know what the hell I was doing.” Until, that is, the early 1990s.
His thriller Along Came a Spider was published in 1993, and the novel debuted at No. 9 on the New York Times hardcover bestseller list. Other Alex Cross books followed: Kiss the Girls in 1995, Jack and Jill in 1996, Cat and Mouse in 1997, and on and on. Many became bestsellers. The Patterson dynasty had begun.
Writer collaborations
Over the next three decades, while Patterson continued to pen his successful solo novels featuring Alex Cross, he also began something different: collaborating and co-authoring with other writers. “I just had a gazillion ideas,” he explains, and not enough time to write them all by himself. The first book was with his friend Peter De Jonge, called Miracle on the 17th Green.
Next came his Women’s Murder Club tomes, followed by countless others. Patterson explains his collaborations like this: “In 95 percent of the cases, I write a 50- to 70-page outline, and then I will ask the co-writer to contribute. One, because I want their ideas, and secondly, because it gets them emotionally involved in the thing if they bring some ideas to the party. I look at the stuff every two or three weeks. It’s not like publishers where a year later you bring the book, and they say that it wasn’t what they were thinking. I’ll either say, ‘You’re the best’ or ‘Hold it, we’re marching sideways here’ or the tone has been lost. It’s a lot easier to deal with two weeks of work.”
Although some have criticised this arrangement, Patterson doesn’t care. “For starters, in advertising, it’s all collaboration – you work with an art director and a producer. We’re used to collaborating. You’ll have six or 10 writers in a writers’ room for TV shows,” he explains. “It’s not as crazy as people think.”
Looking back
During the height of COVID-19, Patterson was stuck in his home in Palm Beach, Florida, for several months. “I started scribbling stories, and once I had the tone, I really enjoyed it,” he says. Those stories became his memoir, James Patterson, which was released in early 2022. He writes about his grandmother, who was a major force in his life and gave him the motto for his writing career: Hungry dogs run faster. But it also talks about his parents, his childhood, his time in school, attending Woodstock (“Everybody my age says that, but I was actually there,” he quips) and much more. “I’m really excited about it,” says Patterson. At this stage of his life, looking back, is there anything that he hasn’t done but would like to regarding writing? “I’ve had very successful books, but not like a Harry Potter. That would be fun,” he says. “I want to write the kind of novel that would be read and reread so many times that the binding breaks, and the book literally falls apart – pages scattering in the wind. I’m still working on that one. But it does drive me.”
“I want to write the kind of novel that would be read and reread so many times that the binding breaks...”
Giving back
Patterson and his wife Sue have become philanthropists, giving half of their money to charity. Together, they’ve helped fund more than 18,000 classroom libraries across the country. The Pattersons have recently announced a new program to get books to children who can’t afford to buy them.
"We try to make [our giving] about getting kids reading or getting teachers through school without too much debt," he explains. They have also given more than $50 million to their alma maters and established more than 450 scholarships for those studying to be teachers or writers. The Pattersons have also donated more than one million books to military troops.
