John Connolly

They just pop off the perch.

Who died?

You died.

Well, I'm not planning on it.

You'll feel really bad if something happens to me when I leave now.

Yeah, I could have bought a book, you know.

So I think what happens is generally writers of series just die.

And if they're successful enough, the publishers will engage some hack to write his or her name in tiny little letters on the bottom and hope nobody's noticed that you're dead.

But I've always thought that the Parker books kind of represented chapters in a larger narrative.

And I would like to finish that narrative.

The challenge for writers is how to finish that without alienating readers.

Yeah.

depriving them of characters that they've loved and giving them an ending that's appropriate.

And so that's what I'm aiming for.

Yes, unless I said some piano falls on my head as I leave here, which my last words will be to curse you, Clare Byrne.

True, but the books remain.

you know, the books will be there.

Oh, no, I don't.

Nobody does.

No, that's absolutely it.