"I’ve always seen fiction as a mug’s game. . .
". . .There’s so much competition and the odds against becoming published are so slim that I had to give it a try."*
Writer Quentin Bates and his fictional hero, Sergeant Gunna Gisladottir, have similar senses of humor.
The Gunnhildur (Gunna) Gisladottir Mystery Books, set in Iceland, are Bates's first admitted foray into fiction. (He's been a journalist with a nautical magazine for the past decade.) He made the switch after Iceland's financial meltdown because the crisis was such a good source of dramatic stories (and motives for murder).
In his impressionable youth, UK born Bates spent a decade in Iceland, after which he moved back to the UK with an Icelandic family and an appreciation for salt fish. Before finding his way to writing for a living, Bates worked as a netmaker, factory hand, trawlerman, truck driver, teacher and fisherman.
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*from the author's website http://graskeggur.com