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Book Shop Chats:
Welcome to Book Shop Chats, your go to podcast for indie authors and learning insight into what it takes to write a book (HINT: You can do it too!!)
Join authors as they share their personal journeys, successes, and challenges, providing you with unique insights into the writing process. The discussions explore into various aspects of storytelling, from character development to plot structuring, ensuring you have a well-rounded understanding of the craft.
Whether you're just starting out or have published multiple works, this podcast is your companion in the pursuit of storytelling excellence. Tune in, gather inspiration, and let your passion for writing flourish alongside a community that celebrates the art of the written word.
Book Shop Chats:
Behind the Pages: Legal Drama to Literary Debut with Victor Suthammanont
Victor Suthammanont shares his journey from aspiring playwright to debut novelist with "Hollow Spaces," a dual-timeline thriller about a man acquitted of murder and his children who, decades later, attempt to determine his true guilt or innocence.
• Former actor and current lawyer who balanced creative writing throughout his career
• Drew inspiration from a New York Times article about a man whose life was ruined despite being acquitted of murder
• Explores intergenerational trauma and what we inherit from our parents
• Writing process involves "pantsing" (discovery writing) for most of the book before outlining the final quarter
• Discusses how anger often masks sadness, particularly in men
• Writing requires perseverance through constant rejection
• Advises new writers to treat their journey as "a marathon, not a sprint"
• Finds joy in crafting sentences and discovering unexpected narrative directions
Book Blurb:
The sole Asian American partner at a prestigious law firm sees his professional and personal life demolished when he is put on trial for murder. Three decades later, his children reunite to uncover the truth and try to salvage what remains of their family.
Thirty years ago, John Lo, the only Asian American partner at a prestigious New York City law firm, was acquitted of the murder of an employee he was having an affair with. The repercussions of that long-ago event still haunt his adult children. Brennan, a lawyer following in her father’s footsteps in more ways than one, has always maintained that the trial got it right. Hunter, a disgruntled war correspondent whose similarities to his father run more than skin-deep, believes their father got away with murder. Their convictions have pushed them apart. Now, spurred on by their mother’s failing health, the estranged siblings decide to reconcile their differences by reinvestigating the murder to come to a definitive conclusion, and, in the process, salvage what’s left of their fragmented family.
Told in a dual timeline that moves between John’s perspective thirty years prior and Brennan and Hunter’s present-day investigation, Hollow Spaces is a moving portrait of a flawed man’s shocking fall from grace and a gripping exploration of race in corporate America, filial loyalty, ambition, and the fallout of a sensational trial for those caught in its wake.
About Victor:
I am a writer who practices law in New York City. I write literary/upmarket and crime fiction. My debut novel, Hollow Spaces, is scheduled to be published by Counterpoint Press on August 5, 2025. I am also the author of the Audible Original Little Surrenders.
I was raised in Jersey City, New Jersey, and attended St. Peter’s Preparatory School, where I was, among other things, the editor of the literary magazine and a varsity swimmer. I attended New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts, where I studied at the Atlantic Theater Company Acting School. While at NYU, I wrote, produced, and directed an off-off-Broadway play, as well as performed stand-up comedy.
LINKS
Website
About Victoria:
Hey there, I’m Victoria! As a writer and developmental editor, I specialize in helping busy writers bring their publishing dreams to life without the overwhelm. Editing doesn’t have to feel like pulling teeth—it's the magic that transforms your story from “meh” to masterpiece!
Here’s how I can help:
📖 FREE Manuscript Prep Workbook: Take the stress out of editing with simple steps to organize your revisions.
Grab it HERE
📝 Developmental Editing: Get ex
Oh hey, it's Victoria from Victoria Jane Editorial and your host of Bookshop Chats. This podcast is all about authors, writing and the magic that goes into storytelling. We cover all of the things that go into writing a book, from the creative process, from taking your idea to a first draft, creating and cultivating community within the author space, marketing all of the fun things. If you are a reader, a wannabe writer or an author, you will find tips and tricks that suit whatever level you are at. So I hope that you enjoy and you are unfortunately, or fortunately, going to find many more books to add to your TBR, so I will invite you to sit back and listen to the episode. Welcome back to Bookshop Chats. In today's episode, I am chatting with Victor Tsunamaton. I think I kind of got close.
Speaker 1:I tried very hard. No, it's so hard I just I try so hard and it's close. I tried very hard, it's so hard. I just I try so hard and it's. Yeah. I'm very sorry, but I'm very excited to chat with you today and here, yeah, and just kind of get to know about you and your book and all of the, all the things.
Speaker 2:I'm glad to be here and thank you very much.
Speaker 1:Amazing, awesome. So we are just to dive right in, and I am very, very excited to hear all about your debut novel that is coming out in August of this year. So, yes, I would love to like just give you the floor. Not that that's not scary at all, right?
Speaker 2:I'm happy to talk about it. The novel is Hollow Spaces. It's about an Asian American partner at a law firm who's quitted of a murder charge and what happens to him after that and then, three decades later, his children. You know, one thinks he is innocent and one thinks he did it. He's guilty. You know they come together and try to solve the crime and it tells those two stories side by side in a dual timeline.
Speaker 1:I love that. I feel like that's such a yeah, just a unique kind of perspective. I always find it so fascinating to hear about, like these stories that authors kind of come up with and, yeah, just how they create these worlds and such. So I would love to hear a little bit more about, like, how you got into writing, like what pulled you into writing.
Speaker 2:Well, I've always written, I think from a young age, in high school. I wrote for a long, you know I wrote. I was on my high school literary magazine. I did a lot of poetry and short stories at the time. And then I went to acting school and I got my bachelor of fine arts and drama.
Speaker 2:And, you know, aside from just doing the acting, I wrote plays and one act plays, and then, for a short period of time, started a theater company. I produced some of the plays, but I was writing, and then it shifted to screenplays, which in a roundabout way led me to law school. And then, but I finished my first novel, which is in a drawer somewhere, figuratively, because it's on a hard drive, but right before I went to law school, and that was a kind of a really transformative experience for me. And that was a kind of a really transformative experience for me, you know, I think in the first 10 years of being a lawyer, I found I found it very difficult to find time to write. And then, when I left, you know, the Wall Street firm I was working for and started working for the government, I found a little more time in the evenings and my kids, were older by that point to to write more um.
Speaker 2:So I finished a novel that that got me my agent um, and then, in 2020, I sold a short story to audible which is called little surrenders, um. And then I wrote that while I was working on hollow spaces, which at the time was untitled um, and then my agent um sold hollow spaces to counterpoint and, uh, that was, like you know, the achievement of a long time of writing and struggling and and, but it's a story I really loved and I was very, very.
Speaker 2:It's hard to overstate how thrilling it is to to accomplish that in terms of traditional publishing, which had been my dream.
Speaker 1:I love that and I think you bring up some really great points of just this sort of.
Speaker 1:I feel like a lot of like, especially new authors. There's a lot of pressure that they put on themselves if, like, you write the book and then then then you have to publish it and then you have to like it's just this rush, and I think sometimes it's okay if it takes time, right like it's okay if you have to let life kind of happen and there's nothing wrong with that. And I think really I'm a big believer of like honoring kind of the season of life that you're in, and like when you are working a ton or you've got a like a family and kids are like it's just. The reality is your time is very limited, so it's okay to have that space where you just kind of need to step back, but still, like you said, finding those little pockets that you could make work is like. I feel like that's key when it comes to writing and just kind of like following your dream filling up your cup. Small wins are like the best.
Speaker 2:Absolutely, and I think in terms of the timing the issue you're raising, there is two pieces of things I've heard people say over the years. That always resonated with me was you have to be forgiving of yourself, right, because we all have obligations in our lives and other priorities. I don't know that any writer is just sitting down 24 hours a day pounding out words, and it's hard to be a writer if you don't have a life right. You're writing about life, you're writing about things you know, so you have to live that life and so for me.
Speaker 2:I think you know, aside from the actual pressures to make, a living and to perform well at my job and the things I love.
Speaker 2:I mean, I do love practicing a lot. I love my career and what I've done and believed in it, and so I always viewed that as just as important as writing fiction or the things I wanted to do or accomplish there, and I forgave myself for even resting right. We all have lives. Sometimes you need rest, sometimes you need to check out, but at the same time I always tried to make productive use of time in terms of find time and create time to think about writing, to write, and I was very forgiving of myself of thinking.
Speaker 2:You know, it's just as useful sometimes to go for a walk when you're not in front of a keyboard and think about a story, think about a plot, think about what you want to talk about, and that is productive time, right, you don't just have to sit at a keyboard and type words and I think that comes from my legal training right, you're paid as a lawyer to give advice, and that requires thought and contemplation at times, and so that was one of the things where I think it influenced the way I approached fiction writing.
Speaker 1:Yes, that's such a huge reminder, I feel like, especially if you're like struggling with like writer's block or things like that's usually a sign that you're you know you're just not in the right head space, you're burnt out. There's a lot going on and it's wild how powerful like a walk can be to like process and get ideas flowing and even reading. I find that can be a really great way to kind of like spark inspiration and be like oh wow, like look at how they created these characters or this story, this plot. Like I would have never thought of this. So I think that it's such a great reminder that, yes, obviously writing is necessary to get the book written, but there are different things that you can also do that I feel like are equally important to that process Absolutely.
Speaker 2:And speaking of breaks and things like that, you know I think the short story I wrote I wrote, you know, sold to audible was literally the outgrowth of of me being in a, I think, stuck on hollow spaces in a way, needing a break from that project. Having conversation with a friend in the bar about can you start a short story with a bullet point list, and then me saying, okay, I want to be productive and do some writing, maybe that'll unblock me, so I'm going to work on something different. That's fun, that's kind of funny for me as a writer to just do. And then that grew out into a different thing that I was able to sell and was a great experience for me.
Speaker 2:And I've had other ideas and other concepts for, you know, maybe novels I'll write in the future or, you know, even stuff I worked on in the past of just that came out of like let me take a break from this thing I'm stuck on and just have a little fun with the process, right?
Speaker 1:You're right, because that's really, I feel like at the end of the day, that's kind of the goal of writing is to have fun, to create these worlds and characters and, like let them come to life on paper so that readers love them. Uh, so I would, I guess, backtrack me a little bit. Um, I'd love to hear a little bit more about, um, like, where the book idea came to you. Like, how did this come? Because I always find that fascinating of like how an author, like a story, comes to an author.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's funny. There's a number of different inspirations I had for it. I think the most immediate one was there was a story in the New York Times about a man who had been accused of murder in upstate New York and had been acquitted after trial. And I read the story and he had a quote in the story to the effect of you know, the acquittal is nice, but you know, my life's been kind of ruined by this whole experience, been kind of ruined by this whole experience, and I gave some thought to that about. You know, most legal dramas end at a trial and with a conviction or acquittal and they don't really ask what happens after that or it very rarely shows what happens after that.
Speaker 2:And I was really, and I generally am interested sometimes in like what's the story beyond the story? I was really and I generally am interested sometimes in like what's the story beyond the story? Um, and so I asked myself the question what if you started a story at that point in the trial, like the trial is over, something has happened, and now what happens? And what is that story? Um, and so I came up with this idea of this man who had been, um, acquitted of murder, and then that merged with a separate idea I had been working on or in my mind about, like thinking about the things we inherit from our parents. You know, like you know, and in this case you know, intergenerational trauma, you know how does. And so at some point I connected those two ideas in my mind and actually had been working on another story. So I took the first chapter of that story and then scrapped the rest of it and then it became part of hollow spaces and anyway, but that's how the idea came about.
Speaker 2:And then the way I wrote it kind of the tone, the language, the style all came out of other things I'd been thinking about. So a lot of things contributed to just the way that story came together.
Speaker 1:A hundred percent. I feel like that's always really cool and I feel like a lot of that's often kind of the thing that I noticed with a lot of like authors, creatives. It's just like those subtle little moments that people like notice, like you see it in a movie or like when you're out or whatever, and you're like, oh, my gosh, this could be a whole story Like what is going on here. And then you make up like this whole thing in your head and you're like, okay, I need to do something with this. So I really I always find that so fascinating of how, yeah, these, these little threads, these little things, like, like you said, the story behind the story, like what makes people like how did they get here and that stuff. I get so nerdy about that and just like watching people and and kind of how, yeah, what is their story? And putting that into words is such a cool thing and to see it kind of come to life, I imagine that's such an amazing experience.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no and I think writing this novel, you know most things I write. It's hard to, I don't wanna say separate yourself from the characters, because they're always separate, right? You're not, unless you're writing a memoir or an autobiography. It is fiction and you know.
Speaker 2:The question became for me is or one of the interesting parts about writing it was, you know, thinking to myself okay, what do I want to talk about? Why do I want to talk about it? Talk about, why do I, why do I want to talk about it? What makes this, you know, special for me, for a reader, in terms of you want to get at the truth, or some kind of truth about something, and so, for me, I really focused on like, okay, what is what is like the, the darkness in this man? What led him to be accused of murder? Right, and exploring that question of like, how does what? How does this person find himself in this situation? What was it about his personality? Why?
Speaker 2:is his story worth reading and that made me ask myself some very uncomfortable questions about, like, why do I want to talk about that? What am I exploring for myself? You know, and, and you know, and really came down to like, at least for the father's story, and the kids have a different story, but for the father's story, what? What is it about the concept of you know wanting something so badly, you know, in his case, you know, you know, to be happy, you know, and not being able to achieve it, and why, and all the things that stood in the way and what. And not being able to achieve it and why, and all the things that stood in the way, and what if you're not able to process it Right.
Speaker 2:And so for me, I was lucky enough to have, like you know, I used to have a lot of, you know, I think, what a lot of men experience, which is, you know, you know the stereotypical I'm using air quotes here anger issues, Right, and one of the things that really changed my life and my outlook and just the way I handled myself was somebody asked me, you know, are you angry or are you sad?
Speaker 2:And every time I felt anger. After that I actually asked myself am I angry or am I sad? And when I realized, like you know, I'm not angry, I'm sad, and then I confronted the sadness things and why am I sad and how to handle that, that really made me a lot less angry in life, you know, and really changed my outlook on a lot of things. And I was like what if nobody had ever asked me that question? And what if I had no tools to deal with that? And that became the character of John, like this, this really extreme version of that, that person that maybe I was scared of becoming you know, and so his story is very personal to me in the sense of like a what if?
Speaker 2:nightmare scenario. Like you know, uh, my life um but you know, but it's not me and it's entirely fictional.
Speaker 1:So thank god for that a hundred percent, yeah, but I feel like that's such an interesting point of, like you know, tapping into these experiences that I feel like often are not talked about, especially with men.
Speaker 1:I think that there's something that, like it, kind of gets glossed over a little bit and like these are things that I feel like are very important to bring to the forefront. And I mean just like from my own experience of like my dad worked in in the prison system, like so I understand, like all of the trauma, like all of that stuff that goes into that. So I think bringing this, even though it is fictional, I feel like it's a very relatable thing for a lot of um men to navigate of, just like you said, that that anger, that sadness of not knowing how to even name emotions, uh, so that's a huge thing to bring, yeah, forward, and I love that this is being like these, these hard topics are being talked about in in stories. Now, I think it's a really amazing thing to create these characters that feel like in reality, they could be your family or they could be their name, your neighbor, they could be you, right? So I think that's huge.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, and I hope it resonates. I mean, you look at, you know again, with my theater training in college, you know, read a bunch of plays like the angry young man was a huge type in drama, right Like the works of Harold. Pinter and people like that. Um, and so you know, when I was younger, in my 20s, I didn't really unpack why that was or what that meant or why they were angry, aside from just the state of their worlds or their lives um you know, and then you get older and a little more contemplative and you know people ask you to write questions and suddenly you're like, oh wow, there's a whole.
Speaker 2:there's layers on layers, once you start peeling that back 100%.
Speaker 1:I would love to hear a little bit more about like what is your favorite part of the sort of writing process, or do you find it kind of like depends on the book that you're writing?
Speaker 2:I think it depends in terms of specifically it depends, but generally I will say, is I really enjoy crafting sentences and language and I probably enjoy it too much. So, like one of my big blocks for a long time in terms of process, right Is I tended to just edit, edit, edit as I was writing, which means you don't make that much progress and with hollow spaces. I had to force myself. I made a rule for myself I could only go back two pages. So I would kind of start two pages back and kind of work my way into to give myself a little momentum into writing new pages, but I wouldn't let myself go back and touch anything before that and that really helped me, I think, maintain momentum in drafting new words.
Speaker 2:But there was part of me that if I crafted a sentence I really loved or a moment, you know in terms of like the actual plot or what was happening, those things were really, really enjoyable for me. That's my favorite part, um, especially if I'm doing something playful that is, in my head, completely meta. So with the audible short story, it's the easiest example of that. You know, I discovered that story as I wrote it, by asking myself questions, by based on the sentence I had just read. So like it started in the second person because of the way I had framed this with my like it started in the second person because of the way I had framed this with my friend as the joke of can you write a short story in the second person. And so it was you're going to need and then colon, bullet point list.
Speaker 2:right, that was the first sentence, but because I started the story with the word you, it's clearly in the second person. So then I was like why is the story in the second person? And asking myself that question led to like five different ideas for the plot and how to do it. And that part's fun, like when you're discovering or playing games like that it leads you to new things.
Speaker 1:That's, yeah, 100 percent. I feel like just like getting to know the characters, like figuring out like what it is. I mean I'd love to be able to have like a rough outline for all, but I feel like that's just not how my brain works and often it just kind of like we're just gonna go and we're gonna see what happens and hopefully it makes sense. But you can fix that stuff at the end anyway, right like that's what editing's for, that's what the editors are for.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and the plotter versus pantser spectrum. I'm definitely leaning towards pantser, although I tend to. Once I get to a certain point, I think with almost everything I've written, I turn in generally the last quarter of the book. When I get towards that part I'll sit down and actually make outlines for how I want to wrap it up, but the majority of it is completely just pantsing the whole way through.
Speaker 1:I love it and I think that really is like what writing is all about, right, Like you've got to find what works for you and like just kind of roll with it, even if you're like this makes no sense, it is utter chaos, but it still gets the words out, so who cares right?
Speaker 2:Absolutely.
Speaker 1:Amazing, Awesome. Well, as we kind of get close to wrapping up, I'd love to ask what would be one piece of advice you would give for someone who is just starting out their writing journey.
Speaker 2:I think the same advice I'd give to anybody in any journey, generally speaking, which is that it's a marathon, not a sprint, you know, know, and it goes back to what we were discussing earlier about conserving energy, finding time to rest, finding time to recharge, but also remembering that you actually have to make progress from time to time to get where you're going. Um, but it's hard to, you know it, it's hard to to move forward if you're carrying. You carry a lot of weight, I think, just because of nature of humanity, and you don't need to add more weight to yourself by self judgment or insecurities, or you know those voices in your head. I mean, it's hard to quiet them completely, but I think whatever works for you to quiet those voices, to take that weight off yourself, is super. Uh, I think at least for me was super helpful yeah, I love that.
Speaker 1:I feel like that's so true, it's, it is, it is the long game, like that's what we're here for. So it it takes time, as annoying as that is and as much as we wish it didn't, but eventually you get to the point you're like, okay, wow, I get that it took, it needed to take as long as it did. Right, so I, I love that.
Speaker 2:Uh and finally, yeah, one more thing for that, yes, please, which, to your point, about long times is. You know, I I was lucky enough to. When I went to acne school first week of school, um, you know, one of my teachers was like, look, you have all chosen to go to school, in college for a profession that is going to say no to you 99 times out of 100. You need to be prepared for that and get right with it or decide like it's not for you.
Speaker 2:And I think with writers I've known, you know I've met at conferences or my friends who write, you know, I think the rejection part of it has been really is one of the hardest things for people to bear, because it is literally what happens day after day after day for years sometimes in terms of rejection, and I think not getting embittered by it or discouraged and trying to find whatever works for you to be um, to persevere, is a key thing. You have to know what you know, whether you love your work enough, whether you believe in it enough, whether you love your work enough, whether you believe in it enough, whether you just feel the passion to write all the time. You know, but it has to be something in whatever, whatever it is that takes to persevere. I think that is. You need to find that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that is so true, and really that's sort of like I feel like it's that internal drive of like you can't put, like because you are going into a career that people literally are like that's crap.
Speaker 1:I like right, like people will tell you that to your face and you're like, wow, thanks, so kind, uh, because that's just the nature of art. Right, it's subjective and not everyone loves it. Um, so yeah, that's a hard, hard pill to swallow, but I feel like it's it's like insanely brave that we do this day in and day out and we're like, yep, I am constantly getting rejected, but I keep showing up, and I think that's really what you just kind of got to laugh it off. And that's the reality is, you can't make everyone happy, and you know your book will be for somebody, though, and I think that's something that's constantly I'm constantly reminding myself of like I know I loved it, I know I needed to read it. Somebody else is going to feel the same, and I just need to find that that person Absolutely, absolutely, and that is, you're 100 percent right.
Speaker 1:I love that Amazing Well, finally, where can people find you and your book and kind of follow along on your writing journey?
Speaker 2:book and kind of follow along on your writing journey. Sure, I have a website. It's victorsutominantcom, which I assume will be somewhere in the things or you can Google. Sutominant and Holospace is available on Amazon and Barnes, noble and bookshoporg. I hope it'll be in stores everywhere you might want to find it and Counterpoint Press is the publisher. They have a site for the book as well, so those are some of the places you can find it.
Speaker 1:Amazing. Well, everything will be linked in the show notes so it will be super easy for people to find you and your book. But yes, I loved chatting with you. I feel like I learned so much. It's always fun to hear other writers and their processes and just yeah, the stories and journeys that they go on.
Speaker 2:No, thank you Victoria. And we didn't even hit a Victor Victoria joke this whole time.
Speaker 1:So that's impressive, we did it. We did it Right. I don't often meet too many Victors, so I feel like I've managed to kind of bypass that in my life mostly. But yeah, it's fun, I think.
Speaker 2:It's a great name to have.
Speaker 1:Thanks so much for listening to today's episode. I would love if you would leave a review and also if you loved the author that we chatted with, go find them on social media and hype them up, comment on their stuff, share their work, Even if you can't buy the book, these kind of things are great ways of supporting indie authors and getting their book in front of new readers. And if you are a writer or author in need of a developmental editor, please reach out. I would love to chat. Everything is linked in the show notes and it would be an absolute honor to be able to get eyes on your novel. So thanks again and listen to the next episode.
