Dave Donelson’s career as a broadcaster, entrepreneur, and writer has taken him from the jungles of Australia’s Cape York Peninsula to the minarets of Riyadh. He’s climbed the spire of the Empire State Building, floated the Usumacinta River to the Mayan ruins at Piedras Negras in Guatemala, and photographed the tree-climbing lions, and mountain gorillas of Uganda.
Dave’s inquisitive, active lifestyle finds its way into freelance writing and photographic assignments for magazines like Disney’s FamilyFun, Woodworker’s Journal, and Las Vegas Magazine. Closer to home, he writes features for Westchester Magazine as well as a regular column on golf. He is a member of the prestigious Metropolitan Golf Writers Association.
His first novel, Hunting Elf, began as an audio book at www.huntingelf.com and was published as a trade paperback in 2006. K9 Perspective called it “ … a delicious romp through the suburbs of New York.”
Dave’s first book was Creative Selling (Entrepreneur Press, 2000), a non-fiction prescriptive described by Brian Tracy as “ … a terrific book on selling.” As a business journalist, he writes for The Christian Science Monitor, Family Business Magazine, and dozens of trade publications serving industries from the automotive aftermarket to sporting goods retailing.
Dave has a BA in Rhetoric and Public Address from Missouri Western State University. He serves as a Trustee for the Westchester Library System, a consortium of thirty-eight public libraries serving Westchester County, NY. He lives in West Harrison, NY, with his wife, Nora, and an ever-changing roster of dogs and cats. You can visit his Web site at davedonelson.com or heartofdiamonds.com.
Q: Thank you for this interview, Dave. Can we begin by having you tell us briefly what your book is about?
A: Heart of Diamonds is a romantic thriller about blood diamonds, love, scandal, and death in the Congo. When TV reporter Valerie Grey goes to the Congo to cover the endless civil war in that country, she uncovers a scheme to smuggle blood diamonds into the United States. The diamonds come from a mine in the Congo owned by an American televangelist who has powerful friends in the White House. Valerie must tell the world about the illicit operation when U.S. troops are sent to Africa. There’s a big romantic love triangle, too, that Valerie must resolve if she’s ever to live in peace with herself.
Q: How did you come up with the title?
A: The title plays on several levels. Heart of Darkness, of course, was the first great book written about the Congo, and its theme of the horrors of colonialism is echoed in Heart of Diamonds, where I also write about gang rape as a weapon of terror, child soldiers, and the plights of the hundreds of thousands of refugees that exist in the Congo today. Then there is the romance in the book, symbolized by the heart-shaped diamond motif popular in jewelry stores. The smuggling scheme involves diamonds secreted inside little dolls called minkisi, essentially giving them hearts of diamonds. Finally, there is the hard resolve in the heart of Valerie Grey, the drive that makes her stand up to the evil that threatens to destroy her.
Q: Are romantic thrillers your specialty or have you written other genres?
A: This is my first foray in this genre. My first book was a non-fiction prescriptive, Creative Selling. My second was a comedic adventure, Hunting Elf, about a dog that has the social graces of Grendel’s mother and the world view of Groucho Marx. Heart of Diamonds is very different from either of those.
Q: Can you tell us why you chose the Congo as your setting?
A: The story actually sprang from true events in the Congo, or Zaire as it was known at the time. The famous American televangelist and one-time Presidential candidate Pat Robertson owned a diamond mine, gold mines, and timber concessions in Zaire in league with Mobutu Sese-Seko, the dictator who raped that unfortunate country for thirty years. When I discovered that connection, I had to write a book.
Q: Can you give us more insight into your characters? Who are they and what roles do they play?
A: Valerie Grey is the protagonist. She’s an international TV reporter with a passion for getting and telling the story no matter what it takes. She’s also romantically involved with David Powell, her mentor and the head of the MBS TV network’s Washington bureau, who asks her to marry him. Before she can decide, though, Valerie goes to the Congo and meets Dr. Jaime Talon, an altruistic doctor who runs a struggling clinic in the village of Mai-Munene, which is the location of the diamond mine. Her attraction to him really complicates Valerie’s life. Valerie’s principle opponent is Thomas Alben, a missionary who runs the mine and who dreamed up the diamond smuggling scheme. He works for Gary Peterson, the televangelist in Atlanta. When Valerie uncovers the scheme and tries to flee Mai-Munene to report it, Alben pursues her in league with Steve Scavino, an American agent sent by the White House.
Q: What kind of research did you have to do to write Heart of Diamonds?
A: I studied the Congo for a year before I started writing. The history, the geography, the politics, the flora and fauna, and especially the people. I read modern missionary accounts and classic texts from the colonial era. I also visited Central Africa twice to get a feel for the landscape and the people. I came back with a ton of first-person detail to really give Heart of Diamonds a sense of place.
Q: Did you ever get writer’s block or did it flow like you wanted it to?
A: Knock on wood, I’ve not generally had that problem. I write for a living—almost always on deadline—so I seem to have developed the ability to sit down and force it out even when it doesn’t want to come. There were a few times when I had to stop and figure out a plot point, but that’s different.
Q: What’s your most favorite part of the book?
A: There is a scene near the end of the book when Valerie, Jaime Talon, and Christophe are fleeing the Congolese army and the American agents and come across a tiny village that’s just been raided by a rebel group. What they find there is horrifying, but it very accurately reflects the real conditions in the Congo today, where nearly six million people have died as a direct result of the conflict since 1998.
Q: What’s next for you, Dave?
A: When I created Valerie Grey, I made her an international TV correspondent so she could pursue stories anywhere in the world. Right now, she’s deep into an investigation of Central American drug lords and the gangs of New York and Los Angeles. Her love life isn’t any less complicated, either!
Q: Thank you so much for this interview! Can you tell us where we can find out more about you and your latest romantic thriller, Heart of Diamonds?
A: There is a wealth of material at heartofdiamonds.com and my Heart of Diamonds blog, heartofdiamonds.blogspot.com. Both have excerpts, video trailers, and a great deal of background information about the Congo.