Photo by Patrick Hanlon

Patrick Foss: Let’s get started. I think the first thing people are going to want to know is: Why are you interviewing yourself? I mean, that’s a little fucked-up, isn’t it?

Patrick Foss: Truman Capote did it. Norman Mailer’s done it.

PF: My point.

Patrick Foss: Writers are always complaining about being blindsided by interviewers. That or misquoted afterwards. So to get my media blitz started off right, this seemed like the way to go. How can you ask me a question I don’t expect? How can you misquote me? You are me.

PF: I’m likely to be more sympathetic, aren’t I. Throw you some softballs.

Patrick Foss: Also give me more time to respond. Ask me a question, I can take all day to answer. Nobody will know the difference.

PF: Ah. Trying to get around the Witty Response rule.

Patrick Foss: Exactly. You always come up with the wittiest response to any particular question five minutes after said question is asked and it’s already too late.

PF: Unless your name is Grant.

Patrick Foss: Right. That’s the exception that proves the rule.

PF: Cary Grant, Hugh Grant…

Patrick Foss: Lou Grant, Ulysses S. Grant…we could go on and on. If your last name is Grant, you are, by definition, always funny as hell.

PF: Dave Eggers interviewed himself, didn’t he? In his first book. The Genius one.

Patrick Foss: Did a kick-ass job of it too.

PF: You’re not going to try to be a pale imitation of Eggers, are you?

Patrick Foss: Everybody between the ages of twenty and thirty-five who’s white, educated and vaguely middle-class is a pale imitation of Dave Eggers. That’s why that book sold a billion copies.

PF: He and his friends are hilarious, too. You ever been to his site? www.mcsweeneys.net? Wait, of course you have.

Patrick Foss: Yeah. Good stuff, as long as you take it in small doses. Which describes most of our generation too, actually.

PF: Us included?

Patrick Foss: Definitely.

PF: Let’s talk about your first book then, THE BANG DEVILS.

Patrick Foss: THE BANG DEVILS is about a couple of Americans and a Filipino living in Japan who try to extort a million dollars from a rich Japanese businessman. Only he’s got a secret that throws the proverbial monkey wrench in their plans. Mayhem results.

PF: What does it mean, the title?

Patrick Foss: There’s a word in Japanese, tonma, that loosely translated means “idiot.” But I heard that the same word is also slang for loud, rough criminals, because ton can mean “bang” and ma “devil.” Bang Devils. I thought the double meaning was apt, given the book’s main characters.

PF: How so? Man, these are softballs.

Patrick Foss: Japan can go to your head. A lot of Americans are surprised when they come over here. If you’re white, blond, blue-eyed and even the least bit attractive, you get more attention than you’ve ever had in your life. People stop you on the street and ask if they can take a picture with you.

PF: People you’ve never met.

Patrick Foss: Never met, never seen before. It’s like you’ve turned into Tom Cruise. Well, maybe not that bad, but close.

PF: And this is because…?

Patrick Foss: Not sure, but it messes some people up. They start thinking they’re special. They start thinking normal rules don’t apply to them. Which isn’t too smart, but it’s a trap that’s easy to fall into. The main characters in THE BANG DEVILS, Chris Ryan and Jessica Romano, fall into it big time.

PF: You live in Japan. Was it a trap you fell into?

Patrick Foss: To some degree, sure. Everybody does to some degree. I remember, my first year in Japan, whenever some friends and I would walk down the street and see an attractive woman with her boyfriend, we would stare right at her, give her the once-over, being totally obvious and asshole-ish about it. She never seemed to mind—at least not outwardly—and it gave my friends and me a kick to see the way her boyfriend would look uncomfortably from her to us, not sure what to do.

PF: In America he’d have beaten the shit out of you.

Patrick Foss: Right! And we’d have deserved it. But we would have never done it in America. We did it in Japan that first year because we thought we were special. I don’t do that anymore, by the way. I’ve learned my lesson. Plus, I’m married.

PF: Did you ever try to do anything criminal, like Chris and Jessica?

Patrick Foss: It’s not like I’d tell the world if I did, but no. There’s a reason they call it “fiction.” I’m depressingly law-abiding.

PF: What sort of research did you do then? To make the book authentic.

Patrick Foss: Living in Japan for nine years, I’ve soaked up a lot of the cultural stuff. I’ve met an interesting cross-section of people too. Bartenders, low-level drug dealers, hostesses, you name it.

PF: In the book, Jessica’s a hostess. What is that, anyway? You know, this isn’t very witty so far.

Patrick Foss: Shut up. Picture yourself in a bar, only it’s the nicest bar you’ve ever been to. Expensive paintings on the walls, polished countertops, waiters in black tuxedos, the works. Now imagine that all the customers are men. The only women in the place are the ones that work there, and they’re all young, beautiful, and dressed to kill. As soon as you come in they take your arm, sit at your table with you and start flirting hard. They come on so strong, you’re sure one of them’s going to go home with you. Only she doesn’t. That’s a hostess. Instead of sex, at the end of the evening you get a bill for anything from three hundred to several thousand dollars.

PF: Jesus.

Patrick Foss: Would want no part of the hostessing business, but yeah. Some of these women make fortunes. The market’s not as good as it was ten years ago—Japan’s been in a recession for a decade—but the really good-looking ones who can play the game still rake

Photo by Patrick Hanlon

it in. In tips alone they can make a fortune. One hostess I knew, almost everything in her apartment had been given to her by customers. Her TV, stereo system, kitchen appliances, jewelry, dresses, cell phone, computer….I’ve heard of other women getting cars, apartments, real estate—course, when you get to that level you’re probably doing more than flirting.

PF: So there’s pressure on them to give it up, then.

Patrick Foss: That’s the whole purpose of the game. Who’s going to give in first? Who’s going to win?

PF: So who wins in THE BANG DEVILS?

Patrick Foss: You already know the answer to that one.

PF: Yeah, but they don’t.

Patrick Foss: Let’s help them find out then.

Read an excerpt from THE BANG DEVILS. Buy the book from Amazon.com or Barnes & Noble. Click here to ask Patrick a question of your own. Every once in a while, Patrick will collect the best questions, answer them, and publish everything online in an interview format. You'll be famous! Sort of. Note: Patrick reserves the right to edit questions for length and any other reason he sees fit.