A: No, I don't think it's tough. Because you have the advantage of being able to visit crime sites, the investigative materials are available and patterns begin to emerge that didn't even exist at the time. So the FBI has not closed the Hoffa case, they have not resolved it. From a legal point of view, the Hoffa case is still open.

Q: How much research did you do?

A: I did what I could under the circumstances. It wasn't a lot because the really crucial events are still clouded in mystery. I read the newspaper accounts, a couple of books on Hoffa's life and death, and recently the FBI files have been released. I didn't study the files, but I read summaries of them and commentaries on them.

Q: The book was written in the first person. Was this difficult because all of your previous novels are in the third person?

A: My feeling about it is this. I am not crazy about the first person voice. I know that it is probably the most popular style for mystery novelists, especially today. But personally, the third person is quite a bit better. Here is the thing: there is no reason why a novelist can't write basically in the third person, with little first person interludes. I think that is probably the optimum style.

Q: Do you have a favorite book in the series?

A: I like GROOTKA. I like that book. And I also like HIT ON THE HOUSE.

Q: Where do you get your ideas from?

A: Sometimes you just get ideas from reading the newspaper and talking to friends. I get a lot of ideas from my brother, who is a cop, a detective. He worked in Detroit, but now he has been on the Missoula County Sheriff's force for several years, as a detective. Larry is very helpful and I talk to him a lot about this stuff. I run stuff by him and ask him if it would actually happen in police circles and so forth. I have been very gratified with inquiries from policemen and ex-policemen, who are readers. They say the police work in their estimation is much like what they have experienced. Larry has provided me with a lot of information on the Detroit force and invaluable insights into police work.

Q: What are your writing habits like?

A: If I am really interested in a story, I can hardly stop writing. I tear myself away to go play golf or go fishing, but basically I stay close to the story until I get it to a certain point. If it is not going well, I don't like to push it. I don't think that's helpful, because you can start putting all this extraneous material into the book and you have a hell of a time getting rid of it.

Q: What has been your greatest challenge as a writer?

A: Well, the greatest challenge is getting a more serious literary novel published.

Q: Why, you don't think the fiction you are writing is literary?

A: I think it is more literary than the run-of-the-mill crime fiction. I am interested in "serious fiction" in the sense that I'd like to write fiction that is concerned with the most serious problems that confront us. I'm thinking that "serious fiction" is grounded in the reality of our lives. A lot of crime fiction is so ungrounded that is seems to me ephemeral. I would like to write more serious stories. It doesn't mean that they don't have to be crime novels, I am happy to do that.

Q: This summer (1998), Dennis McMillan published your novel "GO BY GO." This is the story of the murder of Wobbly organizer Frank Little by the Pinkerton's in Butte, Montana in 1917. Is this what you mean by serious writing?

A: Yes. See, I am interested in a novel like GO BY GO. Now, that is a serious novel about what really happened in 1917, in a strike in Butte, in which an IWW [Industrial Workers of the World] organizer was murdered. That was a crime that was never solved. I did all the research so I would satisfy myself as to what was the true story and then I wrote a novel on it. I didn't hesitate to make any changes that I wanted to make. I invented a few characters, described events that have never been described. I was also influenced by reading that Dashiell Hammett had told people that he, then a young Pinkerton agent, had been asked to get rid of Frank Little by an officer of the Anaconda Copper company. Personally, I don't believe Hammett was involved. Let's face it, 1917 was long damn time ago, but unfortunately many of the same circumstances that precipitated that event in 1917 are popping up again. I think it is a serious novel, but it doesn't adhere to any of the standard conventions of the crime novel. There is not a heroic detective, and the bad guys are not brought to justice, and so forth. I made some amendments to bring it in line with conventional crime fiction a little bit, but not much.

Q: Is there a new Mulheisen novel in the works?