Author delves into dark corners with latest novel
For Manor Park author John Delacourt, everything crystallized with a photograph.
There really wasn’t much to the image. A fogged, murky landscape illuminated by an impressionist splash of low-sodium lights. The shot was compelling not because of what it depicted but because of what was implied.
It was snapped by a photographer who specialized in seeking out clandestine prisons, places where people have been detained without being charged or receiving due process and are often tortured or even murdered there. These prisons are also known as “black sites.”
The Manor Park author has always been drawn to how the larger political environment can challenge, and often inflict itself, upon individuals. This furtive photo was enough to bring together ideas that had been bubbling during the pandemic.
Soon he had the focal character for his latest novel, The Black State, published in April.
Leading with character
A graduate of the University of Toronto, John studied at the Humber School for Writers. There, he was taught by John Metcalfe, a critic, editor and also a formidable writer. Under his guidance John says he learned not to be preoccupied with high concept. John recalls him saying, “Whenever I get a big idea, I just lie down until it goes away.”
Instead, he advised to “lead with the character.” The rest would follow.
John came to Ottawa from Toronto to work as a speechwriter. He ended up working as government consultant. He’s written on political topics for many publications, including newspapers and Policy Magazine, a publication devoted to policy and politics.
His professional work has informed his fiction thematically in the “intersection” of politics and culture, and throuhg his research. He’s learned that ideas that might seem over the top in fictional context pale compared to real life events. “Always err on the side of the incredible.”
Inspired by global events in the early 2000s, John was working on Parliament Hill during a tumultuous time and was struck by how so much happened “behind the scenes” or was decided in the back rooms.
For The Black State, the Manor Park author literally has his character take a wrong step and be immediately seized and dragged down by these forces into this murky world that exists “beyond the frame.”
“A lot of what happens in the ‘corridors of power’ is arcane for most people.” Yet he notes what happens there can have enormous impact on our regular lives.