Charles Courtley (aka Robert Seymour) is a 61-year old retired judge, who resides on the English coast with his wife Jane, of 38 years, and a small dog called Phoebe. Previous to writing Wig Begone, Mr. Seymour contributed articles to legal newsletters and blogs. At present time, he is adapting his novel into a screenplay and writing a sequel.
You can visit the author's website to find out more information and other places to find him in cyberspace: http://courtleyprocedures.wordpress.com/
Please tell us a bit about your book: Wig Begone - characters, plot, etc.
Charles Courtley, a young ambitious lawyer, ducks and dives his way through the shark-infested waters of the English criminal courts. The sharks aren’t just the criminals either – but the Dickensian judges too! Caught in a honey trap, Charles faces a challenge which all lawyers dread — being on the receiving end of the criminal process.
If you could meet, in person, any of your characters, who would it be and why?
Charles’ bugbear – Lord Flaggett, Lord Chief Justice of England. This judicial villain follows the tradition of Judge Jeffries of the Bloody Assize and Horace Avory — a hanging judge of the 1920s. He also comprises an amalgam of other real-life judges I appeared before in my early years. It would be so delightful to give the old monster a dressing-down!
If you could fictionalize yourself and put yourself in any situation, how would it play out? Could you give us a scene/scenario of such an occurrence?
Defending a murderer in a gas-lit Old Bailey courtroom in the 19th century and to be able to say to a jury: "Look at her, gentlemen of the jury, look at her! God never gave her a chance - won’t you?"
Quoting the immortal lines of the celebrated advocate, Sir Edward Marshall Hall QC, defending a prostitute facing the death penalty. How wonderful to be so eloquently emotional, impossible to do now in these prosaic times.
Do you have any particular habits that you carry out while writing? Places you write the best, foods, drinks, etc., that help set your "writing mood"?
I generally write in my study upstairs (in a converted bedroom) usually enjoying a quiet smoke (as an unrepentant pipe-smoker) before I begin. Too much indulgence in coffee and snacks, however, proves to be a distraction sometimes difficult to avoid.
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