Posted in: Amazon Studios, Audio Dramas, TV | Tagged: Audible, Audio Drama, Bosch, Jack Quaid, Michael Connelly, the boys, The Lincoln Lawyer, The Safe Man, Titus Welliver

The Safe Man: Bosch Creator Michael Connelly on Audio Drama's Origin

Bestselling author Michael Connelly explains how his Audible audio drama, The Safe Man, starring Titus Welliver & Jack Quaid, came to be.

Michael Connelly, the creator of the Bosch series of books – and now television series and spinoffs – is venturing into the realm of audio drama with the Audible adaptation of his 2012 short story The Safe Man. The story is Connelly's first (and so far, only) foray into the supernatural – where a reclusive author, played by Bosch star Titus Welliver, hires a professional safecracker – played by The Boys star Jack Quaid – to open and remove an old safe in his house. Getting a sense that something "otherworldly" is in play?

Connelly was originally invited to contribute to an anthology where the writers were briefed to write outside of their usual genre. Instead of the usual crime stories found in his Bosch and Lincoln Lawyer novels, he chose the supernatural and drew on his own life:

"I was with a bunch of writers to write for a collection that was being put together," he said. "And the catch was 'you don't write what you're known for or what is in your comfort zone. Specifically, they said to me 'no detective story, no legal thriller, do a romance or Sci-Fi or something.' If I ever stray from my reading in what I do – I read a lot of detective fiction so I can be abreast of what's out there – I go to the Stephen King world. I go to the ghost stories. I love watching Horror on television and movies. I quickly said, 'I'm going to write a ghost story,' and I had this thing in my life like in the short story where there was a house on an island that was dredged out on a bay, that was my house. When I wrote the story, I lived in that house. It was an old house in Florida, almost a hundred years old. It was gothic, it had columns, it was very much as described in the short story. I also had a safe in the floor that came with the house and was locked. I was touching on things that were happening to me but adding dimensions of fear and horror."

"I had a drill because I didn't like the idea of a safe in the house like Paul Robinette. I was haunted by this idea that, at some point, someone might be holding a gun to my head and I couldn't open the safe. So, I had a drill. It was empty, full of dust in real life. In 'The Safe Man,' I extrapolated that through my imagination into what you saw in the story and what you have in the audio drama," said Connelly.

The original short story version of The Safe Man was driven largely by dialogue, which readers know is one of the best parts of the Bosch and Lincoln Lawyer books, so it's perfect for the audio drama format. We'll have more of Connelly's remarks on entering the audio drama medium in the next few days.

The Safe Man is available on Audible from May 16th. Bosch and its sequel series Bosch: Legacy, are on Prime.

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