Meet Jeffrey L. Diamond | Author of the Ethan Benson Thriller series and former Television News Producer/Executive

We had the good fortune of connecting with Jeffrey L. Diamond and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Jeffrey L., what habits do you feel play an important role in your life?
As an author and a television news producer my success has always been based on just a few basic habits that I follow diligently even today—discipline, dedication, and the need to seek out the truth. I’ve always been a creature of habit, and when I was working on one of my stories for the ABC Newsmagazine 20/20 or when I’m now writing one of my Ethan Benson thrillers, I routinely work for three to four hours a day, each and every day, plotting my storylines, getting my ideas down on paper, and then constantly revising and improving what I have written. To achieve success, to write a good book or to produce an interesting television story, I’ve always found it critical to work hard, to never be satisfied with my product, never, not until the very last moment when I had to meet a deadline.

During my years at 20/20, I won six Emmy Awards, including one for the best investigative television news story of the year—an expose on a defect in the front seats of the Volkswagen Beetle that led to serious injuries during a rear-end collision. I spent months doing my preliminary research, reviewing thousands of pages of documents, working with a confidential source, speaking with experts and victims, and then plotting my storyline, casting my story, deciding on locations, before shooting, writing, and editing my product—all to make sure that I didn’t make a mistake. As an author, a murder mystery author, I adhere to these same principles and spend months researching an idea before sitting down at my computer and writing a novel.

Ironically, I could never watch one of my 20/20 stories when it was finished and hit the airwaves, and I can never read one of my Ethan Benson thrillers after it’s published and in the bookstores, because I see every flaw in my finished product and how I could have told my story better. And for me, that’s been the key to my success, always striving to do the best job I can and get to the truth, no matter what story I’m telling.

Let’s talk shop? Tell us more about your career, what can you share with our community?
Great question but a difficult one to answer.

Being a writer and creativity is very hard to define. People ask me all the time how do you write a book, where do the stories come from, how do you figure out plotline, create your characters, build suspense, and tell your stories? And you know what? There is no simple answer to any of these questions.

When I’m writing a book, it always begins with a germ of an idea that percolates in the back of my mind, an idea that grows and develops over time. Take my new Ethan Benson thriller, Full Live Rehearsal, which is now at my publisher and due out in the spring. It’s a story about a female serial killer and is set in the Florida Keys. I first began thinking about writing this book almost twenty-five years ago while working at 20/20. At the time. Aileen Wuornos, a psychopath who lived in Florida and murdered seven men, was making national headlines. I was fascinated by her story and spent months digging into her past—talking to law enforcement agents, forensic psychiatrists, victim’s families, and trying to set up an interview with Wuornos. After working on the story for months, I was unable to pull together the elements and never produced the story for television.

But I never forgot about Aileen Wuornos or what she had done.

As I finished my fourth thriller, All Cameras Live, about a serial arsonist in Western Massachusetts, I started thinking about my next novel, and like most of my books, I flashed on the idea of fictionalizing a story about Wuornos. So I started doing the research: reading newspaper and magazine articles, some that I had read all those years ago, buying half-a-dozen true crime novels about her case and other notorious female serial killers, and outlining the book in my head. Then, as in all my Ethan Benson thrillers, I sat down at my computer and started to write. A year later, I finished the manuscript and sent it off to my editor.

How did I get from page 1 to page 380?

Was it smooth sailing from day one to the end?

Hell no. It was a battle of writing and rewriting, of pushing the story forward and making changes, of never giving up, letting new ideas flow into my head where they’d percolate for days, sometimes for months, and then putting them down on paper. For me, this is the essence of my creativity—to be able to take an idea, learn as much as I can about a subject, and then use my imagination to write a murder mystery with twists and turns, an explosive ending, and a storyline that keeps readers sitting on the edge of their seats.

Of course, my years working as a journalist, working on crime stories, meeting killers, rapists, drug dealers, and sexual deviates has given me the raw materials that have become my Ethan Benson thrillers. The rest—the fictionalized storylines and the characters and the ebb and flow of the content that make up what I hope is a compelling story—all come from my imagination, and that as I said is difficult to define.

If you had a friend visiting you, what are some of the local spots you’d want to take them around to?
This is an easy question to answer. I love, love, LOVE the Florida Keys and have been vacationing on the different Islands for decades. I’ve been to Key West, Duck Key, Key Largo, and Marathon over a dozen times, but if I had to pick a specific island to recommend to a friend, it would be Islamorada. To me, it’s the epitome of paradise.

My wife and I usually stay at the Cheeca Lodge—a five star hotel which we consider one of the best in Florida. It sits right on the Atlantic Ocean, has three swimming pools, beautiful grounds, a golf course, tennis courts, organized activities, a spa, and great food. It also has a huge pier where I like to while away the hours and fish, especially in the moonlight. But if you enjoy a resort that’s a bit more lowkey and a little more layback, there’s always The Islander and Casa Mirada—two other hotels where we’ve stayed that are charming and a less expensive.

The island itself is quite funky, quite honkytonk, and informal—the perfect place to lounge around, to relax, daydream, and do nothing. We like to spend the day reading and swimming at one of Cheeca’s pools then go out and eat at one of the local restaurants. The seafood is fresh and delicious and there’s a wide range of eateries, from downhome roadside shrimp joints to more expensive gourmet food palaces. We particularly enjoy the Green Turtle, Chef Michael’s, and Lazy Days at the southern tip of the key with it’s great views of the ocean and the sunsets.

On a typical day, my wife will get a massage at Cheeca’s spa while I’m taking a leisurely walk along the Overseas Highway, and then after lunching, we both like to go deep sea fishing. A decade ago, we had the most thrilling experience of our lives when we chartered a boat for half-a-day and hauled in three sailfish each over sixty pounds and six feet in length.

Of course, if you want to play tourist, there are lots of places to go, from the John Pennekamp Coral Reef to Pigeon Key with its wildlife and bird watching to a day trip to old Key West where Ernest Hemingway once lived and wrote some of his most famous books.

Now that I live in Boca Raton, it’s only a hop, skip, and a jump down to the Florida Keys. I spent a glorious weekend at Cheeca Lodge just last June and hope to go back very soon. It has always been and always will be one of my favorite places. So go check it out for yourself, and I’m sure you’ll see why!

Shoutout is all about shouting out others who you feel deserve additional recognition and exposure. Who would you like to shoutout?
Writing, especially fiction, is really dependent on an author’s life experiences and the art of telling stories. In my case, the protagonist in my Ethan Benson thriller series is a television news producer at a fictional television news magazine that I call The Weekly Reporter. He is one of the best investigative journalists in the business and uses his reportorial skills to solve sensational crimes and learn the truth.

My success in writing my murder mysteries, and to date I’ve published four books in my series—Live to Air, Live to Tape, Live to the Network, and All Cameras Live with a fifth novel, Full Live Rehearsal, due out next spring—is based on what I like to call my first career—the forty years I spent working in television news. Like the hero in my novels, I was a producer and senior producer at ABC News 20/20, the creator and executive producer at Dateline NBC, and an executive at Martha Stewart Living where I ran her syndicated television show and the broadcast division of her company.

During these years, I was mentored by some of the best journalists in television news—Charlie Gibson, Hugh Downs, Peter Jennings, Jane Pauley, Stone Phillips, the incomparable Barbara Walters, and of course, Martha Stewart. They taught me the art of planning hard-hitting interviews, the mechanics of building multi-camera sets with huge production crews, and the essence of writing and telling stories. I also had the privilege of working with some of the best cameramen, editors, soundmen, grips, and lighting directors as well as some of the best researchers, writers, producers, and executives in the business.

My success today as an author and the the stories I tell in my Ethan Benson thrillers are based on the many people I worked with during my career in television news. My novels are about the the criminals I met and interviewed and the crimes they committed, and as you read each of my books, you’ll see how the people I collaborated with and the crimes I reported on influence the characters I create and plotlines I dream up in each of my books.

So lets give a shoutout to all the people from my old life who have given me the wherewithal to create my my new life as the author of a fictional world of television news.

Website: https://www.jeffreyldiamond.com

Instagram: officialjeffreyldiamond

Facebook: Jeffrey L. Diamond

Image Credits
Please credit ABC News for the 20/20 black and white group photo