He took the opposite route by being successful in the United States before the general public embraced him in the Netherlands. HEX, his big breakthrough, is now being made into a TV series. The international publishing rights to his latest book, ORAKEL, had sold many tons in advance and now this work, too, is high on the bestseller lists....
Text: Gerben Bijpost
Who is Thomas Olde Heuvelt?
At the age of 11, I already had the ambition to be in shops worldwide with my books. At Dekker van de Vegt bookshop in Nijmegen, I saw the stacks of Stephen King books. My first thought was: I want that too. Of course, secretly I also wanted to become a pilot, or a rock guitarist. But above all, a storyteller. At the time, I had not read any of King's books. My mother wouldn't let me, she thought I was too young. Rightly so, probably. But I had a grandfather and an uncle who always told me slightly too scary stories at bedtime. With a mean edge to them, in the style of Roald Dahl. I loved those. I also lived those stories. Mathilda played out in my experience in my own schoolyard. After George and the mysterious magic potion I also mixed my own potions...
Scary storyteller, by the way, I was at a much younger age. My Playmobil men often ended up on a pyre. With glue on top, which I would then light. And model airplanes usually ended up in a crash scene, which I then lit of course, haha. Funnily enough, I am a very optimistic person, but that darkness has always been in my imagination.
My father died when I was just three. From a virus. The doctors never found out exactly
came to know what it was. He was very healthy, running half marathons. And suddenly, within a week and a half, a virus was fatal to him. That made it something mysterious, something eerie. Death was present as a tangible thing in our house after that. As a child, I visualised it as a thing that lived in our attic, in the shadows behind the dryer in the laundry room. I thought if I made too much noise on the stairs or in the hallway, it could come to me, pull me along. But what you fear is also something that fascinates you, makes you curious. That probably gave my stories that dark edge.
At three years old, I may have been very young, but I remember it all very clearly. Experiences so intense stay with you. I can still see images of the cremation, or how he was lying in bed and taken away by the ambulance. And also from before, when he was still alive. I know, it's special to have memories from so young, but maybe that's something quite normal when events are so intense.
So that's how my ambition was born. To tell exciting stories and publish them worldwide. All my life, I have devoted all my energy to achieving that goal. First writing short stories for a Dutch audience, then investing myself in translations into English. Travelled the world to conventions to meet publishers and editors. Eventually, we managed to get HEX published. It was subsequently published in 30 countries. That huge success locked me away for a while. I got writer's block. George Martin, writer of Game of Thrones, helped me get out of that. I visited him in Sante Fe, New Mexico, during the US tour for HEX. He had experienced the same thing after the success of GOT and told me to get back to the feeling of that little boy, sitting in his attic telling stories. The open-mindedness of you, the story and nothing else. To hear this from the mouth of such a successful writer touched me.
With ECHO, I wanted to try something new, move away from HEX, not repeat the same trick. As a result, I perhaps missed a piece of open-mindedness. That doesn't mean I don't think it became a good book, on the contrary. Technically, it may be my best, but it is much more complex than HEX and ORAKEL. In the end, all three books are equally dear to me: HEX opened all the doors for me, from ECHO I learned the most, it developed me the most, and to ORAKEL I had the most fun writing it, and I think you read that in it. The pressure was off then. But I certainly don't feel like I'm already there now. Every next book has to be better than the last.
Corona was secretly a positive during the writing. Because HEX was such a success internationally, you get a lot of requests to come somewhere, to speak. And I don't say no easily, because I enjoy travelling, meeting readers. But that takes a huge amount of time and comes at the expense of writing. Because of corona, my schedule was completely empty and I could concentrate on writing full-time.
I enjoy maintaining very personal contact with my readers. I put a lot of energy into that. For me this is something natural, because a story is mine when I write it, but it becomes the readers' as soon as it is finished. I need the reader's imagination to bring my words to life. That's a magical interaction. That's why I love hearing reactions, knowing who my readers are.
Inspiration
Inspiration can be found everywhere, in films, games, books... Stephen King is obviously important. But there are many more authors who inspire me: Neil Gaiman, Roald Dahl, Jonathan Safran Foer... And Chuck Palahniuk! You might know him from Fight Club. This really is one of those writers where you know it's him from a single sentence, so unique is his narrative voice. A kind of Rock 'n Roll with language he does. Fantastic. But something very different from what I do myself. With me, the style is secondary to the story. My stories are there because they are scary, touch you, make you laugh or make you look under your bed at night. Is it irritating that the media call me the 'Dutch Stephen King'? A little. I will never call myself that. But I understand that the link is easily made: we both write horror. And people see it as a compliment, which of course it is. But what meant much more to me was that he, my great childhood idol, sent a tweet into the world in which he commented positively on my book.
Clothes make the man
I am not someone who buys clothes very often. But when I do, I prefer good and beautiful things. I perform regularly nowadays and I just want to look good. My clothes should be chic and casual, but not loud. So not those expensive brands with a big name on them. I really like the old style of Bottega Veneta, with lots of leather and those pockets... I like that. I also pay more and more attention to sustainability. Saving the earth has always been important to me, but clothing brands didn't do much with it, so there wasn't much to choose from. Fortunately, that has changed.
Armcandy
What time it is I usually see on my laptop. Because that's what I work on. And on the road, I check the time on my iPhone. I never wear a watch, because I like something smaller around my wrist. A subtle bracelet. Leather, or with stones. I only wear a watch in the mountains. One of those with an altimeter, by Suunto. Not because I like it, but purely functional. If I were to choose a watch, it would be a very classic one, with visible cogs...
Home port
I now live on Mookerheide, in the north of Limburg, just below Nijmegen. In a pleasant detached house, very wooded. There is a separate writing house in the garden. You experience the seasons to the full here, everything around the house is alive. Squirrels, deer... very idyllic.
My house feels like pure holiday. Glass on all sides, bringing the outside in very much and giving you the feeling of living half outdoors. I like a quiet, modern-chic layout. Not too many things, especially large objects. Especially in hectic times with lots of promotional trips abroad, I can totally land here, unwind. Still, we want to move to Nice in the south of France within a year or two. My partner and I are both in love with the Côte d'Azur. The light there, the colours, the feeling. Saint-Tropez and Cannes are a bit jet-set locations, I don't have much with those. But Nice is another pretty classic city. A bit away from the centre, on a hillside overlooking the city, over the sea... That's what we're looking for at the moment.
Places I know well sometimes also provide a stage for my stories. In HEX, it was Beek-Ubbergen, in the region where I grew up. The opening scene of ORAKEL is now set in the Bulb Region, but in the first version of the story it was set near Nijmegen, the city where I lived for years. As the story developed, I came to the conclusion that it should be set closer to the sea and moved it to Noordwijk. After all, Oracle is about the power of the sea, the threat of water. By the way, all the locations that appear in the story really exist. This is especially important when you are telling a story in which things happen that cannot be real. Then all the details of the real world have to be right, because that way you create a believable whole in which the reader goes along. That also makes the supernatural acceptable.
Location scouting in the Bulb Region I initially did with Google maps and streetview, because there was a lockdown. By the time I could actually visit those places later, the story had progressed to the point where I felt like I was driving into my own book. I knew exactly who lived where, according to my story then. In reality, of course, very different people live there.
Beek-Ubbergen has now become something of a pilgrimage site for HEX readers. That place also plays very much to the imagination, a bit stark, hilly, dark forests, close to the German border... Wonder if the same will happen in the Bollenstreek soon.
Wheels
I drive a Jaguar XF. My previous car was a Peugeot 307 in convertible version, but I smashed it up, nota bene in Beek-Ubbergen. That XF is a very pleasant car. The other day I visited 83 bookshops in 9 days, a total of some 4,000 kilometres. Then it is nice to be in a spacious car that does exactly what you want. And it is stylish, has class. A car from 'the better class', but not 'tacky', something I find from many expensive Germans. So it does match my outfit. Nice and chic, but not gaudy.
Leisure time
When I'm not at my keyboard I like to do sports. Usually running or fitness. In addition, mountain climbing has always been a great love of mine, but I do it less now than I used to. My regular climbing buddy died suddenly a few years ago. We were good friends and you don't just find someone like that again. I have also become more realistic. I used to be very ambitious and wanted to climb all 4000ers of the Alps, in Peru and Alaska. I have let go of that. I still find the mountains very beautiful, places full of power where you can recharge. But I no longer necessarily need to climb every summit. Above all, I want to come down alive. I also play guitar, on a double neck. An acoustic with 6 and 12 strings. I also used to play in bands, on an Ibanez Jem, such a guitar as Steve Vai (guitar virtuoso, especially famous in the 80s and 90s; GB) also had. I loved playing those complex solos. Not as good as Vai could, of course, but still quite nice. Secretly, I think it would be quite nice to be in a band again. But I'm just running out of time. The guitar is in my writing cabin and every now and then I sit and play the guitar. Then my fingers don't get rusty....
TRAVEL
As a writer, I travel a lot anyway. But when I have free time, we like to go to the south of France in summer. Just a month before Corona struck, we were in Bali. I like to go to more adventurous places from locations like that. One time, for instance, we went to Komodo from Bali. Those islands stick out of the sea like dragon's ridges. When you walk around there, meet one of those Komodo dragons and look it in the eye, you get the feeling that this must be the creature furthest away from humans. It is almost unearthly. A mighty beautiful experience. Where I would really like to go again is Madagascar. Again, because of that unique nature, so different from anywhere else on earth. And in fact, there is nothing stopping me from visiting it one day. After all, I can work wherever I want....
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