D.W. Layton's life has been a journey as adventurous as the stories he writes. Inspired by James Michener's The Drifters, he set out to explore the world after college, experiencing life as a vagabond. He ran with the bulls in Pamplona, stomped grapes in Greece, and pulled giant crab pots from the depths of the Bering Sea. After law school, he attended Cambridge University, earning an advanced degree in international law, and spent over 35 years in practice, often representing governments in disputes at the World Trade Organization in Geneva. In addition to his legal career, Layton has always been passionate about the arts, even appearing in two operas at the Kennedy Center. He and his wife of over 45 years split their time between homes in Florida and the South of France, enjoying a life rich in culture and adventure. His debut novel is Otello's Oil.
Otello’s Oil is the first of the "Saga of Blood & Oil" duology set at the beginning of the next decade when the global demand for oil is increasing, supplies are limited, and competition for what’s left keen. The story begins when the US Secretary of State invites Kuwait’s Oil Minister to dinner in Georgetown followed by opera at the Kennedy Center. In Act III of Giuseppe Verdi’s Otello a shot is fired, but no one hears a thing. The Minister slumps in his seat. Blood oozes from his chest. The Secretary was only inches away. Was she the target? Was she in love with her guest? Elliot Jones, a Special Agent with the US Diplomatic Service, is tasked with finding out. He soon discovers that the Oil Minister was in the crosshairs of a global battle among the super powers for energy.
The idea for writing Otello’s Oil first came to Layton thirty years ago. Back then he was a lawyer at the US Department of Commerce in Washington and a friend introduced him to the Washington Opera Company. One thing led to another and soon he appeared as a supernumerary in Aida, followed a few years later by, Otello, in which Layton was cast as the captain of the guards. In the opening scene of that opera, as the curtain jumps skyward and the orchestra explodes into Verdi’s opening Esultate in C-sharp major, Layton led the other guards at a full sprint across the front of the stage and up the stairs of the castle to see if they could spy Otello’s ships returning from battle. It was commonplace then, as it is now, for dignitaries and other VIPs to attend the opera in Washington. More often than not they would sit in the front row.
Layton stops by In Reference to Murder to take some Author R&R about researching and writing the book and series:
Otello’s Oil
I wrote Otello’s Oil in less than a year. How is that possible? Well, as a lawyer, you learn to write fast. No client, no matter how wealthy or how important the case, is going to pay for a brief or memorandum that takes years and years to write. Nor is any judge or arbitrator going to sit around and wait for you to finish a filing at your leisure. I also made a point in Otello’s Oil of writing about things I know. The examples are legion: the assassin from Egypt had the same part in Otello that I did, I used to own the same car, a 1954 Jaguar XK120, as that driven by DSS Agent Alice Lake, and Mrs. Layton and I once stayed in the same hotel room in Bali that US Secretary of State Lynne Farnsworth and her Qatari lover stayed in.
Otello’s Oil is also an international political thriller. The settings are, inter alia, an international diplomatic conference in Jakarta, the U.S. Mission in Geneva, and the White House. These are all places I have been and all things I have done in the course of my legal career. As a result, I did not have to perform that much research to write Otello’s Oil. Yes, I had to make sure my dates and details were accurate. For example, if I said Lynne Farnsworth, before she became the Secretary of State, was Majority Staff Director for the Senate Finance Committee, I had to make sure Senator Lugar, her sponsor, was chairman of the committee at that time. But for most everything else, I was able to write about things I generally know.
The only time I had to perform extensive research was when the story went far afield from my personal experiences. For example, I was never a Navy Seal. Indeed, I have never served in the military. And I’ve certainly never been the head of Egypt’s Bureau of Homeland Security, inside the Al-Seif Palace in Kuwait City, or inside private rooms in the Kremlin. On those occasions I needed to perform very detailed research. Thus, I would read books on the subject. Watch podcasts. Basically, devour anything I could so that my story and its details were accurate.
The ultimate goal being to write a story that was believable to as many readers as possible -- both the initiated and the uninitiated. I don’t want readers who are versed in these subjects and places to say: “that’s not right” or “that would never happen.” In this regard, I try to write like Tom Clancy did. Almost like I am writing historical fiction, or as I prefer to think of it – “contextually accurate fiction.”
St. Crispin’s Eulogy
The next book in the "Saga of Blood & Oil" is tentatively entitled St. Crispin’s Eulogy. Students of history and readers of Otello’s Oil will know that the Kuwaiti Oil Minister was killed on St. Crispin’s Day, October 25. St. Crispin’s Day is famous primarily because of the Battle of Agincourt in 1415 when the English army, led by King Henry V, achieved a decisive victory over the numerically superior French forces. St. Crispin’s Day is also well known because of William Shakespeare’s play Henry V, which includes the famous “St. Crispin’s Day Speech”:
We few, we happy few, we band of brothers; For he to-day that sheds his blood with me Shall be my brother.
I like this title because the readers of St. Crispin’s Eulogy will learn that the Kuwaiti Oil Minister was not the only person killed on October 25 at the hands of forces aligned with the global fossil fuel industry and its supporters. A group of idealistic and mainly young investigators in London who are trying to shed light on the labor practices and abuses taking place in the oil fields of the Gulf will also be killed on that day.
St. Crispin’s Eulogy will be both a sequel, a midquel, and a prequel to Otello’s Oil. It will, among other things, force my protagonist, Elliot Jones, to see Farnsworth’s Qatari lover, Saman Khalil Al-Fhani, in a new light. In fact, Jones will save Fhani’s life and expose the truth behind the deaths on St. Crispin’s Day.
You might think writing the second book would be easier than writing the first. It will not. In Otello’s Oil I could take the story anywhere I wanted. I wrote, as it were, on a "blank slate." In St. Crispin’s Eulogy the story must align in every respect with Otello’s Oil. Yes, the story will grow and the drama will increase, but it can’t conflict with anything in Otello’s Oil.
One Last Personal Observation
I think I may have been a teacher in an earlier life. I love to teach, to help people understand things. Over the years, I have taught classes and spoken at conferences hosted by countless organizations, including Georgetown University, American University, George Mason University, the American Bar Association, the Foreign Ministry of Iceland, the Foreign Ministry of Mexico, the Federation of Industries of the State of Sao Paulo, and the Foreign Ministry of the former Soviet Union. This probably explains, as much as anything does, why I take the time in my books to teach the reader a little something about everything from the Five Eyes Alliance exposed by Edward Snowden to the Russian invasion of Ukraine. It also explains why I delight in reviews that describe Otello’s Oil as "uncommonly sophisticated" and "educational."
You can learn more about D.W. Layton and his writing at his website or by following him on Facebook, Instagram, Goodreads, and LinkedIn. Otello’s Oil is now available through all major booksellers, including Amazon.
