Feathered Quill Book Reviews

 #Authorinterview with Kirk Voclain

Today, Feathered Quill reviewer Katie Specht is talking with Kirk Voclain, author of Double Exposure: A Spy Thriller.

FQ: Tell our readers a little about yourself. Your background, your interests, and how this led to writing a book?

VOCLAIN: I am a professional photographer from Houma, Louisiana. For close to 50 years I have made a living pointing a camera at real people who do not think they are photogenic, and proving them wrong. Most of my days are spent photographing high school seniors, families, and anyone who wants that one great image that actually looks like them on their best day.

Along the way, I built a teaching community for photographers, both in person and online. I love talking about light, posing, sales, and the business side of this crazy profession. Photography has let me travel, meet thousands and thousands of people, and collect more stories than will ever fit in one lifetime.

At some point I realized I was already telling stories, just with light instead of words. Double Exposure, my debut novel grew out of a simple thought that came from real experience. A person with a camera around his neck and a confident walk can get into a lot of places. What if that photographer was actually a spy, and the camera was the perfect cover? That question pulled me into fiction. Now I do for a hobby what most people call a career, and for a career what most people call a hobby, and I am having the time of my life telling stories in both worlds.

Author Kirk Voclain

FQ: Tell us a little about your book – a brief synopsis and what makes your book unique.

VOCLAIN: Double Exposure is an espionage thriller about a spy who works under the cover I know best, a professional photographer. The main character is Reed Sawyer. His job is simple on paper. He travels the world, points a camera at important people, and quietly gathers information that never shows up in the proofs.

At the start of the book, Reed is on his way from New Orleans to Vienna for what is supposed to be a routine assignment. During the flight he starts to feel that something is wrong. Small details do not add up. By the time he lands, the job has shifted from a simple photographic cover to a setup that could destroy him. He is framed from the inside and suddenly the agency that trained him is hunting him.

What makes Double Exposure unique is the way the spy work and the photography are woven together. A camera and a confident walk really do open doors that stay closed to everyone else. I have lived that part for close to 50 years, in a legal way. Reed uses that same access in a very different way. The book leans on real locations, real photo techniques, and the real feeling of working under pressure. It is a story about trust, about what an image can reveal or hide, and about a man who has to decide who he is once the lens is pointed back at him.

FQ: Please give our readers a little insight into your writing process. Do you set aside a certain time each day to write, only write when the desire to write surfaces, or something else?

VOCLAIN: I wish I could say I sit down every morning at 5 a.m. with a cup of coffee and a perfect word count goal. The truth is, I write in focused bursts when the story grabs me and refuses to let go.

When I was writing Double Exposure, my wife and I took a vacation to Hawaii. Beautiful beaches, blue water, all of it. And for one solid week, I hardly left the hotel. I was in a groove. I wrote all day, every day, because Reed and this story would not let me do anything else. I saw more of my laptop screen than the ocean, which my wife will never let me forget.

Back home, my photography work actually helps the writing. If I spend an hour photographing, I usually spend an hour in front of a computer perfecting those images. In those pockets of time, while files are backing up or software is processing, I slip back into the manuscript and keep the story moving. I do outline enough to know where I am headed, but I leave room for surprise. For me, it is less about a strict schedule and more about treating the story like a real job when it shows up and wants to work.

FQ: The genre of your book is an espionage thriller. Why this genre?

VOCLAIN: I would list the genre as an espionage thriller with a strong spy novel heart.

This is the genre I have always loved to read. John Grisham, Tom Clancy, Ian Fleming, those are the shelves I pull from when I want to disappear into a story. I enjoy books where smart people are forced to make hard choices under pressure, where small details matter, and where trust is as dangerous as any weapon.

When I started Double Exposure, I knew the spy piece would fit what I do for a living. A photographer is already halfway to being an operative. We blend in, move through secure spaces, pay attention to angles and details, and people rarely question why we are there. That felt like the perfect engine for a thriller.

The challenging part was holding two lines at once. I wanted the book to move fast and deliver the twists readers expect from this genre, but I also wanted the photography details to feel real. My goal was simple. If a working photographer reads it, they nod. If a thriller fan reads it, they turn pages late into the night. I have to say it was fun to do, and I think I pulled it off.

FQ: Is this the first book, the second, etc. in the series and how many books do you anticipate writing in this series?

VOCLAIN: Double Exposure is the first full length novel in what I see as an ongoing series. When I finished the book, it was clear that Reed Sawyer and this world had more stories in them.

I have already started writing a novella set in the same universe, titled Counter Exposure. It fits between books and gives readers a closer look at one of the side characters, Barry Cox, the villain in Double Exposure. My experience is that people do not just wake up one morning and say, “I am going to be a bad guy today.” They reason, explain, and justify what they do. That idea sits at the heart of the novella. Counter Exposure is about showing the story from the so called bad guy’s perspective and letting readers see how he gets there.

I am also working on the next full length novel in the series, Under Exposure, which picks up after the events of Double Exposure.

In my head, there are at least three main novels, with shorter stories and novellas filling in the gaps. Each book is written so a new reader can jump in and follow the story, but if you read them all, you start to see a larger picture of the agency, the photography world, and the cost of living a double life.

I have already added to the universe with a super short story called Code in the Grain, where I wake up inside my own novel. It was written for a contest. I did not win, but it was a lot of fun to write. That story is available on Amazon now and gives readers another small window into this world.

FQ: Tell us a bit about the series. Do you know where the series will take the characters or are you working that out as you go along with each book? What has been the reader response to your series?

VOCLAIN: The series of course is going to follow Reed Sawyer, a photographer who works for a covert agency that uses cameras, credentials, and confidence to move in and out of high security spaces. Each story takes him a little deeper into the question that sits underneath all of this: what does it cost a person to live behind a cover for too long.

I do have an overall arc in mind. I know where Reed starts and I have a good idea where I want him to end up. I know more about the agency than has shown up on the page so far, and I know there are secrets inside the secrets. At the same time, I like to leave myself room to discover things as I write. New characters step forward, side characters surprise me, and sometimes the “small” details end up driving the big turns.

Reader response has been very encouraging. Thriller fans talk about the pacing and the twists. Photographers enjoy spotting the real world details, the gear, and the way access works in embassies and events. Several readers have told me they can “see” the book as they read it, like watching a movie. That makes sense to me, since I have spent my whole life building stories in images. My goal is simple. With each new book, I want to expand the world a little more, raise the stakes, and keep readers eager to follow Reed into the next assignment.

FQ: Where did the idea for your story come from?

VOCLAIN: The idea for Double Exposure really started in an airport security line.

I was on my way to a photography job with a big tripod inside my bag. An agent pulled me aside, studied the X-ray, and called over more agents. For a few tense minutes, they treated that tripod like it might be a weapon. Then, once they realized it was “just camera gear,” the whole mood shifted. Smiles, a couple of questions about what I shoot, and suddenly I was waved through with a level of trust you do not usually see in an airport.

Walking away, I remember thinking, what if I was not just a photographer? What if I was working for someone else, someone who wanted access to the places my camera naturally gets me? That little “what if” stuck. I started paying attention to how many doors open when you carry a camera bag and act like you belong. Confidence is the key, if they think you belong then you belong.

The story grew from there. I took the real world access I have had for forty-five plus years and pushed it into the world of espionage. Reed Sawyer became the version of me on the other side of the line, a man who uses the same tools and confidence, but for a much more dangerous purpose.

If you only read just the prologue of my book you get a really good idea of how this story all started.

FQ: Tell us about the protagonist in your story.

VOCLAIN: Reed Sawyer is a professional photographer on the surface and a covert operative underneath. His cover is his camera. He travels to high profile events, embassies, and meetings where few people are invited, and he is there to “take pictures.” In reality, he is watching faces, habits, and offhand comments. The images he delivers to clients are real, but so is the intelligence he gathers in the background.

He is very good at what he does, but he is not a superhero. Reed is smart, observant, and quick on his feet, yet he carries the weight of the choices he makes. Loyalty matters to him, maybe more than it should in his line of work. In Double Exposure, the worst thing that can happen to someone like that happens. He is betrayed from inside his own agency and has to decide who he can trust when the people who trained him now want to erase him.

At his core, Reed is a man who believes in truth, even while working in a business built on lies and covers. He uses humor to keep things from getting too heavy, he sees the world through a photographer’s eye, and he is still figuring out where his moral line is. That tension between what he does for a living and who he wants to be as a person is what drives the story.

FQ: Are any of the characters based on real people you know? If so, how closely does your character mimic the real person?

VOCLAIN: Yes, several characters in Double Exposure started with real people I know, mostly from the photography world.

Barry Cox is loosely based on my good friend Gary Box, a photographer from Tulsa. Keith Kranch started with my friend Keith Branch. Marty Grimes began with my friend Darty Hines. In the book, Mr. Grimes runs a photography convention named SYNC. In real life, Darty Hines runs a photography convention named SYNC. So photographers who know that circle will see some familiar shadows right away.

Even the protagonist carries a real name. Reed Sawyer is my grandson, Reed Sawyer Gauthier. I borrowed his name with permission and a grin.

Now, that is pretty much where the mimicking stops. The real Gary, Keith, Darty, and my grandson are not part of a spy agency. At least, not that I know of. I took bits of personality, names, and inside jokes and then let the story do the rest. By the time the book was finished, the characters had become their own people, living in a much more dangerous world than the one we share at photography conventions.

FQ: What was the most difficult scene to write and why?

VOCLAIN: For me, the hardest “scene” was really the last stretch of the book, where everything has to click into place. Double Exposure has a lot of moving parts. Different locations, overlapping motives, people who are not who they seem at first glance. All of those threads have to land in a way that feels natural and earned.

Wrapping up the story was a real challenge. I spent a lot of time connecting dots. If Reed makes this choice here, it has to line up with what happened three chapters back. If a side character appears in Vienna, it has to make sense with what we saw in New Orleans. I did many rewrites and just as many re-reads, trimming, adjusting, and checking the logic.

By the time I reached the final scenes, I wanted the reader to feel that snap of recognition. That moment where you think, “Of course, it had to be this way,” even if you did not see it coming. Getting to that feeling was the toughest part of the job.

For more information about Double Exposure, please visit the author's website at: https://kirkvoclain.com/