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Writer Tom Rachman, photographed in Toronto in June, dedicated his second novel, The Rise & Fall of Great Powers, to his sister, who died in May, 2012.Fred Lum/The Globe and Mail

Tom Rachman's debut novel The Imperfectionists, about a troubled English-language newspaper in Rome – informed by his own experiences in journalism – was an international bestseller that was translated into 25 languages. Mr. Rachman, who was born in London, moved to Vancouver when he was seven in 1982 and stayed through high school. It was here that he developed a great love for bookshops – which informs his second novel, The Rise & Fall of Great Powers. The story unfolds during three periods and in various settings, including a used bookshop in a tiny Welsh town.

The Globe reached Mr. Rachman in London, where he now lives, ahead of his appearance this week at the Vancouver Writers Fest.

Your first novel was a huge success. Was it intimidating to begin work on the second?

I would say in most respects that the second one is much easier. The first one I wrote having absolutely no idea whether it would ever be published. I had quit a steady, good job in journalism and I took all of my savings, moved to a different city and was slaving away in Paris in the dear hopes that maybe what I was writing would one day be seen by somebody. And the stress of that was tremendous because you never really know whether what you're writing is complete junk and only valid in your own hopes. As it turned out I got incredibly lucky with that book. And having had that experience, I didn't then think with the next one what a terrible situation I'm in that people are now going to be reading my new book that is definitely going to be published. There are a tremendous number of very fine, worthy writers who only get one book [published] and through just bad circumstance or luck, it's never properly recognized, and they don't maybe get another one. So if I were to sit around and lament the fact that I do, then I would be looking at it in all the wrong ways.

The book is partly set in a used bookshop. How formative was the bookshop experience for you?

It meant a huge amount to me. My father and I had a lovely tradition when I was growing up in Vancouver. Every weekend we would go on this route – we would go to Granville market, then we would go to A&B Sound and look at the music, then we would top if off by going somewhere like MacLeod's or one of the other great used or new bookshops around town and we would spend the rest of the afternoon there. I would get to pick one or two books. It was one of the highlights of every week. I should add, though, that when I was young, I wasn't the most bookish kid at all. I was really much more stuck in movies. In fact, the first books I would have chosen were probably books about the film industry and old Hollywood movies. I think it was partly that experience of being treated to these books that got me interested [in literature] and the fact that he wasn't saying you must read this or that. Instead, he was just loosing me inside an amazing fire hazard of a bookshop like MacLeod's, and it was up to me to decide whatever suited me. And from that you manage to tap into somebody's passion.

As I travelled around the world after that I always went for the bookshops wherever I went and always found companionship inside them. They continue to be among my favourite places of refuge in the world.

Are you concerned about the current state of retail bookselling?

I suppose that I'm concerned in some ways because it's hard not to notice the extraordinarily large place that digital media now have in everybody's every minute, pretty much. I have no idea what's going to happen technologically, but I do have a certain degree of faith in a portion of humanity to continue to demand great books.

It's interesting that you say when you were a kid you were more interested in movies because your books are cinematic. Do you think there's some cross-pollination there?

I think there must have been because so many people have said that to me that I'm sure they must be right. It's not something that I've ever done consciously, but I think there must be an accumulated effect of having watched five movies a week throughout my childhood. I think that whatever form of storytelling it is that you're absorbed with in your childhood is formative. I never ever sit there thinking I want this to be cinematic; I just want to write the scene as well as I can.

The rights for The Imperfectionists were picked up by Brad Pitt's production company; what's the status of that?

They worked up a screenplay. Trying to condense so many characters into the 100-minute format was such that they had to eliminate an awful lot of characters. I think that ultimately everybody decided that this was something that would probably work better as a TV series rather than a film. Something with a bigger canvas so you could replicate the book a little bit better. So they suggested that we try to make it a TV series and the auction of the rights ended up moving from Plan B, which is Brad Pitt's company, to BBC Worldwide, which is the LA-based production of BBC. So they are now developing it as a television series.

The Rise & Fall of Great Powers is set primarily in Wales, New York and Bangkok, but also Italy, Ireland. B.C. got a mention. Did you do much travelling in researching and writing the book?

I did a ton of research for the book and a lot of it involved travel. I like to invent as best I can the characters and the story lines; however I like the settings to be authentic; it always ends up enriching in unexpected ways the characters and the stories that I've already created. And in this case I went to Thailand, Italy, I went to the Welsh Hills, I went around New York, so almost every place that appears in the book, I was there taking notes and interviewing people.

The book is dedicated to your sister Emily [who died in May, 2012] and in the acknowledgments you write, 'This book is not about my sister Emily, but her life infused mine when I wrote the novel.'

I kind of regret having put that in there because people always ask me about it and in some cases they completely misread it and say, 'Oh, you based the character on your sister.' What I meant by that was that she was very very ill when I was writing the book so her life, rather than her death, suffused my own and my own thoughts when I was writing the book. The book was in effect written before she even got sick or before we knew she was sick. So it didn't actually affect the content; it was just more that she was very, very important in my life when I was writing it.

You're about to return to Vancouver for the Writers Festival. Does that feel special for you?

It is special. It's funny when I was growing up in Vancouver I wanted to see the world and kind of escape, and as I've gotten older the more intense my affection for the city grows each time I go there. It is a city that I'm deeply fond of. My parents still live there. It's been an amazing home for my family for more than a quarter-century now so it means a huge amount. The funny part that in terms of coming back to talk about my writing, my entire professional career has taken place outside of Vancouver. So it feels a little bit weird; it sort of feels like going back to my past and I feel slightly odd about it.

This interview has been edited and condensed.

Tom Rachman appears at the Vancouver Writers Fest on Friday and Saturday.

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