In the fictitious world of the television crime drama Castle, novelist Richard Castle is not only a successful mystery writer but a bona fide “rock star” within the genre. His resume includes over twenty-five bestselling books, most of which center on the adventures of private detective Derrick Storm. Castle has also written a second series of novels featuring a newer protagonist – New York homicide detective Nikki Heat – that have likewise found success, including a big-screen adaptation of the inaugural volume, Heat Wave.
At night, meanwhile, Castle participates in a weekly poker game with such real-life mystery writers as James Patterson, Michael Connelly, and the late Stephen J. Cannell, while by day he assists Detective Kate Beckett of the New York Police Department solve murders as a consultant to the force.
Richard Castle is more than a fictional television character, however, as the producers of the series capitalized on the popularity of the show by likewise releasing Castle’s oeuvre into the factual world-at-large. Thus while Heat Wave climbed the fictional charts of Castle, it simultaneously found itself on the actual New York Times Best Sellers list as well.
As further testament to “life imitating art,” Derrick Storm also made the transition from the imaginary realm of television to the real world with a graphic novel adaptation of the private investigator’s first case in September 2011, co-created by acclaimed comic book writers Brian Michael Bendis and Kelly Sue DeConnick.
Castle creator Andrew Marlowe often noted that The Rockford Files was a source of inspiration for the television crime drama, and the same holds true for Derrick Storm. Instead of master detective, Storm is a down-and-out private eye who takes on domestic cases of infidelity in order to make ends meet. The only mail he receives are bills, collection notices, and the occasional postcard from an ex-girlfriend interested in reconnecting.
The character of Richard Castle is also reflected in Derek Storm. When a routine investigation involving a cheating husband turns into a case of American spies betraying their country, a CIA operative hires Storm to assist in finding a missing agent. “Let me have it,” he replies before adding, “My secret agent toy. My spy phone that’s really a camera. A pen that’s a gun. My invisible jet.” Castle would no doubt have generated the same enthusiasm if placed in a similar situation.
Deadly Storm was not the only Richard Castle creation released in September 2011 as the third Nikki Heat novel, Heat Rises, debuted one week earlier. Through the course of Castle’s multiple seasons, Richard Castle has often been heard saying “that needs to go in the book,” and Heat Rises contains moments that are easily recognizable to fans of the series, similar to the previously published Heat Wave and Naked Heat.
In the television installment “Last Call,” for instance, Kate Beckett and Richard Castle investigate the murder of a former dockworker turned bar owner. “It’s legendary, all the great writers drank there,” Castle explains of the tavern. “It’s noted as history. First as a blacksmith, then a bordello. It only became a bar during prohibition as a speakeasy and it was one on the best. I swear you can still feel the vibration of every notorious episode of glamour and debauchery on its wall. The Old Haunt is the last of a dying breed.”
In Heat Rises, meanwhile, the corresponding duo of Nikki Heat and Jameson Rook are led to another fictitious New York tavern during their own investigation. “He knew the Brass Harpoon for several reason,” the novel says of Rook. “First, it was one of those legendary writer’s bars of old Manhattan. Booze-infused geniuses from Hemingway to Cheever to O’Hara to Exley left their condensation rings on the bar and on tabletops at the Harpoon over the decades. It was also a mythical survivor of prohibition, with its secret doors and underground tunnels, long since condemned, where alcohol could be smuggled in and drunks smuggled out blocks away.”
In addition to brief references to actual episodes of Castle, the characters of Heat Rises likewise shares similarities with those on the television show. Richard Castle’s tendency to offer humorous puns regarding the way victims have been murdered is one example. In Heat Rises, Nikki Heat is forced to stab an attacker with an icicle in order to halt his deadly attack. “Please tell me you said ‘Freeze,’ because that would only be perfect,” Jameson Rook tells her afterwards.
Then there’s the character of Nikki Heat, who has been modeled by Richard Castle after his television partner in crime solving, Kate Beckett. Part of the admiration that Castle exhibits towards Beckett has to do with the New York detective’s ability to empathize with the victims, a trait that has been incorporated into the personality of Nikki Heat as well.
“And then, cold as she was, the homicide cop stopped and stood there to perform her next ritual – a pause to honor the dead she was about to meet,” Heat Rises observes. “That small, quiet, private moment lived as a ceremonial interval Nikki Heat claimed when she arrived at every crime scene. Its purpose was simple. To reaffirm that, victim or villain, the waiting corpse was human and deserved to be respected and treated individually, not as the next stat.”
Despite similarities between the characters and obvious allusions to previous episodes of the television series, the Nikki Heat novels are well-written mystery tomes that contain their own originality and are more than capable of standing on their own merit. They have also found their own level of success. The first release – Heat Wave – eventually rose to number six on the New York Times Best Seller list in 2009, with follow-up novel Naked Heat debuting at number seven the following year. 2011, meanwhile, featured two Richard Castle creations making the charts – Deadly Storm entered at number three while Heat Rises hit the number one slot.
Richard Castle may not be the same “master of the macabre” in the real world like he is on Castle, but he is a bona fide bestselling author on both sides of the television screen nonetheless.
Anthony Letizia