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Comment from the book world in February 2016

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February 2016

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'Trying to write the book'

29 February 2016

‘Writer's block is a reluctance to make decisions. You're trying to keep your options open and hoping a simple idea comes along, so it's hard to commit to one. My wife once told me, as I was having trouble getting going, "That's because you're trying to write the book, and you just need to write a book.

I can't work if I can't walk. Even though I live in an urban area, I'm very close to the countryside and I like walking by the River Clyde. It helps me think and write; I read recently that it's because walking, running and physical tasks occupy certain parts of the brain and free up the collective unconscious to get on with itself, and suddenly thoughts can flow more freely and it's easy to process things. So even if it's windy and raining heavily I have to go out, although I've been told I look like a deep-sea fisherman when I do that.'

Christopher Brookmyre, author of Quite Ugly One Morning and Black Widow in the Independent on Sunday

 

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'But Rachel is not me'

22 February 2016

‘I knew this book would be my last chance and admit that before I wrote it, and even in the early stages, there was a fair amount of despair.

People, like I was, are intrigued by what they see or imagine on a travel route. I'm sure, too, that Rachel's weaknesses as an unusual and troubled person, can be identified with.

Of course I did occasionally drink a bit too much and fell into taxis without really remembering where I had been, but Rachel is not me.'

Paula Hawkins, author of The Girl on a Train, which shot to the top of the bestseller lists in the UK and US when it was published last year

 

 

'As if imagination has no part to play'

15 February 2016

‘Novelists are often asked which of their characters is them, as if imagination has no part to play. Most of us will answer that characters develop out of the need of the story itself. So my Cassie and her murderous actions are necessary in The Taxidermist's Daughter for the plot to work. She's not me, any more than is Freddie in The Winter Ghosts or Alais in Labyrinth. By the same measure, an author who has written a story with an unreliable narrator at the heart of things might choose to make their protagonist, say, an alcoholic - as Paula Hawkins does in The Girl on the Train. The reader at first discounts Rachel's impressions as delusional and muddled, which is crucial, before later having to learn to trust her. This is the nature of novel-writing, where individual characters drive forward individual aspects of the novel.

In any revenge narrative, you first have to confront the question of whether revenge is justified, then, how much might be too much? What steps can a woman justifiably take if there is no redress in law or natural justice? And how does the author engage the reader's sympathy without appearing to justify violence or contempt for life?'

Kate Mosse, author of The Taxidermist's Daughter and Labyrinth, in the Sunday Times

 

'Galloping imposter syndrome'

8 February 2016

‘Like a lot of authors I have galloping imposter syndrome: as far as I'm concerned I have cunningly infiltrated the writing community. With each book that gets published I have this dread fear that I'm going to be found out. Certainly when The Lie Tree was published, I thought: ‘This time they'll see through me for the fraud I am.' Things have not panned out as I expected!...

What I remember is the world I knew vanished and I was in this dark, other place with the sound of water and lights I couldn't identify moving in the distance. I remember a sense of awe and a sort of fear but also excitement and a weird stillness. Everything was potent and vivid and then the lights came back on but those seconds where I felt transported to that terrifying but fascinating other place left this imprint, as if part of my imagination never came back. I'm sorry, that sounds completely weird...

I was an everything-minded girl. I wanted to be so many things, but definitely a writer and an artist and an international spy.'

Frances Hardinge, winner of the 2015 Costa Book of the Year 2015 with The Lie Tree, in the Guardian