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Minette Walters talks about her life, her work and why she has never chosen to write a series based on one character.
Where did your interest in crime come from?
Two things really. Reading Grimm's Fairy Tales as a child.
It's all about baddies getting their come-uppance and wicked stepmothers being
rolled down the hill. Then there was the James Hanratty A6 murder case in the
1950s. (involving a man hanged for a murder that many thought he didn't commit).
To hang someone with the level of doubt that existed in that case, it was so
dreadful. He was one of the last people to be hanged in Britain. I was only
about nine or 10-years-old then. But I was absolutely fascinated.
Why did you pick a psychological thriller as your
first book?
I have always been fascinated by the challenge that crime fiction
represents to an author. I wanted to know if I could carry an intricate plot for
100,000 words, and keep readers guessing, while I was portraying characters
under considerable tension.
Why don't you have a
series character?
I'm always asked why I chose not to create a series character like
Poirot or Rebus, but I was never interested in creating a series character
because I wanted to be free to tackle whatever I wanted, when I wanted, without
being shackled to a particular person or place.
Of the books you have
written, who is your favourite character and why?
This is always very hard to answer because I become fond of all my
characters, even the murderers! It's quite hard to spend a year with people
- which is how long it takes me to write a book – and not end up liking their
good sides. From the author's point of view, the most interesting
characters to write are always the dark ones, so my favourites in purely
creative terms are probably Mathilda Gillespie from 'The Scold's Bridle', whose twisted voice comes through her diaries, and Fox in
'Fox Evil' whose even more twisted voice comes through his complex love/hate/abusive
relationship with 10-year-old Wolfie.
Is it true that you
often don't know "whodunit" until halfway through writing a book?
It's not sometimes...it's always! It's a much more exciting way to
write. The challenge is to create a puzzle for the readers. My job is to keep
them guessing for as long as I can. It's like flying by wire. You embark with
nothing, just a tightrope across a chasm. It's a much more enjoyable way to
write because I have to work it out along with the reader. If I don't know who
did it until half way, the reader is going to be fairly fazed as well. So it is
very "suspenseful" for both the author and the reader.
Do you put some of your
friends in your books?
Quite a lot of my friends think I have written them into my books,
but, if I have, they never pick the right characters. I always say to them
'You're absolutely right' because they usually pick on the nice characters!
Do you consciously
write with a specific reader in mind or do you write for yourself?
I write only for myself because anyone else would lose the plot if
they could only read an average of 500 words a day!
You've spent many years
as a prison visitor. Why do you go, and do you construct plots from the stories
you hear there?
I find prisoners tell you so much more about themselves than
friends ever do. At the dinner parties I go to, the topics are wine, mortgages,
and children's education or summer holidays, and that can get a bit tedious
after a while! However, I don't use the actual stories the prisoners tell me —
that would be extremely boring. I find I tend to use details of their
personalities in constructing the motivations of my characters.
What is your writing day
like?
It's a regular day. My two best working times are from early
morning to about 1.30pm and then from about 5pm until 8pm or later. I have a
lunch break and a rest. My husband Alec also has his office in the house. For
two years now we have been working in the same house. It works amazingly well.
We're both very disciplined. We take it in turns to make lunch and supper.
How long does it take
you to write a book?
The Ice House
took me two years to write. a year for my agent to
sell it and a year before it was published. By that time I had already finished
The Sculptress. It takes me about a year to write a thriller now.
Why have you been so
successful?
I concentrate on the trauma that exists within families and
communities when a murder is committed, and explore the tensions that
necessarily arise from it. Perhaps there is a greater sense of involvement for
my readers. That is not to say my stories are unremittingly bleak. I have a
great faith in the redeeming power of love. And that is also reflected in the
way I write. I think all my books are good "reads" which reflect my
own taste. My favourite books are always the ones I can't put down.
Where are you most popular?
I seem to be popular especially in Northern Europe, Denmark,
Scandinavia, France, and Germany. They have their own thriller writers but
readers in Europe seem to have a passion for the British variety. They love
Agatha Christie, the Germans, particularly. I think it's because they are
getting quite a good view of English life through crime writing. As a crime
writer you have to be very attentive to detail. I always say that if you want a
good picture of English life in the 30s, you'd do better to read Agatha Christie
rather than, say, Dorothy Sayers. Sayers was sort of swinging between Oxford
academia and the aristocracy of Lord Peter Wimsey. I am a great Sayers fan. But
Agatha Christie was dealing with suburbia, little county towns and bank managers
who weren't all they should have been.
How
would you describe yourself?
Essentially, I'm a workaholic who finds it physically impossible
to do nothing. My philosophy of life is: Make the most of it while you've got
it. Life's fun…death isn't!
What's next?
Sadly, Alec and I lost our three surviving parents during
the last 12 months. They came to live with us five years ago when we moved to
Dorset and, although all three were very frail, it was a shock to lose them so
close together. This was particularly true of our mothers who died within six
weeks of each other during the summer. As a result, finishing Disordered
Minds was even more challenging. So, I really felt the need to
re-charge my batteries, which was why I decided to take a short break from
writing and publicity following its publication. However, I have now started
work on book number 11 and hope to support its publication with a book tour in
2005.
Unless otherwise stated, this interview was conducted at the time the book was first published, and is reproduced with permission of the publisher. This interview may not be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the copyright holder.
Kate Atkinson won the Whitbread (now Costa) Book of the Year prize with her first novel, Behind the Scenes at the Museum. Her four bestselling novels featuring former detective Jackson Brodie became the BBC television series ... (more)
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The Breaker
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Australian-born Geraldine Brooks is an author and journalist who grew up in the Western suburbs of Sydney, attending Bethlehem College Ashfield and the University of Sydney. She worked as a reporter for The Sydney Morning ... (more)
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The Swift and the Harrier
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