Today I’m joining the blog tour for The Woven Lie. I’m sharing my Q&A with the authors with thanks to Rachel Gilbey at Rachel’s Random Resources for inviting me on the tour and to Liz Harris for answering my questions!

Have you always wanted to write?

I’ve always loved writing, from imagining I was donkey in the Sahara to my essays for degree examinations, and I’ve always loved reading what others had written.

I had never thought of connecting my love of writing with my passion for reading, though, until one day a friend of mine, a recipient of my regular voluminous letters, stood in front of me holding up one of my lengthy tomes in her hand. ‘Why don’t you write a novel?’ she asked in weariness.

So I did, and I’ve never looked back.

What were your previous jobs? Have they helped you with your writing process?

They helped me with what I write, rather than how I write it. The latter evolves from the requirements of the particular story I’m writing. Every novel is different from the last, so the way I approach writing each novel inevitably differs.

During my six years in California in my twenties, I did a variety of jobs, such as cocktail waitressing on Sunset Strip, collecting and returning hired cars, looking after children, secretarial. All these introduced me to a range of people I might not have otherwise met, who are bound to have influenced me. I believe that everyone a writer encounters at any time of their life is likely to colour the characters and themes of their novels, possibly consciously, probably subconsciously.

When back in England, I taught English and French in secondary schools. In The Best Friend, a central character, Caroline, is an English teacher. She isn’t me but she has elements of me, and she’s modelled on what I saw in some classrooms. And she and I both taught ‘Carrie’s War’. In the same novel, I have a trainee barrister, Emily. My first degree was Law so some of what I wrote came from first-hand knowledge. I also had a very attractive lawyer in Evie Undercover.

What was your inspiration for The Woven Lie?

This was the third of the Three Sisters trilogy, in which each novel is complete in itself. The head of the family was John Hammond, owner of several haberdashery/notions shops. He and his wife and three daughters were introduced in The Loose Thread. I’d chosen a family who would be very different from the Linford family who appeared in the series beginning with The Dark Horizon. The head of the Linford family was the chair of the family’s successful construction company.

So I already had the family background, and I knew that Violet, whose story The Woven Lie is, had been training for some years to be a teacher. We glimpsed her in the first two novels about the Hammonds.

I knew also that the novel would be set in 1948, the year in which the NHS came into being. So there’d have to be at least one doctor in the story.

I felt that making Violet a teacher would limit the scope of what I could do with her story, so I wondered in what else she might be interested. A museum came to my mind, and at the same moment, I saw in my head the pinched face of someone already working in the museum, a character to be called Gladys Wilson, and I knew that I had my story.

How do you construct your characters? Do they have traits of people you know?

Not consciously, no. Although they probably do, but I’m not aware of it. When I’m writing my characters’ responses to words or actions, I’m standing in their shoes and thinking how the character I’d created would react. But their responses will have been influenced by the things I’ve learnt about people, which will have come subconsciously from my experience in the past.

I hope all my characters come across as human beings with flaws. Most people have flaws (I exempt myself, of course!) and some flaws are more extreme than others.

What does your writing process look like? Are you a plotter or a pantser?

I can’t imagine anyone being a true pantser unless they’d written a large number of similar books before embarking upon their latest. If they were, their editing at the end must be a nightmare.

In the opening three chapters you’re introducing the reader to the genre of book it is, the period and location of the story, and you’re setting in motion the plot and the conflict. Life for a novelist is much easier, therefore, if they know from the outset where they’re going and can point the reader in that direction.

I think most authors are a combination of both plotter and pantser. Like a train, you know the station from which the train sets out, and you know the station at which the journey will end. You also know some of the large stations where it’ll stop on the way to its destination, but you don’t yet know the smaller stations in between. You discover those as you write the book, and stand in your characters’ shoes.

How did you research? Did you enjoy it?

Apart from a mountain of research books that I read before I start writing, carefully storing the information I garner in headed online files, for The Dark Horizon, I went to New York; for A Bargain Struck, Golden Tiger and A Western Heart I went to Wyoming; for my four books set in Asia, starting with Darjeeling Inheritance, I went to India and Vietnam; for The Loose Thread, The Silken Knot and The Woven Lie, I went to Jersey, France and Suffolk. For the book I’m currently writing, Jaipur Moon, I’m off to Jaipur in March.

All the trips are tax deductible, so yes, I really enjoy researching my novels! 

Who are your favourite writers? Are you influenced by them?

It’s an interesting question. Jane Austen is my all-time favourite. She was the first writer I’d read who allowed her characters to open their mouths and condemn themselves, rather than it being left to the author to tell the reader the character’s flaws.

I hope that my characters, by their words and actions, show the sort of people they are, and that the reader doesn’t have to rely on me telling them in an authorial voice what the characters are like.

I can’t begin to list my other favourites as I read and like the books of so many writers. At the moment, I’m reading the Ruth and Nelson books by Elly Griffiths and I’m really enjoying them. They are the novels she’s set in an archaeological background. I love the banter between Ruth and Nelson, and the wry authorial comments.

If you could invite three people, living or dead, to dinner, who would they be and why?

William Shakespeare.  Being an actor and a playwright, he’d be very entertaining company.

Moreover, I would be the toast of school children throughout the country for putting an end to the speculation that plagues them throughout their examination years as to which were the exact words that Shakespeare wrote, and which parts of his plays he wrote himself, and which he didn’t.  

Having taught for many years, I should enjoy the novelty of coming across as one of the good guys for a change!

Tony Warren. Although an actor and a writer of television dramas and critically acclaimed novels, he’s best known for creating the soap opera Coronation Street.  With his ear for dialogue, scurrilous gossip and for the foibles of others, I think that he’d be a highly entertaining companion at any dinner table.

Delia Smith. While I’d have to deflect her from any mention of Norwich Football Club as I find discussion of sport tedious in the extreme, she could be a very useful dinner companion if anything went wrong with the meal. In the event of a culinary disaster, with Delia at the table, we wouldn’t have to leave with empty stomachs – she’d be able to slip into the kitchen and do wonderful things with an egg.

Who would you least like to be stuck in a lift with and why?

Elon Musk. I’m afraid I might do him a physical injury that could result in me being incarcerated for a lengthy period of time in something not much more comfortable than a lift!

Who would play the main character/s in a film version of The Woven Lie? 

Violet – Saoirse Ronan or Florence Pugh

Dr Edward Russell – Jack Lowden (but without a beard)

Gladys Wilson – Cate Blanchett

Stanley Patterson – Gary Oldman

What do you like to do in your spare time?

I love reading. I always have a book on the go, but because of the amount of research I have to get through in the day, I read only in bed at night.

I love the cinema – I’m seeing ‘Conclave’ next week.

I love cryptic crosswords, particularly those in the Daily Telegraph. I prefer not to buy The Daily Telegraph so I buy the books of their cryptic crosswords. When I met Colin Dexter, the creator of Morse, we bonded over our love of cryptic crosswords and of The Archers, and ended up friends. He came to my launch in Waterstones Oxford for The Road Back and gave a talk.

What is next for you?

I’m currently writing Jaipur Moon, set in 1934, my fifth book set in Asia.

Unlike the other novels I’ve set in India, although Jaipur, known as the pink city, is set in 1934, at the time of the British Raj, it was a princely state. The British had a Residency in Jaipur and a few areas of governmental responsibility, but Jaipur was run by the Maharajah. 

As I said above, I’m off to Jaipur in March and I can’t wait. I saw a lot of India during my last visit, but didn’t get to Jaipur, so this is an exciting first.

Favourites:

Book?

Pride and Prejudice

Film?

The Nun’s Story (I love the book, too)

Band/Singer?

I love opera and classical music.

TV show?

Scandi noir – I watch a lot of Walter Presents. I also enjoy programmes such as ‘Call the Midwife’, and police programmes set in the UK. I’m very eclectic in my taste.

Colour?

Dark blue

Place?

My study. It’s my little corner of paradise.

Biscuit?

Most chocolate biscuits, but not Jaffa Cakes.

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The Woven Lie is available from Amazon.

You can follow the rest of the blog tour here: