Under The Mistletoe, by Sue Moorcroft

Regular blog readers will know I've been friends with Sue Moorcroft for a while, having met at the Kettering Writers Group in 1999 (the group leader was of a more literary bent, so we genre writers were consigned to the back of the room, where we had great fun).  Since then she's gone from strength to strength, hitting number one in the Kindle Bestseller charts (with The Christmas Promise), becoming a Sunday Times Best Seller and her novel, A Summer To Remember (which I wrote about here) won the Goldsboro Books Contemporary Romantic Novel Award 2020.  As well as featuring her a lot on blog (to see more, click this link), I'm also pleased to be one of her beta-readers and thoroughly enjoyed her latest novel, Under The Mistletoe, now available in paperback and as an e-book.

Snuggle up with a mince pie, a cup of cocoa and the most heartwarming book this Christmas from the bestselling Sue Moorcroft.

Christmas. A time for family, friends – and rekindling old flames…

When Laurel returns to the village of Middledip, she’s looking for a quiet life. Adjusting to her recent divorce, she’s ready to spend some time getting back on her feet amidst the glorious snow-dusted countryside.

Yet, life in Middledip is far from straightforward. Coming to the aid of her sister, Rea, as she navigates her own troubles, Laurel barely has a moment to think about where her own life is going.

However, time stands still when she sees her old flame, Grady Cassidy – and it’s soon as if they’ve never been apart. But through her happiness, Laurel remembers why she left the village all those years ago, as she recalls a dark night and Grady’s once-wayward brother, Mac…

Can Laurel learn to forgive and forget? Or will her chances of Christmas under the mistletoe with Grady remain a dream?

My review:

Another winner, this is set in the heart of Sue's beloved Middledip and all the better for it.  Laurel, orphaned as a teen and looked after by her older sister Rea, left Middledip after a sexual assault and only comes back as a thirtysomething to help Rea with her daughter Daisy.  While there, she literally bumps into one of the group who attacked her, along with his brother Grady, who Laurel fancied at the time and still, she discovers, has a thing for.  Now a successful artist, Laurel is soon drawn into village life and as her relationship with Grady builds, so does the inevitable confrontation with the people who caused her so much anguish.  Strikingly well told, as always, this is filled with vivid characters (a lot of whom have either been the protagonists of previous novels, or were at least featured players), plenty of humour and a willingness to deal with the grittier side of life.  Hugely entertaining, thoroughly embracing the spirit of Christmas (I defy anyone to read this and not see the little cottages swathed in snow) and told with wit and pace, this is a cracking novel and I highly recommend it.

* * *

Thankfully - taking care to mask up and socially distance - Sue & I have been able to start meeting again, to chat over a drink at The Trading Post and I took the chance to ask her a few questions about the new novel.

MW:   Thanks for doing this Sue and I have to say, the book is a real treat.  What was it that sparked it off in the first place?

SM:   I had a memory of something that I think happened locally when I was at senior school, which caused a bit of a stir. I remember hearing a man say, dismissively, ‘Surely it was just horseplay that got out of hand?’ and I wasn’t impressed with his attitude. I haven’t given the exact same situation to Laurel but one that has much in common with it. Then I sat back and tried to work out the attitudes of various characters. It soon became clear that forgiveness - or being unable to forgive - was going to be a major theme.

MW:   I really enjoyed your setting for the book and I'm sure your fans will too but for you, as the writer, how much fun was it being back in Middledip for Christmas?

SM:   A lot. Middledip certainly knows how to do Christmas! The pub’s lit up like Santa’s Grotto and there are Christmas trees in every window. I enjoyed creating a village art group and have them all make Christmassy things. The cover image is actually a slice of a picture painted as a community art project.

MW:   There's a testing of sibling love in the story, did that come from personal experience?

SM:   Not at all. I’m very lucky that I get on extremely well with my brothers. I think that’s why I went onto Twitter and asked people how they’d feel if their sibling had been involved in ‘horse play that got out of hand’, especially if they loved them and looked up to them. Interestingly, not a single person said they’d overlook it. They spoke of disappointment and disillusionment. They felt that when trust was broken at such a fundamental level it would be hard to deal with, despite them continuing to love the person in question. I don’t think I could have had Grady and Mac stop speaking or anything, though.

MW:   I remember reading some of the online responses and have to say, I felt the same way.  Moving on a big element of the novel is accepting people's faults and issues and forgiving them.  Where did that come from?

SM:   When Grady learned the truth about what Mac got caught up in led me to puzzle over how Laurel was going to be able to move forward with a life with Grady. Her - very understandable - feelings had painted her into a corner. In fact, she’s plagued by a desire for revenge, rather than a wish to let bygones by bygones.

Mac was in a bad situation, too. He was horrified when Laurel returned to the village. To him, her reappearance threatened everything he’d worked for and the peace of everyone he loved. We can’t forgive to order or stop feeling something just because someone wants us to. She had to have a moment when she could see a way for everyone to get what they wanted. She and I puzzled over that for a long time!

MW:   And the business with the compostable wreaths!

SM:   Did you like that idea?

MW:   Yes, I really did.

SM:   Last year, I had a couple made by a friend of the family. I really liked the natural look and I also liked the idea of there being no plastic or wire involved. You need something whippy like willow, beech or clematis so you can wind it into a circlet. Collect evergreen leaves, cones, seed heads and berries and, using 100% jute twine, tie them into little bunches. Then tie the bunches on the circlet so they lie attractively. You don’t have to cover the entire circlet - half covered looks nice, too. After Christmas put the wreath on your compost heap or garden refuse bin instead of contributing to landfill.

I know you’re going to rush off and make one, now…

MW:   I am.  Though Dad's a big fan of yours, so if he reads this, he might not be surprised come Christmas...  

 

Sue Moorcroft is an international bestselling author and has reached the #1 spot on Kindle UK. She’s won the Goldsboro Books Contemporary Romantic Novel Award, Readers’ Best Romantic Novel award and the Katie Fforde Bursary. Published by HarperCollins in the UK, US and Canada and by other publishers around the world.

Her short stories, serials, columns, writing ‘how to’ and courses have appeared around the world.

Born into an army family in Germany, Sue spent much of her childhood in Cyprus and Malta but settled in Northamptonshire at the age of ten. An avid reader, she also loves Formula 1, travel, family and friends, dance exercise and yoga.

Website: www.suemoorcroft.com

Blog: https://suemoorcroft.wordpress.com/ 
Facebook: sue.moorcroft.3
Facebook author page: https://www.facebook.com/SueMoorcroftAuthor
Twitter: @suemoorcroft
Instagram: suemoorcroftauthor
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/suemoorcroft
Amazon author page: Author.to/SueMoorcroft

Under The Italian Sun, by Sue Moorcroft

Regular blog readers will know I've been friends with Sue Moorcroft since we met at the Kettering Writers Group in 1999 (the group leader was of a more literary bent, so we genre writers were consigned to the back of the room, where we had great fun).  Since then she's gone from strength to strength, hitting number one in the Kindle Bestseller charts (with The Christmas Promise), becoming a Sunday Times Best Seller and her 2019 novel, A Summer To Remember (which I wrote about here) won the Goldsboro Books Contemporary Romantic Novel Award 2020.  As well as featuring her a lot on blog (to see more, click this link), I'm also pleased to be one of her beta-readers and thoroughly enjoyed her latest novel, Under The Italian Sun, now available in paperback and as an e-book.

A warm, sun-baked terrace.

The rustle of verdant green vines.

The sun slowly dipping behind the Umbrian mountains.

And the chink of wine glasses as the first cork of the evening is popped…

Welcome to Italy. A place that holds the answer to Zia-Lucia Costa Chalmers’ many questions. Not least, how she ended up with such a mouthful of a name.

When Zia discovers that her mother wasn’t who she thought she was, she realises the time has come to search out the Italian family she’s never known.

However, as she delves into the secrets of her past, she doesn’t bargain on having to think about her future too. But with local vineyard owner, Piero, living next door, Zia knows she has a serious distraction who may prove difficult to ignore…

This summer, join Zia as she sets out to uncover her past. But can she find the future she’s always dreamed of along the way?

My review:

A warm, sun-baked terrace. The rustle of verdant green vines. The sun slowly dipping behind the Umbrian mountains. And the chink of wine glasses as the first cork of the evening is popped.  Welcome to Italy...

A big fan of Sue's writing anyway, I enjoyed this a great deal. The story rolls along with a good pace, Zia and Piero are wonderful leads (equally feisty and damaged, they spark off one another nicely), the locations are well used and evocatively described, with a nice callback to One Summer In Italy too. The ‘baddies’ (for want of a better term) are smart and hissable, the older characters are superbly observed (and brilliantly funny too) and the plot is tied in well. The emotional side, as always, is pitch perfect and really tugged at the heartstrings, especially towards the end with hints of sad family lives (the boy at the bar and “be happy” particularly) but is solid all the way through. 

Another winner, this is an excellent read that I highly recommend.

* * *

With the pandemic still here, Sue and I weren't able to have our regular get-together at The Trading Post (and oh, how I've missed that, though we did manage to fit in a socially distanced walk over Christmas), but went virtual instead as we discussed her new novel.

MW:   As always, there’s a very real sense of place in Under The Italian Sun and it’s clearly an area of the world you love.  What made you decide to “go back to Italy”?

SM:   The idea of a British woman named  Zia-Lucia, and Zia Lucia in Italian translating to Aunt Lucia, was part of it. The spark for the book, writing about someone who almost had the same name as someone she didn’t know, just hit me one day. It proved a happy chance as the pandemic would have made on-the-ground research of a new place impossible, whereas I’ve visited the region of Umbria in Italy. For the past seven years I’ve led courses and writing retreats for Arte Umbria, so I had a lot of experiences and photos to draw on. I had planned to write a chunk of the book at Arte Umbria but, of course, the retreat had to be postponed.

MW:   Your work always has a serious topic at its heart, what made you choose the family issues that dominate this one?

SM:   I’m not sure why I wrote about a woman searching for her birth father, other than it being an intriguing idea. I always knew my own dad and my lovely parents stayed together, so it’s not like I had a story of my own to tell. I was interested in the story of a friend who was adopted and I spoke to her at length on her feelings about identity. I used those feelings rather than her history because her search had different, serious consequences, which didn’t belong in Under the Italian Sun.

I do know why I wrote about postpartum psychosis. Some years ago I joined several friends for a literary lunch and as I sat down someone said, ‘Mind the baby under the table.’ I looked under the table, and there was a baby sleeping peacefully in his car seat. He was the nephew of one of my friends. She was looking after him because her brother’s wife, the baby’s mum, was suffering from postpartum psychosis. I’d never heard of postpartum psychosis and was astonished to learn of the awful effects of this rare condition. I always thought I’d write about the baby under the table at some time. It didn’t happen exactly as I’d first envisaged but that’s often the way my books develop. I explore ideas and my plotty head tells me which way to take them.

By coincidence, I saw a film called Irene’s Ghost made by Iain Cunningham  of forwardslashfilms.com. It was about his search for information about his own mum, who died when he was very young, and who had suffered from postpartum psychosis. I tweeted him to say how much I’d enjoyed the film and that I was writing about the same subject and he offered to chat. He was kind enough to offer insight into how Zia might feel to realise her past wasn’t quite what she’d thought it.

MW:   There’s a wonderfully hissable villain in this (who isn’t the person you originally suspect) and it feels like you had great fun writing him.  Was that the case?

SM:   I suppose it was! Brendon was originally just a boyfriend who’d cheated on Zia. Ending the relationship, and her redundancy, provided her with the opportunity to look into living in Italy. Finding the father she’d been told was Italian seemed the place to start because kinship could make it easier for her to obtain citizenship. There are traditional roles for ex-boyfriends. Maybe the heroine misses him; maybe she’s been bruised by him; maybe he shows her what she doesn’t want in a man. With Brendon, I decided to make his role subtler. I heard someone talk about a relationship where the guy was the one who cheated but couldn’t bear being to blame for the end of everything. He was like a kid whining, ‘I don’t want it to be my fault!’ He tried to romance the woman back because, to his mind, it would change the narrative to ‘You overreacted to a meaningless encounter.’ Then he’d feel better about himself. I thought a person like that would make a much more interesting ex.

MW:   The plot has plenty of twists and turns, can you talk me through your process a little, on how you kept track of everything?

SM:   I usually begin a book by exploring the characters of my hero and heroine and how various people in the book view them. I research themes, goals and conflicts. My brother helps me here as I send him a list of things I’m interested in and questions I need answered and he provides me with answers, links and related reading. He’s good at this and it saves me valuable time. I start working on goals and conflicts, what characters want consciously and sub-consciously, what’s going to get them together and what’s going to keep them apart. Then I make a list of things I see happening. And that’s about the extent of the plan. I start writing. I often feel like one of those people who have fifty plates spinning at once. As the book develops, I make notes on paper, notes on my notes app, notes on the manuscript itself … I’m lucky I have a reasonable memory so it somehow all comes together. In the second draft I sort out knots and stupidities then I send it to my editor to see if she can find any others. (She always does.)

MW:   So what’s next?

SM:   A winter book. It has the working title of Christmas Now and Then and is due out in the UK on 28th October 2021. It’s set in Middledip, the English village that exists in my head (there’s a map on my website, too). Laurel Hill returns to the village after an absence of nineteen years because her sister, Rea, is struggling with agoraphobia. This is making life difficult for her fourteen-year-old daughter, Daisy. Trouble is, Laurel left Middledip for a reason - and he still lives there.

Thank you for inviting me for a chat, Mark. It’s always a pleasure.

Sue Moorcroft Sunday Times bestselling author and has reached the coveted #1 spot on Amazon Kindle UK as well as top 100 in the US. She’s won the Goldsboro Books Contemporary Romantic Novel Award, Readers’ Best Romantic Novel award and the Katie Fforde Bursary. Sue’s emotionally compelling, feel-good novels are currently released by publishing giant HarperCollins in the UK, US and Canada and by an array of publishers in other countries. 

Her short stories, serials, columns, writing ‘how to’ and courses have appeared around the world.

Born into an army family in Germany, Sue spent much of her childhood in Cyprus and Malta but settled in Northamptonshire at the age of ten. An avid reader, she also loves Formula 1, travel, family and friends, dance exercise and yoga.

Website: www.suemoorcroft.com

Blog: https://suemoorcroft.wordpress.com/ 
Facebook: sue.moorcroft.3
Facebook author page: https://www.facebook.com/SueMoorcroftAuthor
Twitter: @suemoorcroft
Instagram: suemoorcroftauthor
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/suemoorcroft
Amazon author page: Author.to/SueMoorcroft

Dark Missives, a Q&A with Dan Howarth

With the publication of his debut collection, Dark Missives, I decided to ask Dan Howarth some questions...

DARK MISSIVES is the debut collection from author Dan Howarth, bringing together 11 stories that encompass the full range of horror.

A holiday camp employee finds himself in the middle of a murder spree. A band’s biggest fan discovers just how far he will go for new music. A detective investigating a series of murders gets pulled into the seedy underbelly of the city. A delivery driver gives in to temptation and opens a suspicious package. The owner of a gallery is determined to leave his own legacy on the art world.

Let DARK MISSIVES take you on a tour of the roads less travelled in Northern England to explore what truly lies in the shadows.

Dan Howarth is a writer from the North Of England (Manchester born but now living on Merseyside).  Co-editor of several anthologies with James Everington, I first got to know him when my story appeared in The Hyde Hotel (2016) and since then, we’ve established a little mutual support group, spurring one another on with our novel writing.

Although his work has appeared in many publications, Dark Missives is his first full-length release and collects eleven short stories.  Away from writing, he enjoys craft beer, German football and BBQ food, which seems a winning combination.

After he kindly interviewed me over the release of my novella The Exercise (you can read the interview at his site here), I jumped at the chance to ask him some questions and this is what happened.

MW:  What can you tell me about your debut collection, Dark Missives?

DH:   Dark Missives collects eleven stories from my back catalogue for the first time and is my first full length book. 

There are four originals and seven stories published or produced elsewhere. I’ve been lucky enough to have my stories produced as podcast episodes at The Other Stories podcast numerous times, so whilst these stories are hitting print for the first time, they have previously made their way to readers/listeners. 
The stories that are original to the collection are generally a bit longer and a bit weirder. Lots of short story markets ask for stories under 5k words. I’ve got a few stories in here that I’m really pleased with, they just never fit a market, word count wise. 

MW:   What made you decide to go the self-published route? 

DH:   I’ve spent the last few years largely writing novels and trying to get an agent. I’ve come pretty close a couple of times but still haven’t cracked it. For a large part of the submissions process (as you’ll know, Mark) you can feel like an outsider looking in. 

But that feeling of being an outsider doesn’t have to be negative. It’s something I’ve channelled. There’s absolutely no reason now for creatives of any kind to let their work die on their hard drives anymore. We’ve all got the skills and the means to get out there. As long as the quality of the output is high, we shouldn’t sit on our stories. 

Inspired by people like Sub Pop and Dischord Records, although more specifically David Moody and his press Infected Books, I decided that things weren’t going to happen for me unless I made them happen. So, I took the first steps. 

I’ve started my own publishing label, Northern Republic. It puts some distance between me and my work. We’ve got a website, we’ve got logos, and we’ve got other books on deck. Northern Republic isn’t a traditional press, but it will be associated with some brilliant books. Hopefully, starting with mine. 

MW:   How did you find the self-pubbing experience? 

DH:   Bewildering at first. Everything is new and everyone has an opinion on every conceivable option you can take for your book. I’ve worked with small presses before, so I know what I like and what I don’t. 

The key thing for me was to get a belting cover. I am fascinated by graphic design, probably because I’m terrible at it. I hired Luke Spooner of Carrion House to do the artwork and he’s been brilliant. A great talent and spot on to work with. He’s been really patient with my dumb questions and turned out a top-notch cover. 

My technical skills are pretty limited, and I leaned heavily on the experience of others. It’s not something I’m ashamed of. Everyone has to learn somehow! Some people have really helped me, particularly Paul Stephenson of Hollow Stone Press was a living legend. He saved me with formatting etc. It’s something I’ll be picking up myself going forward, hopefully. 

The most interesting thing to learn is the marketing. There are so many theories and different ways of promoting your book. Some people lean heavily on ads but I don’t know enough about the route for it be anything other than wasted money right now. 

Instead, I’ve leaned on contacts I’ve already. Made contact with lovely people such as yourself for a bit of a boost. I think that’s an important part of it, exploring the horror community. I’m in touch now with sites that I’ve followed for years and some of them are publishing either reviews or articles I’ve written. 

What’s been amazing is seeing not only how these sites can help me, but what I can give back to the genre as well. How I can help other writers and give them a platform, something I’ve tried to do via the signal boost section on my newsletter and through interviews on my author website. 

MW:   What got you into writing? 

DH:   Stepping fully into the cliché, in some form or another, I’ve written for a very long time. Whether it was terrible songs, terrible scripts or terrible stories, I spent time writing when I was younger. I’d always messed about with words but never took it hugely seriously. 

In 2012, I joined a writing group near where I lived. It was around that time I discovered that horror was where my fiction gravitated to. I didn’t write as much as I should back then. It was only when my daughter was born in summer 2016 that the need to really create and take it seriously bubbled over. 
Since then I’ve written 5 novels, a couple of novellas and a bunch of short stories. I write five days a week, pretty much come hell or high water. I’ve broken the back of resistance and carved out a daily habit, one that I won’t let go of. 

MW:   Tell me about the process for the collection. How did you decide on the stories to include and how did you decide the running order? 

DH:   Good question! 

I always knew I would close the collection with Collaboration. It leaves the reader with something to chew on. I also wanted to start with a bang. Dustin is one of my favourites in this book, so it seemed a natural choice. I feel as though that story was where I really started to find my voice. 

In between, I went by feel really. There was no science or no luck involved. I went through the pieces one by one and moved them around until I felt comfortable. I have my cornerstones and the rest fitted around them naturally really.

MW:   So what’s next?

DH:   Hopefully getting a novel published one way or another. I’ve just finished a novel, a kinda crime/thriller/dystopian piece. I actually really like it, but it needs a thorough edit. For sure. Where that one will land, who knows? 

I’ve just finished a new novella that will likely be my next release from Northern Republic towards the back end of the year. After that, perhaps start to release some of the novels I’ve got under my belt as well as there are some books I’m really proud of there. 

Direct book link - https://books2read.com/darkmissives

Matryoshka, by Penny Jones

In a new edition of the occasional series, I want to tell you about a book I've read and loved, which I think adds to the horror genre and that I think you'll enjoy if you're a fan.

There’s something wrong with her husband, Mark. Lucy had heard all the rumours about him, the whispered warning behind her back. The half heard Chinese whispers seemed to haunt her, mocking her wherever she goes. Now it appears that whatever’s the matter with Mark is spreading; tainting, infecting both strangers and those that she loves the most. So, Lucy will go to any lengths to protect both her young daughter and her unborn child.

Lucy is heavily pregnant with her second child and struggling to cope with her three-year-old Susie.  There’s also something wrong with her husband Mark - she’s heard rumours about him, whispered warning behind her back, mocking her wherever she goes. Now it seems whatever’s the matter with him is spreading, tainting strangers and those she loves the most so Lucy has to do whatever it takes to protect her children.

I went into this knowing very little about it and it worked all the better for it.  Having now read it, I’m not sure of how much to discuss in this review without spoiling the twists and turns that readers need to discover for themselves.  Online, Jones has said the novella is “about child birth, loss of identity and post-partum psychosis”, which it absolutely is and once you realise things are going very badly for Lucy, everything goes downhill.  You can see the signs, Lucy can almost see the signs, but there’s too much forward motion for her to make any changes.  Well told with a pace that doesn’t let up, this feels claustrophobic and oppressive, horrific but realistic and offers no easy get outs.  It also presses a lot of soft spots on the way (I found myself cringing in places), including an excellent sustained sequence in a caravan park that will make any parent sweat.  Lucy is a compelling protagonist, clearly suffering mentally and trying to keep herself together and she has our sympathy, even when she does things that make those around her question her sanity.  With a clever last line, this is well worth a read and I would very much recommend it.

* * *

I'm lucky enough to know Penny and her husband, having hung out with them at various Cons and a Crusty Exterior gathering and she kindly agreed to answer some of my questions.

PJ:   Hi Mark, thanks for inviting me to prattle on about my new novella, I was so nervous when you said you were reading it. I get really bad impostor syndrome every time I have anything published, and as this book was written entirely during lockdown, my mind weasels have been working overtime.

MW:   It's good to have you here!  So where did the original spark for Matryoshka come from? 

PJ:   The story is very loosely based on a patient I nursed years ago who developed post-partum psychosis during the last two weeks of their pregnancy. It was a terrifying time for all involved, but for the mother to be it was like she was living through a horror movie. She believed that there was a family curse, that her own mother had actually given birth to twins and that the twins were given away at birth as they were evil, and that her twin was out there slowly swapping each member of the family with their evil twin. Imagine finding yourself forced into a psychiatric hospital, locked up, believing that your four year old son had been replaced, that your mother was not your mother, that your husband was under the spell of your own evil twin and that they were only waiting for the birth of your daughter to steal her away as well. For her family and for the medical professionals involved in her care it was terrifying: she was refusing medication and she wouldn’t eat or drink because she was sure we were poisoning her. She was a flight risk but we couldn’t restrain her because of the advanced stages of her pregnancy, she actually did manage to escape from the hospital and ended up barricading herself in her attic, no one could get up there and she only just fitted, so even if we got up there, no one would have been able to safely get her down again. I decided against adding the attic ending to my novella as I thought my readers would have found it far-fetched. In case anyone is worried, she had a healthy baby (though labour did start in the attic, it did not finish there) and following the birth she accepted treatment and when she came back to see us six months later mother, baby and family were all doing well.

MW:   Well that's reassuring!  Lucy is a fantastic character, did she appear fully formed or did you have to develop her?

PJ:   As I said in the previous question the story is loosely based on a patient of mine, and Lucy herself definitely draws attributes from several of the women I have nursed over the years who have had post-partum psychosis and depression. Rosemary from Rosemary’s Baby was also a strong influence in the character of Lucy and in the writing style I used for her. I was aiming for that unstable narrator throughout Matryoshka. 

But as with a lot of my characters there is a whole lot of me in there as well. I feel for a character to be fully formed there has to be a level of truth to their actions and behaviours. When I originally pitched the idea to Peter Mark May at Hersham Horror, I said my main concern was that I didn’t want the reader to feel cheated, as another nurse was fond to say I didn’t want to be a Dirty Birdy with my story. So I tried to put myself in Lucy’s shoes, took off my author head and tried to write her reactions as if they were my own in the same situation, as if I as the writer didn’t know if what was happening to Lucy was real or a slow descent into madness.

The Crusty Exterior in Ye Old Trip To Jerusalem, April 2019
from left - Wayne Parkin, Penny, Simon Jones, me, Ross Warren, Phil Sloman and James Everington

MW:   In your story notes, you mention that children scare you.  Did you find that factor helped or hindered you with this?  For what it’s worth, I read this as a parent dreading what might happen next.

PJ:   Children do scare me. I think they are an excellent trope that can never be overused in the horror genre. There is something innately alien about them, something other, an uncanny valley where their whole persona is so slightly off kilter from our own. They mimic us (both our good and our bad traits) to learn how to be functioning member of society. And there is something both comforting and terrifying in watching someone trying to be you (Vivarium builds the tension in this symbiotic relationship brilliantly). I am aware though that children in horror can be also be very divisive for readers. There are some readers who won’t be interested in the parent / child dynamic, and there will be those who will read it through the eyes of parents, fearful for the child, and there will be those who will read it fearful of the child. Each person’s own relation with the children in their life will colour the way they read a book with children at the heart of it, and it is balancing the story so that it can resonate with as many readers as possible without losing its central concept that is most tricky. I know that I am scared of children, but what I think is terrifying, someone else will see as endearing. So that balance of behaviours being both realistic and unnerving is really difficult to get onto the page.

MW:   Your pacing with this is very good, do you find the novella length works best for you?

PJ:   This was actually my first novella, I usually write short stories, and they tend to be short, short stories, my sweet point is only about 4,000 words. But I always knew this was going to be a novella length piece as there was too much to tell in a short story, but I thought it would loose its ambiguous horror if it was novel length. I really enjoyed writing it and I certainly have one other novella length piece that I want to write. 

MW:   And what’s next?

PJ:   I’m currently working on what I think will be a novel, though unlike my first novel, which I wrote very specifically on a traditional story arc and which came out at a traditional novel length of 90,000 words. This one I’m allowing some freedom to it, so if it ends up as another novella I won’t be disappointed. I’ve actually planned this story out, which is something I never do, though how useful that will be I have no idea, as so far I have missed out the second of my chapter post-its, and now I’m on post-it four, I’ve decided that the previous chapters probably aren’t needed. My elevator pitch for the story is Bridget Jones meets The Wicker Man.

MW:   Well that sounds very intriguing!  Good luck with it!

* * *

Penny Jones knew she was a writer when she started to talk about herself in the third person (her family knew when Santa bought her a typewriter for Christmas when she was three). Penny’s debut collection Suffer Little Children published by Black Shuck Books was shortlisted for the 2020 British Fantasy Award for Best Newcomer, and her short story Dendrochronology published by Hersham Horror was shortlisted for the 2020 British Fantasy Award for Best Short Story.

https://www.penny-jones.com

Ormeshadow: A Q&A with Priya Sharma

In a new edition of the occasional series, I want to tell you about a book I've read and loved, which I think adds to the chilling/weird genre and that I think you'll enjoy if you're a fan.

Acclaimed author Priya Sharma transports readers back in time with Ormeshadow, a coming-of-age story as dark and rich as good soil.

Burning with resentment and intrigue, this fantastical family drama invites readers to dig up the secrets of the Belman family, and wonder whether myths and legends are real enough to answer for a history of sin.

Uprooted from Bath by his father's failures, Gideon Belman finds himself stranded on Ormeshadow farm, an ancient place of chalk and ash and shadow. The land crests the Orme, a buried, sleeping dragon that dreams resentment, jealousy, estrangement, death. Or so the folklore says (Orme is the Old English for worm or dragon). Growing up in a house that hates him, Gideon finds his only comforts in the land, where he will live or die in the shadow of the Orme, as all his family has.

This is a beautifully observed, utterly absorbing tale that grabs hold of you from the off and doesn’t let go even after you’ve read the last word.  Strong and bold, this is a dark coming-of-age tale, full of familial deceit, recriminations and abuse, but also has some lyrical touches of brightness to it.  The characterisation is vivid and understated, the use of locations is masterful and the pacing is pitch-perfect, with just enough told.  Even better is the elegant writing, a turn-of-phrase here, an small mention there, burying the complexity of the tale in apparently simple language that must be read to be believed.  I absolutely recommend this book, a masterpiece in the making - I loved it. 

* * *

Phil Sloman, Priya and me at Edge-Lit 5 in 2016 (which I wrote about here)

As I'm lucky enough to know Priya, I decided to ask her some questions about the book and she graciously agreed to answer them.

(note - since this interview took place, Ormeshadow deservedly won the British Fantasy Award for Best Novella).

MW:   It's an excellent read, but where did Ormeshadow come from? 

PS:   It started as notes for a short story. I was walking up on the Great Orme, a headland above the Welsh town of Llandudno. It’s a beautiful place with dramatic views.  Orme is Old Norse for worme or dragon.

I had the image of a small boy taking refuge in a cave that formed the sleeping dragon’s ear. A lonely boy who’d been hurt and the Orme was his only friend and confidant. That’s where the story started. 

MW:   How much research did you have to do because, as a reader, it felt very authentic?

PS:   Thank you! I love researching for stories. The trick is to know how much (or little) to use, so as not to bog down the reader, isn’t it?  I was thinking a lot about Thomas Hardy’s novels when I wrote this. There’s so much darkness in his characters and their relationships.

The one thing I was careful to research was the sheep farming aspect. I have a friend who had a small holding with a few sheep, which was useful. You can learn a lot from the internet, but I love talking to people – you get details about how things feel and smell.

MW:   I loved the dragon aspect, what led you to that? 

PS:   The Orme was such a gift- it was presented to me on a plate from my visits there. The dragon allowed me the fun of inventing a mythology around it and root the family history element even deeper as I knitted them together. 

MW:   The family elements - especially the terror and the desire for love - are beautifully conveyed. Did that come out stronger in the writing than you’d planned, or did it work exactly how you wanted it to?

PS:   Thank you!

I had to trim the story down to submit it to Tor during their open period for novellas. I lost a good 5000 words, which I found difficult. I worry that some of the nuances of the relationships were lost. I had a strong sense of Gideon and his parents at the outset, but they developed as I wrote and rewrote. It’s  an old piece, so has had a lot of reworking.

There are things I worry that I’ve not fully conveyed when I look at it now. Perhaps I’d edit it differently. For example, Maud craves female friendship and there’s a burgeoning friendship between her and Clare, before Thomas stamps all over it. I had to cut a whole chapter set in church, where Eliza is being shamed for being unwed and pregnant. The father is the abusive schoolmaster. I wonder if I’m too light handed with my signalling for that in the schoolroom chapter.

I don’t judge my characters. They are what they are. If I’ve given the reader that impression, that’s a failing in my writing.

MW:   You didn't give this reader than impression, I can honestly say!  So what are you working on now?

PS:   I’ve just finished a short story based on a work by William Blake. I won’t name it for now, but I’ve always wondered what it meant. It’s monstrous and surreal. I enjoyed the process of researching it and figuring it out for myself. He was an interesting character- abolitionist, antimonarchist, feminist and visionary. I was also interested in his wife, Catherine Blake. She’s becoming more and more recognised as an integral part of the work they produced together- from its design to its execution. 

MW:   Good luck with that and thanks for being on the blog!

PS:   Thanks so much for having me here. 

This is her official bio, but I'd also add that she's wonderful company and has the best handwriting of anyone I've ever met.

Priya Sharma’s fiction has appeared venues such as Interzone, Black Static, Nightmare, The Dark and Tor. She’s been anthologised in several of Ellen Datlow’s  Best Horror of the Year series and Paula Guran’s Year’s Best Dark Fantasy & Horror series, among other.  She’s also been on many Locus’ Recommended Reading Lists.  She is a Grand Judge for the Aeon Award, an annual writing competition run by Albedo One, Ireland’s magazine of the Fantastic.

Priya is a Shirley Jackson Award and British Fantasy Award winner, as well as a Locus Award finalist and her collection, All the Fabulous Beasts, was published by Undertow Publications.

Priya can be found online here

There Goes Pretty, by CC Adams (review and Q&A)

With the publication of his new novella, There Goes Pretty, from the ever reliable Dark Minds Press, I decided to ask CC Adams some questions...

For Denny and Olivia, life is good. In a lavish wedding, the couple have taken another step forward, with a beautiful honeymoon and bright future to look forward to.

 

Like many relationships, theirs is one that needs love, trust and commitment – qualities that are slowly and surely tested, with insidious forces at work. And, gradually, the couple and their relationship will start to suffer, as the cracks begin to show.

 

...as does something else.

* * *

My review: 

Denny and Olivia seem to have it all, they’re deeply in love, they’ve just got married and they have a wonderful honeymoon and life to look forward to.  Except there’s something else in the house, something that clearly doesn’t like Olivia.

Opening with their wedding, this follows the early part of Denny & Olivia’s married life, both of them full of life and happy until Olivia wakes up one night to find a featureless ghost in bed with her.  From there, cracks rip through the relationship and these are handled well, with a nice sense of realism.  Olivia worked well as a character, believable and strong, but I wasn’t so sure about Denny (he’s very much of the TOWIE generation, which I’m clearly not) and that made it hard for me to sympathise with him as his life literally went to hell.  The ghost story aspect is well-handled (though it shifts at the end, so who you think is being haunted isn’t) but I might have preferred them to be a little more shocking than they’re presented.  London is well used as a location and there’s a definite sense of place about the whole thing, rooting the supernatural aspects into a hard reality which helps ground them.  On the downside, it felt a little too long and at least one character seemed superfluous, but these little glitches don’t detract from the whole.  Well paced and told, if you’re looking for a very London ghost story, this might be just your thing.

* * *

MW:   CC, thanks for agreeing to answer some questions.  Where did the initial spark of the idea come from?

CC:   Probably from the notion that a wedding – at least, if it’s done right – should be a happy day. How then does something that joyous lead into something so horrific? I guess there’s some wishful thinking in there – as yet, I'm not married but I think about the kind of wedding that would move me; push the ring slowly onto her finger, lose ourselves in our first kiss as husband and wife. I love romance, I won’t lie. London’s a big enough place; I just picked a venue that spoke to me as something romantic and wondrous, something I’d want for my wedding.

 

Of course, in the realm of the story, that euphoria doesn’t last.

MW:   Without giving too much away, there’s a smart little shift/twist towards the middle of the book - was that in place before you started writing or did it come to you as the story unfolded? 

CC:   I guess a little of both. Partly because people in relationships rarely see eye to eye on everything; so they might compromise. That’s what comes with having different viewpoints as different people. So I had in mind from the off that things would come between them and test them. The other aspect to it is that, yes, I outline my work – I’m not a ‘pantser’ – but there’s room in there to improvise as I’m writing. Again, people won’t always see eye to eye, and they sure as hell won’t agree on everything. That, and the fact that people can still be driven apart without interacting with each other.

Me and CC, chatting horror, at the 2017 FantasyCon in Peterborough
(you can read my Con report here)

MW:   London is almost a character in itself - how important was it to ground the novella in the reality of the city?

CC:   You know, I’m glad you say that. And it’s something I pride myself on – the vast majority of my work is set here in the capital. There are exceptions where my work takes place in other countries, or at least elsewhere in the UK but my work is mostly set here. As someone born and raised in the capital and proud of it, it’s very important. My work is very much the everyday nudged – or shoved – to darker places; anything from off-kilter to downright terrifying. And because those tales are set against the everyday, so the everyday needs to be detailed, nuanced and authentic. All of which serves to make the eventual threat(s) more authentic and, hopefully, more terrifying.

 

London’s my territory. I’m hoping now that those across the globe don't harbour the clichéd idea that it’s a cockney place; all about The Queen, Big Ben, fish and chips, etc. You’ve got one of the major cities on the planet that’s host to distinctive transportation (London Underground/the tube), nightlife, restaurants (don’t get me started), bars, fashion, scenery, cultural diversity, music, entertainment. The Shard, The London Eye, St. Paul’s Cathedral, South Bank, Covent Garden, et al. – the landscape across the city. Those slices of the capital I show you in my work barely scratch the surface. But as someone who loves this city and is proud to call it home, I’d be doing a grave injustice if I didn’t bring it to life in my work.

MW:   Have you ever experienced anything supernatural?  I have - though it didn’t put me on the path to being a horror writer - and I’m endlessly curious about it.

CC:   There was an example I used to cite from childhood, back when Mama used to put up the Christmas tree in December. I don’t think I was any more than ten years old, but here’s the thing. Back then, we used to have a mirror hanging behind the door of the living room, which was where Mama put the tree, by the window. So I’d gone into this room, in the dark to look at the tree glowing with all the lights on. But I didn’t figure on this ghostly shape, hovering behind the door, the classic/cliché ‘hiding under a sheet’ look. I don’t know whether it was my mind and/or the mirror playing tricks on me, but I ran back out. But now, with that buried by the weight of years, I’m not sure how genuine that was.

The more recent example is more disconcerting. Out in Toronto a few years back, and lying face down in bed in my hotel one night, I woke up feeling myself pushed down into the mattress, a force between my shoulder blades. Right now, I can guess it might have been cramp (which I think was unlikely) but there and then? Disturbing, for sure.

MW:   What’s next for CC Adams?

CC:   Currently outlining the next novel. When that’s done, I might move on to outlining and writing the next novella, partly because of juggling work for submission windows from different publishers, as well as what speaks to me. What I’m also overdue on is working on a collection. And I don’t mean a random assortment of stories dumped in a goodie bag, like ‘here you go’ - no. Something more than that, where the stories have a common theme, and they’re interlinked.

 

What I’m mindful of, as productive as I might be, is that what takes me weeks and months to write is something a reader would devour in a fraction of the time. Which means I’m usually working on something. Suffice it to say you shouldn’t have to wait too long before I bring you something new. Hopefully nasty.

* * *

Photo by Clem Onojeghuo

London native C.C. Adams is the horror/dark fiction author behind books such as But Worse Will Come, Forfeit Tissue and Downwind, Alice. A member of the Horror Writers Association, he still lives in the capital. This is where he lifts weights, cooks - and looks for the perfect quote to set off the next dark delicacy. 

Visit him at www.ccadams.com, or on Twitter

The Screaming Dead, by Peter Mark May & Richard Farren Barber

As their new novel, The Screaming Dead, is launched, I hand over the blog to a guest post with a difference from my old partners-in-crime Richard Farren Barber and Peter Mark May.

In the afterlife, the loudest sound is the screaming of the dead.

Death isn’t always the end or the answer. Sam thought his suicide would be the end of his suffering, but he was wrong, as he wakes up in a never-ending graveyard. He soon realises he has an opportunity to be reunited with his departed twin brother, Paul. Yet they must cross through the many planes of the afterlife to find each other. They will need to escape the hordes of the dead, survive forests where burning corpses are nailed to trees, and navigate the feuds and machinations of the people who promise to help them along the way.

Can Sam and Paul find each other in hell, or will the afterlife claim another two souls?

This discussion between Richard Farren Barber and Peter Mark May was recorded on Thursday 11th February 2021 in a Covid-secure manner and without their knowledge.

RFB: You still have the negatives? I assume the deal is we hand them over to Mark once he’s posted a glowing review of The Screaming Dead on his blog, and not a moment earlier?

PMM: They’re in the safe, only accessible with both our retina scans.

RFB: Pete, if Mark asks, what first attracted you to the prospect of working with handsome, charming, witty, stellar author Richard Farren Barber?

PMM: Stevie King kept snubbing my emails. 

RFB: I’ve warned you not to call him Stevie, he doesn’t like that! And I bet he drank that beer in the fridge. Anyway, I’m glad he turned you down. You came up with the initial idea for the novel, and I loved the outline you sent to me. How did you feel about sharing your idea? And how do you cope when your co-writer takes the story off into a different direction to the way you may initially have intended?

Thanks to the pandemic, the last opportunity we had to get together was in Bedford,
on November 30th 2019.  We've chatted online since but it's not the same as meeting
up, scouring secondhand bookshops and having a pizza together.  I miss these two...

PMM: As the owner of Hersham Horror Books, I’m used to sharing good ideas for others to write and run with. With you taking the story off in different directions, it was a challenge in a good way. Trying to steer it the long way back to my ideas, sometimes going in a fresh direction, or simply reinventing large part of the plot, was a great writing challenge.  How did you find the process of writing alternative chapters of approximately 1000 words? Did you write ahead only to be foiled by my next off-kilter chapter and dramatic story direction changes?

RFB: Yes I did! (I can laugh now, but at the time I cursed you. It seemed almost intentional!) But I learned from my mistakes. I would often finish writing a scene and send the file back to you, but by then I was in the zone and I’d carry on writing into the next scene for my set of characters… only to get the document back and discover you’d thrown me a curveball. A few times I could re-use what I’d written, but sometimes I had to stop and rethink where we were going after I got your response. I suppose that is what comes of writing together for the first time. What would you say are the attractions and challenges with collaborative writing when compared to writing alone?

PMM: Doing half the work to write a full book appealed. The challenges were, waiting for the next chapter and finding out either my ideas or the plot you had in mind had to alter or be thrown out the window totally. I enjoyed the dire cliff-hangers I left you with at the end of most of my chapters. Thinking, ‘how is he going to get out of this’ like some old black and white Flash Gordon serial, but you batted them back well. Did any stump you at all?

RFB: Hopefully not, but maybe we’ll get an irate email from a very Cock-a-Doodie reader telling us we cheated because he didn’t get out of the car. (To be fair, and hopefully not giving away too much of a spoiler given that it’s clear from the blurb that if the character in front of you isn’t dead, they will be soon…. We sorted that particular issue by making sure no one gets out of any car alive!)

At Edge-Lit 6, Derby, July 2017 with my collection.
I wrote a report about the Con here.

PMM: What was your favourite chapter to write, any chill you?

RFB: I loved the scenes in the graveyard when the horde churns around and around as a new arrival enters the afterlife. But the one which affected me the most was one you came up with of the dead forest and… well, let’s not give too much away about what happens in there! How about you, do you have any particular favourite scenes from the book? 

PMM: The sky-train of death (no spoilers) was a vivid image I had in my head when writing certain chapters. The chains, death shadow, blood and cow-catcher all unnerved me. That and a certain scene with the baby.

RFB: Oh yes, that scene!

PMM: The story is all about death and the afterlife. Did it stir up personal views, or beliefs in what happens after we die? Did they influence the plot at all?

RFB: Hmm, good question! I don’t recall any particularly strong responses to the storyline in terms of life-after death. I do remember that for me one of the strongest emotions came from the idea of the brothers being separated and that filial urge to get back together. But I do think one of the strengths of horror fiction is the ability to pose the big questions: What is the point of life? Is there anything after this world? I don’t have any answers, but I’m fascinated by exploring the possibilities.

PMM: How does it feel to have something you have writing, turned into audio? 

RFB: It’s a very weird experience! I suppose in some ways it is not dissimilar to producing a script and then handing it over to a team to manage. During the writing process I have a clear idea of what the characters sound like, and so it’s fascinating for someone else to pick that up and give their own interpretation.

We’d better stop now, before someone finds us. Can you send Mark a couple of the images…. Just to keep him focussed! And remind him The Screaming Dead is available in paperback, eBook, and Audiobook.

* * *

Richard Farren Barber was born in Nottingham in July 1970. After studying in London he returned to the East Midlands. He lives with his wife and son and works as a manager for a local university.

 
He has over 80 short stories in publications including: Alt-Dead, Alt-Zombie, DarkFuse, ePocalypse – Tales from the End, Fever Dreams, Horror D’Oeuvres, Murky Depths, Midnight Echo, Midnight Street, Morpheus Tales,  Night Terrors II, Siblings, The House of Horror, Trembles, When Red Snow Melts, and broadcast on Tales to Terrify, Pseudopod, and The Wicked Library.
 
Richard has six novellas published: The Power of Nothing, The Sleeping Dead, Odette, Perfect Darkness, Perfect Silence, Closer Still (which I wrote about here), and All Hell.  His debut novel The Living and the Lost was published in 2019.

Follow him on Twitter and Facebook.
His website can be found here www.richardfarrenbarber.co.uk

Peter Mark May is the author of nine horror novels and one novella Demon, Kumiho, Inheritance (written as P. M. May), Dark Waters (novella), Hedge End, AZ: Anno Zombie, Something More Than Night, Forky’s House, The End of All Flesh Book 1: The Flood in 2019 and The End of All Flesh: Book 2: The Red Death in 2020. 

He’s had short stories published in genre Canadian & US magazines and UK & US horror anthologies such as Creature Feature, Watch, the British Fantasy Society’s 40th Anniversary anthology Full Fathom Forty, Alt-Zombie, Fogbound From 5, Nightfalls, Demons & Devilry, Miseria’s Chorale, The Bestiarum Vocabulum, Phobophobias, Kneeling in the Silver Light, Demonology and Tales From the Lake Volume 5.

He also writes historical crime under the name Alexander Arrowsmith, his first two a series of novels - The Athens Atrocities and The Medousa Murders - published in 2019.

He also runs Hersham Horror Books and has published 30 books so far. 

His website can be found here http://petermarkmay.weebly.com/

Christmas Wishes, by Sue Moorcroft

Regular blog readers will know I've been friends with Sue Moorcroft for a while, having met at the Kettering Writers Group in 1999 (the group leader was of a more literary bent, so we genre writers were consigned to the back of the room, where we had great fun).  Since then she's gone from strength to strength, hitting number one in the Kindle Bestseller charts (with The Christmas Promise), becoming a Sunday Times Best Seller and her novel from last year, A Summer To Remember (which I wrote about here) won the Goldsboro Books Contemporary Romantic Novel Award 2020.  As well as featuring her a lot on blog (to see more, click this link), I'm also pleased to be one of her beta-readers and thoroughly enjoyed her latest novel, Christmas Wishes, now available in paperback and as an e-book.

A sparkling Christmas read from the Sunday Times bestseller – perfect to snuggle up with this winter!

Hannah and Nico are meant to be together.

But fate is keeping them apart…

As soon as Hannah bumps into her brother Rob’s best friend Nico in Stockholm, the two rekindle a fast friendship. But Hannah has a boyfriend – and Nico has two children to look after.

When Hannah loses her beloved shop in Stockholm, though, she is forced to move back to the little village of Middledip – only to find Nico has just moved in too. Under the same snowy sky, can the childhood friends make a romance work – or are there too many obstacles standing in their way?

A heartwarming story of love, friendship, and Christmas magic, perfect for fans of Trisha Ashley and Jill Mansell.

With the pandemic still in full swing, Sue Moorcroft and I weren't able to have our regular get-together at The Trading Post (and oh, how I've missed that), but went virtual instead as we discussed her new novel.

MW:     First off, thanks for agreeing to the chat and coming back onto the blog, it’s always a treat to have a chat with you.  So, what can you tell us about the new book?

SM:     Always great to speak to you, too, Mark, even if, sadly, The Trading Post isn’t involved this time. In Christmas Wishes Hannah loses her lovely shop in Stockholm and her fink of a boyfriend becomes her ex, trying to cheat her in the process. Nico, who’s originally Swedish but lives in the UK, has to downshift with two kids to look after, an unsympathetic boss and Nico’s eating disorder aggravated by the stress. Hannah and Nico knew each other as teenagers and both find sanctuary in Middledip village. Their entwined stories takes them between cosy Middledip and snowy Sweden, influenced both by members of their lovely families and less-lovely non-family characters.

MW:    As ever, with your novels, the conflicts that drive the plot feel very real and very contemporary.  With Hannah maneuvered out of her business - and nearly swindled out of her money too - cash or the lack of it becomes a very emotive subject.  What made you choose it?

SM:     My first job out of college - my only full-time day job, to be honest - was in a bank. I worked closely with the lending team and learned how emotive money can be. Normally civilised people can be transformed when money’s at stake and Hannah’s ex, Albin, definitely falls into this category. It’s not even that he’s short of money! Maybe it’s that ‘money is power’ and he enjoys keeping Hannah dangling. I’m always interested by how businesses run, too. Small businesses become personal to their owners and it’s a deep grief when those businesses are lost or threatened.

MW:       Nico is a terrific character, who really gets put through the wringer in this.  What made you choose to have him suffer an eating disorder?

SM:     It’s usually women with eating disorders I read about and the people I know personally who admit to past eating disorders are also women. Then I heard retired Formula 1 star David Coulthard speaking about his bulimia as a teenager and how it was wrapped up in his need to be below a certain weight as an athlete. I felt conscious that I’m as guilty as anyone in assuming eating disorders to be the female preserve and so gave the issue to my hero, not my heroine. Just before the book was published Freddie Flintoff, cricket legend and now Top Gear presenter, came out about his own experiences with bulimia. The surprise with which this moving documentary was greeted made made me glad I’d decided to shine a light on the subject.

MW:    As always with your books, the level of research is exceptional, with a lot of information transferred to the reader without the piece becoming a travelogue.  What was the research process like for this one?

SM: My British-Swedish friend, author Christina Courtenay, said, ‘If you ever want to set a winter book in Sweden we could go together and stay with Mum.’ So that’s what we did. We talked about what my areas of interest would be and she put the whole trip together, including lining up people for me to talk to about ice hockey, people who’d emigrated to Sweden, an upmarket area of Stockholm called Östermalm and Swedish education. She booked everything except for the hotel in Stockholm. I did that and booked the wrong one. As well as being bilingual and better at making bookings, she’s knowledgeable about history so was the perfect tour guide. Her mum took us to an ice hockey match and furthered my education on the game, too. On non-Swedish subjects, much of my preliminary research is now kindly conducted by my brother Trevor. I email him a list of topics I need to know about or questions I need answering and he provides me with the reading matter or answers. It saves me a lot of time! I also consulted someone at a fostering agency and an HR expert (who also happens to be my niece, author Ella Allbright/Nikki Moore) and a nursery nurse (also my niece, Ashley Panter).

MW:    Fostering plays a key part, did you learn anything surprising during your research of it?

SM:     I suppose I thought that fostered children were always placed by the state when it was impossible for their parent/s to look after them. What I hadn’t appreciated is the number of less formal arrangements there are where family members and friends step in. They take the initiative in a time of need and then social agencies get involved to make sure it’s a viable situation. When I first conceived the idea that Nico and his ex-wife, Loren, would have had created Josie between them but Nico would also later look after Maria, Loren’s child by another man, I worried the situation would seem unlikely. I hadn’t realised Nico could be considered ‘kin’ to Maria even though she was born after his marriage to her mother was over. Kids being neglected grab headlines but I’m glad I was able to write about the other side, the wonderful people who step in out of the goodness of their hearts when a child is in trouble.

MW:    As a longtime reader of your work - and I know others are too - what can you tell me about the Middledip Bibles? You refer to them in the acknowledgements and dedication of Christmas Wishes. They’re something to do with your brother, too, aren’t they?

SM:     My first book set in Middledip was published in 2010 (Starting Over) so Christmas Wishes is ten years later and I began to lose a sense of continuity for recurring characters, although each book stands alone. I’d need to know how long Gabe had lived in the village or when Carola’s husband left her and have to flip through books trying to find the information. Trevor undertook the mammoth task of rereading all the novels set or partially set in Middledip and constructing a vast spreadsheet so I can now see at a glance when Tess and Ratty had a baby or Carola met Owen. He did a similar thing with places, such as the pub or shop, but there are fewer of those. We refer to these spreadsheets as ‘The Middledip Bibles’.
NB There’s a page for my Middledip books on my website here and a map to show where everybody lives.
NB2 Not all of my books are set in Middledip, or visit it, and details of all my writing can be found here.

MW:    As always, having now read Christmas Wishes and I'm keen for more, so what’s next for you?

SM:     I’m editing Under the Italian Sun, presently scheduled for publication in May 2021. It’s set in Umbria, Italy, as One Summer in Italy is - Montelibertà. I’m not sure where the idea came from but I wanted to write about someone who became aware that there was another person with a name that seemed linked with hers. Although she’s British, my heroine’s name is Zia-Lucia Costa Chalmers and she’s been told an Italian lady called Lucia Costa was kind to her, but she’s never known who she is. When Zia-Lucia discovers two birth and death certificates for her mother Victoria Chalmers, each bearing different dates, she looks for answers. Her starting point is searching for Lucia Costa. And does she find her? Yes, she does …

Thanks for inviting me for this virtual chat, Mark. Let’s hope real meet-ups are not too far in the future!

Sue Moorcroft is an international bestselling author and has reached the #1 spot on Kindle UK. She’s won the Goldsboro Books Contemporary Romantic Novel Award, Readers’ Best Romantic Novel award and the Katie Fforde Bursary. Published by HarperCollins in the UK, US and Canada and by other publishers around the world.

Her short stories, serials, columns, writing ‘how to’ and courses have appeared around the world.

Born into an army family in Germany, Sue spent much of her childhood in Cyprus and Malta but settled in Northamptonshire at the age of ten. An avid reader, she also loves Formula 1, travel, family and friends, dance exercise and yoga.

Website: www.suemoorcroft.com

Blog: https://suemoorcroft.wordpress.com/ 
Facebook: sue.moorcroft.3
Facebook author page: https://www.facebook.com/SueMoorcroftAuthor
Twitter: @suemoorcroft
Instagram: suemoorcroftauthor
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/suemoorcroft
Amazon author page: Author.to/SueMoorcroft