1--What is the title of your latest release?
TALKING TO STRANGERS
2--What’s the “elevator pitch” for your new book?
Journalist Kiki Nunn is determined to turn the discovery of a woman’s body in a local wood into her biggest scoop. She sets out to write the definitive piece on one woman’s fatal online search for love, going up against the detectives investigating the murder – and the killer, himself.
3--How did you decide where your book was going to take place?
My last two books have been set in a small seaside town called Ebbing, on the south coast of England. No prizes for guessing where I live… When my husband and I moved back to the UK from France a few years ago, we found ourselves living by the sea for the first time. Coastal towns and villages can look so idyllic - the sea sparkling, the beach busy with surfers and swimmers, ice creams and little cafes with queues of holidaymakers outside. But look at the online neighborhood forums for the reality. Small towns are often a masterclass in barely contained fury. In amongst the ads for pre-loved sofas and window replacement are people festering about the things they see every day – fly tipping, dog mess, blocked views, bad parking. simmers just below the surface in seaside towns all over the UK.
It is meat and drink to a thriller writer.
4--Would you hang out with your protagonist in real life?
I think I already have… Kiki Nunn, the reporter hunting down her scoop is a mixture of several women reporters I have known and worked with over the years.
5--What are three words that describe your protagonist?
Feisty, resourceful, lonely.
6--What’s something you learned while writing this book?
N/A
7--Do you edit as you draft or wait until you are totally done?
Both. As an ex-reporter I edit in my head as I type - but it is only when you see the whole story on the page that the real editing happens.
8--What’s your favorite foodie indulgence?
A perfectly ripe avocado with a sprinkling of sea salt. Bliss.
9--Describe your writing space/office!
I’m sitting in it right now. I used to do all my writing in bed, but it was doing awful things to my back. So, now I write in my shed in the back garden. It is wooden, sort of triangular with four windows, lots of books and is painted pale green. My cockapoo, Teddy is sleeping under the desk, and I can see pots of flowers and lots of sky. Unfortunately, I can also see that the whole place needs a good tidy.
10--Who is an author you admire?
There are so many. I am inspired by authors who take risks to tell stories in new ways; Hilary Mantel (Wolf Hall and Bring Up the Bodies) for the brilliance and vividness of her storytelling. She broke so many rules – and was criticized by some – but I was in her world from page one; Kate Atkinson (When Will There Be Good News? And Life After Life) for her characters and showing me the power of a story told by many; and John Irving (Cider House Rules and A Prayer for Owen Meany) for his sheer, bonkers, otherness. But I am discovering new authors all the time. Last year I found Mick Herron and am devouring his brilliant Slow Horses series. The appalling Jackson Lamb, who presides over a collection of failed spies, is one of my favorite characters of all time.
11--Is there a book that changed your life?
Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier awakened a hunger for psychological thrillers when I was a teenager. I’d been a slave to Sherlock Holmes and Agatha Christie for years, hunting the red herrings and guessing the murderers. But Rebecca did something else. I was in the head of the second Mrs. de Winter from those iconic first lines; chilled and intrigued by the menacing undertow - and the scariest housekeeper ever created.
12--Tell us about when you got “the call.” (when you found out your book was going to be published)/Or, for indie authors, when you decided to self-publish.
I was in a different time zone - six and a half hours ahead of the UK, working in Myanmar with Burmese journalists, when I opened the email from my wonderful agent, Maddy Milburn. I remember sitting there in my tiny hotel room, reading and re-reading those words and then celebrating alone with a glass of warm white wine. It felt surreal. As if I was standing on a pavement watching it happen in front of me.
13--What’s your favorite genre to read?
Too hard to choose. I have been passionate about reading since I could make out the words in my Noddy books and have hoovered up thrillers, historical fiction, romances, short stories, long stories, literary masterpieces and beach reads.
14--What’s your favorite movie?
Cabaret. I love a musical, but this was something completely different. You could almost smell the cigarettes, sweat and grease paint off the screen, and I wept when Liza Minnelli sang Maybe This Time. And still do.
15--What is your favorite season?
Autumn. Some may see it as the dying of the year but, perhaps perversely, it always feels like a time of new beginnings to me. September was all about new uniforms and pencil cases and the excitement of starting a new school year.
16--How do you like to celebrate your birthday?
With a splash. And bubbles, of course.
17--What’s a recent tv show/movie/book/podcast you highly recommend?
Happy Valley, starring Sarah Lancashire as Sgt Catherine Cawood. A masterclass.
18--What’s your favorite type of cuisine?
Asian food for the spicing and huge variety.
19--What do you do when you have free time?
I walk – I’m doing sections of the Camino to Santiago de Compostela in Spain with my closest friends and loving the mind space and views.
20--What can readers expect from you next?
I’m working on an idea for my next book – too early to say if it will take but am excited.
Detective Elise King’s investigation into a woman’s murder is getting derailed by a reporter who insists on doing her own investigation in this nail-biting mystery from the author of Local Gone Missing.
When Karen Simmons is murdered on Valentine’s Day, Detective Elise King wonders if she was killed by a man she met online. Karen was all over the dating apps, leading some townspeople to blame her for her own death, while others band together to protest society’s violence against women. Into the divide comes Kiki Nunn, whose aggressive newsgathering once again antagonizes Elise.
A single mother of a young daughter, Kiki is struggling to make a living in the diminished news landscape. Getting a scoop in the Simmons murder would do a lot for her career, and she’s willing to go up against not just Elise but the killer himself to do it.
Women's Fiction Psychological | Thriller Crime [Berkley, On Sale: August 27, 2024, Hardcover / e-Book, ISBN: 9781984803078 / eISBN: 9781984803085]
Fiona Barton trains and works with journalists all over the world. Previously, she was a senior writer at the Daily Mail, news editor at the Daily Telegraph, and chief reporter at the Mail on Sunday, where she won Reporter of the Year at the British Press Awards. Born in Cambridge, England, she currently lives in southwest France.
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