Story Research
The spark for my third and latest book, The Ex-Husband, was unexpected: towel art. My husband used to work for long periods away on ships and on one trip, one of the housekeepers was amazing at creating towel art. Every day the towels in my husband’s cabin were something different - flowers, elephants, sea creatures. He began photographing and sending them to me because they were so impressive.
The thought of towel art lodged in my mind as I wondered what it would be like to be on board a ship and to find something creepy and menacing on the bed, rather than something fun and sea related. If so, who would do this and why? Charlotte, the protagonist grew from this idea. She is a reformed con artist, desperate to put her past behind her but is trapped on board a superyacht with a former victim seeking revenge. Instead of looking out the porthole and seeing paradise, Charlotte feels cut off and paranoid. One evening, she is made to feel worse when the towel art on her bed is a skull, decorated with small seashells into black eyes and teeth.
The Ex-Husband was mostly written in lockdown. However, I was lucky that the seed of the idea had already formed. My husband and I went on a short research cruise to Antwerp in December 2019. The trip started off smoothly on calm seas but swiftly turned quite rocky and I suffered from seasickness. Fortunately, I recovered enough to explore the ship, the library, the laundry rooms, and the varied hiding places both on deck and in among the maze of corridors and cabins. In doing so, the scenes came to life in my mind.
A long delay due to more bad weather was announced before we left Antwerp. When we finally did slip away from port in the early hours, while it was still dark, the weather still hadn’t improved. I felt trapped as the hours passed while we rocked through the high waves and awaited updates from the captain. Come afternoon, the sea was calm again. On our balcony, surrounded by blue sea, sky and sunshine, it almost seemed that the rough night had been an illusion. However, it had given me the gift of a strong sense of the dark side of paradise which was to become a main feature of The Ex-Husband.
I travelled to Barbados when I worked as cabin crew years ago, but I wanted to explore some more of the Caribbean. We booked a family holiday to St Lucia for April 2020, which of course, never happened. Instead, I spoke to travel consultants who were experienced in cruise ships and former crew members. Another friend of mine used to work on private flights. To get around the problem of not knowing when things would return to ‘how they were’ I edited the book to have a ‘then’ and a ‘now’. I set the ‘now’ scenes on board a superyacht. Although I mainly had to rely on YouTube, it was enormous fun to explore this luxurious world, as was reading and researching the intricate world of con artists. I also sought the help of a former police officer to check the details of missing persons procedures because early in the book, it is revealed that Charlotte’s ex-husband, Sam, is missing.
For my first book, The Perfect Girlfriend, I was able to draw on my experience of working as cabin crew. I tried to give readers a peek behind the curtain of life in the sky. We were lucky enough to go on a research trip to Whistler (where the book is partly set) so I really was able to walk in the protagonist, Juliette’s, footsteps.
My second book, The Last Wife, is set in the New Forest. I live close by and loved the thought of using it as the backdrop for the book. I also attended a day course run by a company called Think Forensic where I learned about blood splatter, preserving crime scenes and searching for clues in the right places. This was helpful for a scene detailed later in the book (which I can’t say too much about as it would obviously be a spoiler).
I’d love to return to Kenya and Tanzania where my fourth (as yet untitled) book is set but so far, I’ve had to rely on my memory and again, interviewing people who have visited recently. I would love to travel again when it’s possible. I’ve already got ideas for where book five will be set…