The Silent Stranger
I had the idea for ‘The Silent Stranger’ when I read a newspaper article about how neighbours were complaining about the derelict state of Saddam Hussein’s châteaux. He was dead by then and I expect the Iraqi government had more on its mind than mansions in the South of France. Then I thought: lots of people achieve their dream of owning a rural idyll in France – but what if you didn’t check out its history? What if someone turned up from its dark and murky past?
“Keeps you guessing
from the first page to the last”
“I loved this slightly
disturbing story, the
way it kept me teetering
on my toes at every turn
of the page”
As luck would have it, my brother-in-law owned a small medieval château in the Lot. I lifted his château and plonked it at the centre of ‘The Silent Stranger’.
‘The Silent Stranger’ won first prize in a national competition for an unpublished extract of 10,000 words in 2007. It went through many iterations as I learnt the craft of writing a novel. It was eventually published in 2019 by Lume Books.
I am working on my second novel – another ‘what if’: What would you do if the man who abandoned you – the love of your life – walked back into your life after twenty-eight years?