The Gossip: The Inspiration Behind the Book
Who doesn’t like a bit of gossip? Shared snippets from a friend about people you both know, perhaps. Or maybe neighbours or work colleagues. We can’t help ourselves, can we? I think it’s part of the human psyche.
My latest psychological thriller, The Gossip, uses this as its theme – people’s seemingly insatiable desire to know what is going on around them. But although some people want to know from an altruistic point of view, so they can help others, there is a dark side to gossip too. And that’s where the story takes us in my book.
Rural societies have intrigued and fascinated me for a long time, as I have spent most of my adult life living in villages. I’ve used one of those villages as the setting for my new book. Talysarn is a real village in Gwynedd, North Wales on the very edge of the national park. I liked the contrast between the wonderful, open countryside, with its soaring mountains and the claustrophobic community of the village where all the houses are close together and generations of the same families have lived there. It also has a very interesting industrial history linked to the slate quarries. It felt like a perfect breeding ground for unsavoury happenings and gossip with a malicious edge.
In reality, I loved living in Talysarn, and the community is wonderful and mutually supportive, but it’s fun as an author to take something positive and wonder what might happen in different circumstances. What if there were bad people at the heart of things? And what secrets might be lurking in people’s lives that could turn the life of the village upside down? Think of Eastenders in a rural setting! That’s the vibe I was aiming for, tying people’s lives in terrible knots.
It was a fun book to write, as we have four different characters to follow. They all have secrets, but which one is willing to kill to keep theirs?
Get your copy today: https://mybook.to/thegossip