Nicola Upson Meet the Author

me and the rest the team at Twitter.

Thank you very much for being with

us

we hear the police with two

different investigations.

Nine lessons, subtitled some wounds

never heal.

They conscious tribute to the

classic English detective tradition.

Not least because Josephine in real

life was a foldable, but now largely

forgotten writer of

old-style thrillers herself.

Welcome.

old-style thrillers herself.

Welcome.

Uncounted debts you feel to the

old-fashioned detective story, they

would be in no doubt after this

book. Cambridge, 1930s, ghost

stories. Very traditional story. In

a sense, you are paying your debt,

making it obvious.

I am paying a

debt to that tradition. When I

decided I would go down the route of

novels featuring Josephine is a lead

character, I decided I would include

all the things we love about the

golden age, the puzzle, the Mr Regan

the red herrings, the suspect. I

would also combine it with a modern

sensibility. They are set during the

golden age period, but by no means

golden age.

A couple of plotlines

intertwine, which we were not go

into in detail, because it is a

thriller. We don't want to spoil it.

A series of attacks on women,

rendered in a very contemporary way.

In a way that the writers in the

1930s would not have dared to touch.

That is the joy of hindsight, you

can treat crimes like that and more

honest way, the way people may have

talked about it at the time. They

were put in print. It is based on a

much more contemporary crime, the

Cambridge rapist, Peter Cook.

Were

you around the time?

No, I was not.

My partner, interestingly was in

Cambridge at that time. She ran a

music club, at a pub called the

anchor. Where he was caught. His

picture started appearing in the

papers. She realised she knew him,

serving him for every week. He

worked for a wine merchant,

delivering wine to the pub. The

shock of that, which still resonates

with her. The fear the Cambridge

rapist, for people who live there at

the time is very strong. There are

bars on ground floor windows.

The

intimacy of the setting is a lot to

do with the story. Everybody knowing

everybody else. Students of that

era, lodging little passageways,

quite close to the University Centre

of the city. They very

claustrophobic atmosphere.

Amazing

how easily that crime transported

itself back to the 1930s. In the

70s, people who suffer that were a

group of female students by and

large. Not relevant in the 30s, but

transfer that to shop workers,

waitresses, nurses at the

Addenbrooke's Hospital, that works

well. The suspicion of the innocent

men, the randomness. The idea that

the man who was holding the town to

ransom could be a taxi driver,

ambulance driver, the Man U cube

next to in the cinema, very

relevant.

We also dealing with a

series of murders, which conceal a

secret. Not unconnected. With the

ghost stories of MR James, a provost

of Kings at one point. He used to

read the stories at Christmas.

Extraordinary scene, going in,

listening to the boss. Reading out

these things.

It is. I love the fact

MR James, Monty as he was known, he

would emerge from his study with the

ink still wet on the page. Blow out

every candle but one, and read his

new story to those gathering. When

you write books like I do mixing

fact with fiction, you are always

looking for that little window of

the truth, just big enough to get

your story through. I found that in

December 1913, of when for the first

time MR James did not finish a new

story. What were the reasons for

that? What if it was not just the

pressure of time, but something so

terrible happened at Christmas, 25

years later the men gathering round

to be at started dying, killed off

one by one in ways echoing the

stories.

You talked about merging

fact and fiction. One particular way

that is relevant to this novel, and

the six preceding it. The character

of Josephine Tay, acting as an

investigator, for the police. At the

scene, realising thing, adding

insights. She was a practitioner of

the detective novel in the golden

age. Writing eight books. What was

it that attracted you to her? It was

particularly her novel, way back in

1948 summer was brave enough to

write a story about two women

abusing younger. I love she picked

up the golden age rule book are

tearing it to shreds in front of our

eyes. No murder, no real puzzle, no

brilliant detective. It was a book

that can be read on many levels.

That is what I loved about it.

Reading it now, about an England

that is gone for better or worse.

You feel the sunshine on your face

would you pick it up. There is a

depth, a darkness convey more than

this, way ahead of time. That is

what appealed about her as a writer.

As a person who I love the fact she

had a light in the theatre. Writing

great plays in the West End running

for every year. She numbered people

like John Gielgud as her close

friend. As a character, there were

gaps in her life.

What a bold thing

to do, to take a real person who you

never a coming to stick in the books

as a protagonist. Someone who makes

the turn, in many ways. You have to

think hard before doing that?

I did

commit felt like I had brave thing

to do. This is quite a long time

coming novels have a long gestation

period. It was before the characters

in film and fiction were so

prevalent. Although she was not as

well known as people like Agatha

Christie. People who love their work

really love that. Like she was quite

a complex and difficult woman. Quite

contrary. Character issues, quite

aloof and dogmatic. Although I don't

want to sugar over the cracks. I

wanted to bring the flaws in the

personality, that is what people

like about the character in these

books. She is not nice all the time.

Sometimes you want to pick up and

shake and scream at her. She is

quite likeable.

If you are going to

use the character of the outsider,

the assistant. Who looks in on the

case. Whether it is a blundering

police officer. Someone just who has

missed the main point. Comes in,

sets it right. That person is a

little bit of a loner.

That is very

true to the woman in real life. She

kept herself to herself. I am

enjoying very much creating a

relationship that JC feeding the

ducks has with my detective, Archie

Penrose. They are friends. Rather

than doing the on off romance which

is a much loved thing about crime

fiction. To write about their

friendship, the ups and downs. Also

when Josephine Pazner gift for

friendship is more needed than ever.

Quite interesting to look at.

A

pretty gruesome but, in the sense

that the crimes we are dealing with

in two parallel series of events

leave nothing to the imagination.

They have a modern sensibility, if

that is the right word. Particularly

the first one. Do you ever feel a

reluctance, a distaste to do so near

the edge in what people will do to

each other?

I think everybody who

writes crime fiction has a line, and

you don't know what the line is

until you are nearly at it. I agree

very much the first murder comes

close. What is important to me, and

has been through all my books is to

make those murders very relevant to

the victim. To the life they lead

before they became the courts in

your puzzle, the victim in a murder

enquiry. -- the corpse.

That is

really very important to me. Nicola

Upson, author