London, 1842. Captain William Avery is persuaded to investigate a mysterious and horrible death at the Reform, London s newest and grandest gentleman s club a death the club is desperate to hush up. What he soon discovers is a web of rivalries and hatreds, both personal and political, simmering behind the club s handsome facade.
At the center is its resident genius, Alexis Soyer, the Napoleon of food, a chef whose culinary brilliance is matched only by his talent for self-publicity.
But Avery is distracted, for where is his mentor and partner in crime Jeremiah Blake? And what if this first death is only a dress rehearsal for something far more sinister?
AUTHOR INTERVIEW
- When and why did you first start writing historical crime novels? And how did you first come up with your detective duo Blake and Avery?
I
started thinking about really doing it in about 2010/11. I’d
written two massive non-fiction history tomes and taken 15 years to
do it (and have two kids). I just wasn’t ready to dive back into
another massive project where I had to check the facts for every
half-sentence. I’d been brooding over an idea for a lone
misanthropic, working-class detective in early Victorian England for
years—the 1840s is a fascinating decade, full of change and turmoil
(horses to railways, letter to telegraph), with lots of parallels
with now. I wanted the pleasure of using my history and being able to
just make things up.
So
I had Blake. Avery emerged from structural need. I needed a voice to
narrate the story. A younger clueless narrator worked well: he hides
my ignorance and he tells as much of the story as he knows —the
reader knows what he knows. But actually he really tripped from the
pen as it were. He just came really easily, whereas my lovely Blake,
so taciturn and tricky, was much harder.
- How did you come up with the idea behind The Devil’s Feast? Did you know who committed the crime from the start?
I’m
probably a bit different from many crime writers in that often what
takes my fancy first is a set-up or a setting rather than a specific
crime. Maybe that’s a terrible admission, but I think one of the
best and most interesting things about crime fiction is that it can
contain so many things: domestic psychological thrillers, books that
focus on unsettling brutal violence, characters with extraordinary
back stories and also —the thing that before I started writing the
things, I reckoned I could do—creating a fascinating world and
showing how it works—and doesn’t. Think of Carl Hiaasen’s
exotic and corrupt Miami, or Rebus’s dark, history-haunted
Edinburgh, or C. J. Sansom’s terrifying totalitarian Tudor court.
My
touch paper for this book was reading about this real-life genius
French chef Alexis Soyer. He was the first real celebrity chef,
half-Heston Blumenthal, half-Jamie Oliver, crazily flamboyant and a
shameless and often hilarious self-publicist, while also being an
amazing logistician and inventor— in fact he seems startling modern
to me in many ways. He was crazily ambitious and dreadfully
sycophantic to the aristocracy, but at a time of terrible famines and
starvation among the British poor, he campaigned and worked
incredibly hard to improve the diet of the poor. I thought, I have to
write about this guy and also the two worlds he crossed: the rich
decadent moneyed Victorian London, and those starving at the bottom.
And I liked the idea of food as a weapon.
As for
whodunit, I always start out with an idea – though it’s never
properly worked out. I can’t seem to commit to an ending until I
absolutely have to. I often write two drafts without actually writing
the ending —out of sort of cowardice. It feels too hard, even
though I know what’s supposed to happen. Then when I do finally
force myself to write it, at the last minute, I think, oh it’s not
quite right and then I have to go back and either tighten it all up,
or—as happened with my previous book—actually decide on another
murderer! (And that’s something I haven’t admitted to anyone
before.)
- What is the hardest part of the writing historical crime fiction for you?
The
plot. Plot doesn’t come naturally to me. It comes in annoying bits,
sometimes I feel I have to pull it out of my head practically. An
idea comes for a turn or a twist and then I’m pathetically
grateful! The history is like my hammock, my safety net. I really
feel perfectly comfortable in it —I feel I can conjure a past
world, I know how to do it (maybe too much), but it remains that it
is the background, and the set-up, and the plot has to be the
foreground. Each time I start another book I think, Christ! How did I
manage it last time?
- Are you a big reader? If so, what are you reading now? Are there any books that have inspired The Devil’s Feast?
I do
read a lot, but when I’m writing I often feel I should be reading
non-fiction stuff connected with the period to add to the layering of
world and to help give me ideas to further the plot. So with The
Devil’s Feast it was biographies of Soyer, 19th
century cookbooks, and books about 19th century food. One
of the best things I read was Bee Wilson’s book, Swindled,
about the history of food scares and food adulteration—which is a
long one, but was a really big issue in Victorian England, and also,
of course, has lots of parallels now. Also I’m a great fan of
Judith Flanders’ The Victorian City —full of fabulous,
exotic, often ghastly, details. Just now I’m reading Dickens’
American Notes about his trip to America in 1842, for my next
Blake and Avery—god, he is just the best journalist.
Over
the summer I got to let my hair down a bit. I’d recommend Sarah
Perry’s The Essex Serpent —another Victorian-set novel. Of
thrillers I’m a great fan of Antonia Hodgson’s 18th
century thrillers.
- What would be a typical working day for you? When and where do you write?
I work
Monday to Friday. I get my kids up for school, they leave the house
about 7.45, then I dog-basket for a bit, listen to radio while
tidying the kitchen, washing-up, plumping up sofa-cushions. I find
creating a bit of external order gets me ready for my desk. I have a
small study above the kitchen, midway through the house, and so
everyone always feels entitled too look in on the way up or down. I
always mean to be at it earlier than I actually manage — hopefully
9 but often later. When I’m writing, I sit at my computer
relentlessly basically all day, just bleeding brain cells and
thinking it should be easier. My husband is always at me to take more
breaks, to do it differently, but I can’t seem to.
I
spend much too much time looking at sofas and shoes and twitter (I’m
no good at Facebook), it’s all a distraction. I usually stop about
5 when my kids get home.
- Do you have any advice for other aspiring writers?
Oh
blimey! Keep practising. Always aim first for clarity, work to make
your meaning as clear as possible— it’s a good way of making sure
you know what you’re trying to say too. Start plain, embroidery
comes later, if it’s needed. Be brutal about cutting out the boring
bits, and too many adjectives and adverbs. (I don’t always follow
this advice.)
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