Author in Focus: Katherine Howell

Interviewed by: Kylie Fox

Katherine Howell is the author of the best-selling series featuring Detective Ella Marconi; “Frantic”, “The Darkest Hour”, “Cold Justice” and “Violent Exposure”.

Katherine worked as a paramedic for fifteen years which gives her an insight rarely seen in other crime novels. She has also completed her Bachelor and Masters degrees in creative writing.

In 2008, “Frantic” won the Davitt Award for best crime fiction of the year and was followed in 2009, by the Davitt Reader’s Choice Award for “The Darkest Hour.”

Katherine’s books are published in more than eight countries, have been featured in major newspapers and on bestseller lists and one was even selected by P&O Cruises as a book club pick.

Katherine is currently completing the fifth book in the series (which we hope to be able to get our hands on soon.)

I was lucky enough to ask Katherine a few questions.

Kylie: You’ve worked as an animal handler, a sales assistant and, of course, a paramedic and you’ve studied both science and writing – all leading up to becoming a best-selling author. How do these very different lines of work and study compare? Do you see any similarities between them?

Katherine: One similarity between those jobs is sensitivity towards the animal or person you’re interacting with, and also a need to be in-the-moment: you’re looking after that one person or animal at that one time and whatever else is going on around you has to come second.

Regarding the study, I guess there is a similarity in that science pulls apart and analyses things, events, and situations, and in my writing degrees I did the same with the books I studied and the ones I wrote and rewrote (and rewrote).

As for between the areas of work and study, I think the sensitivity is what they have in common, particularly in the writing, where I need to have a feeling for the people in the story and for the readers as well.

Kylie: Alongside Detective Ella Marconi, your books feature paramedics in the main roles. There is a certain amount of sexism faced by the female characters in the police force and the ambulance service in your books – how does that relate to your own experiences? Have you seen any change in those attitudes?

Katherine: The police force and ambulance service are historically male-dominated workplaces. When I joined the ambulance service in 1990 the numbers of women in the job were still fairly low and a few men I worked with held onto the attitude that we shouldn’t be there. A fair percentage of the public was shocked to see a female walk in their door too! I was fortunate in that I didn’t suffer overt bullying (although I was the target of the ‘dog food’ crack made by the bully in Cold Justice) but some of the stories I heard from other female officers were awful, particularly from those who’d been posted to rural areas. A number of the tactics used by the bully in Cold Justice were based on these stories. I believe that things are slowly improving though, probably as people are held to account and because the times and the male:female ratio are also slowly changing.

Kylie: You’ve spoken of the emotional toll that being a paramedic took on you. Obviously, this helps in conveying the power into those scenes when you write but does it ever hinder you? Do you ever find that some of that emotion is just too difficult to write about?

Katherine: Writing about it does bring it all to mind again but I’ve never found anything too hard to put on paper. What does bring me undone is talking about it. Twice now I’ve cried on radio, and more than a few times I’ve come close. It’s partly remembering specific cases but I think also being in a job like that or the police changes you: I described it in one of those interviews as feeling ‘raw’, like a protective skin has been peeled off my heart. I keep thinking it’s grown back and then I talk about jobs I did and I realise it hasn’t. It’s been five years, so perhaps this is just me now.

Kylie: Being a paramedic is often a difficult job but must bring with it a certain level of personal satisfaction. Do you get a similar level of personal satisfaction from your writing?

Katherine: I gained a lot of satisfaction from helping people when I was a paramedic, and I gain a lot now when the writing’s going well and I can look at a finished scene and know that’s exactly what I was aiming for, but on those hard days when the words won’t come and it all seems like a pile of dog throw-up I sometimes think being a paramedic was easier. It’s a short-lived delusion, though. It’s very satisfying too to hear from readers who were completely lost in this world that I conjured up, but day-to-day it’s overcoming the mental struggle with the writing and then producing good work that keeps me going.

Kylie: “Violent Exposure” is the fourth in the series featuring Detective Ella Marconi – are we likely to see more of her? What about in the television or film medium?

Katherine: Yes indeedy! Ella’s back in book 5 which I’m finishing now, and which will be out either late this year or early next, and I’m contracted for a sixth which will be out a year after that. I’m hoping to continue on from there too. Ella’s got a lot of life in her yet.

There’ve been a few nibbles from TV producers but nothing more yet. I would love to see it picked up though.

Kylie: For you, what is harder: writing that first book and hoping that it’s good enough or, writing the fourth (or fifth?) book in an already-loved series and hoping that you can repeat that success?

Katherine: They’re both hard but in different ways. With the first book you’re not sure if you can do it well enough; with the fifth you’re not sure if you can do it well enough AGAIN. The story options start to narrow as well: I think back to the key events of each book and think, okay, a child-kidnapping is out, a cold case is out ….

There’s also the reader factor: I so appreciate my readers and I want to give them a better book each time, but how do I do that?

One thing that is easier is the knowledge that the writing always feels bad. I used to worry that I was doing something wrong because it felt so awful and I was filled with such self-doubt. Now I know that’s just how it is. I keep a diary with each book and they’re all full of me whining about ‘how come this one is so hard?’ then I look back through the previous diaries and it’s all the same.

Kylie: What’s next for Katherine Howell?

Katherine: Finishing book 5 first of all! Deadline is the end of the month. Then work on my PhD thesis, which is a study of female doctors in crime fiction, and the novel I’m writing for that too, and also book 6. I’m teaching a few workshops this year too.

For more information on Katherine Howell, her books and public appearances and signings, visit her website or catch up with her on Facebook.

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For anyone who needs an introduction, Val McDermid is one of the world’s most highly acclaimed and prolific crime writers. She has written twenty-seven crime novels, many of which are across three series: the Lindsay Gordon Series, the Kate Brannigan Series and the Tony Hill & Carol Jordan series which spawned the hit television show, “Wire In The Blood”.

Her latest novel, “Trick of the Dark”, released in November 2010, is a stand- alone novel set at Oxford, where Val McDermid herself studied. (Keep an eye out for my review in the coming days.)

Val McDermid has won many awards, including the coveted Crime Writer’s Association’s, Cartier Diamond Dagger Award for outstanding achievement in crime writing. She is a member of Sisters in Crime and has a great relationship with the Melbourne chapter having spoken at various events including attending the 2010 Davitt Awards as guest presenter. McDermid divides her time between living in Northumberland and Manchester with her partner, her son and three cats. Here, she has agreed to answer a few questions about her past, present and future in writing.

KF: You studied at Oxford, went on to journalism then to being a performed playwright, and of course an acclaimed novelist. Your latest book, ‘Trick of the Dark’, is set at Oxford – does it feel a little like coming full circle for you?

VM: In a way! It took me a long time to feel comfortable about setting a book in Oxford. A lot of writing about Oxford university life is romanticised and quite sentimental and I absolutely didn’t want to indulge in that so I thought it best to wait till I felt enough distance from my own student days. And to be honest, while Colin Dexter was still writing the Morse novels, I was wary of treading the same ground, I didn’t want to be accused of jumping on a successful bandwagon! Luckily, I have Colin’s blessing for taking over the city from him.

KF: Your Tony Hill and Carol Jordan series have obviously been hugely successful. Do you have plans to send them out on more cases or did the books finish along with “Fever of the Bone” and the announcement that the
sixth season of “Wire in the Blood” would be the final series for TV?

VM: Not at all. The books have an entirely separate existence from the TV. I am actually writing the seventh Tony & Carol novel right now, with a working title of UNREDEEMABLE. And it features the return of one of their earlier antagonists. For anyone who thought the ending of FEVER OF THE BONE was happy, let me tell you, Tony and Carol are not having a good time now…

KF: How did your time working as a journalist impact on the crimes that you write? Do you find yourself thinking about, or even alluding to, true crimes in your writing?

VM: I try to avoid any parallels between my fiction and true crime. As a journalist, I saw too much grief at first hand to want to touch on anything that might inadvertently cause pain to someone affected by a real case. The main lesson I learned from journalism was not to be precious about writing. When you’re covering the news, you can’t wait for the muse to strike — you just have to hammer out your word count whatever is going on in your own life. Sure, it might not be great, but you can always go back and make it better. For me, writing is my job and when the time of year comes when I have to sit down and write, that’s exactly what I do, whether I feel like it or not. The main gift journalism gave me was access to a vast range of people, places and situations I would never otherwise have encountered, and that’s been one of the key parts of the database of potential book characters in my head. Even though it’s twenty years since I quit newspapers, I still go back to those experiences all the time.

KF: I’ve read that for you, an idea for a story usually presents itself before the characters, settings etc. Do you ever have to try to “fit” the story with characters from one of  your existing series or is it immediately evident whose story it is going to be?

VM: Generally I know pretty early on whose story it’s going to be. There’s no point in trying to shoehorn existing characters into an idea that doesn’t fit them. That’s how Tony and Carol were first born — I had this great idea for a serial killer thriller and I knew it wouldn’t work with either Lindsay Gordon or Kate Brannigan because journalists and private eyes can’t work cases like that with any degree of credibility. But there are always lots of ideas kicking around in the back of my head — it can take years from the first pricking of an idea to being ready to write it.

KF: Your novels delve into the darkest crevices of human nature and, at times, are quite horrifying – if not terrifying. Is there anywhere you won’t take your characters; anything you won’t write about?

VM: I don’t find it useful to set myself limits in advance of writing. There have been points in various books where I’ve pulled back from something because it wasn’t necessary in terms of telling the story effectively — usually elements of a crime where professional advisors have suggested that in reality, a certain kind of killer would have indulged in particular behaviour that I find so disgusting I just don’t want it in my head. I think there’s nothing that should be off limits in terms of subject matter — what you choose as your material is an individual choice for each particular writer.

KF: Along with “Wire in the Blood”, “A Place of Execution” also made it to our TV screens – are we likely to see any others go into production?

VM: THE DISTANT ECHO is currently in development for TV, and KILLING THE SHADOWS is in development for a film. Who knows whether they’ll get made…

KF: Finally, what’s next for Val McDermid?

VM: As I said, a new Tony & Carol. I’m also writing a 5-part radio drama for the BBC, and I have a children’s book called MY GRANNY WAS A PIRATE in production. Never a dull moment
here…

You can find out more about Val McDermid at her website.

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