0:12

Hello and welcome it's another Books of the Year podcast

0:15

from your very good friends at Books

0:17

of the Year. We are here again, we are sailing

0:19

towards Christmas, there's just a few more

0:22

weeks to go. I'm not sailing towards Christmas.

0:24

Are you not? You're not sailing towards Christmas,

0:26

you're sailing away from Christmas? It's November. It's

0:28

November, yes it is, I mean who knows when this goes out.

0:33

The time is, it's too soon to be thinking about Christmas. Do you know

0:35

what, I've already started, we went at the weekend and bought

0:37

some presents. So already the Christmas,

0:40

the Christmas fabulousness has already started.

0:42

I have an email

0:42

here from Libby who wrote to

0:45

BooksoftheYearatYahoo.com which is fortunately

0:47

our email address. Libby

0:50

says, hello boys, I just wanted

0:52

to drop you a quick note to

0:54

say thank you for all the recommendations this year. When

0:57

you were talking to Steve Kavanagh the other day, Matt was

0:59

talking about dust covers. Steve

1:01

talked about his novel Thirteen, what

1:04

a cover. I had to hunt around but I found

1:06

the book. It's a great read and I've fallen

1:08

in love with a new author, which is kind of

1:10

what we're here for. Thank you again,

1:12

says Libby P.S. Star of the North is still

1:15

a favourite. Goodness me, that's going way back,

1:17

that's a North Korean one isn't it, Star of the North.

1:20

I would maintain Steve Kavanagh has done the best

1:23

sell on books this

1:25

year, both on his own and on

1:27

other books because every single book he

1:29

mentioned in his Q&A and also his own,

1:32

I thought oh yes, I fancy a bit of that.

1:36

Dinika Tenhoover on Twitter says, just

1:38

finished Hitler, Stalin, Mum and Dad. Great

1:40

book and so important to read, especially

1:43

the way things are at the moment.

1:46

The pod with Daniel was brilliant and gave

1:48

me a lot more background on the book, which

1:50

I needed. Remember, Dinika

1:53

is absolutely

1:54

right and in

1:57

those words she says, the way things are at the moment, that's

1:59

precisely right. That is one of the books that

2:02

makes extra important reading,

2:04

I think. If you'd like to get in touch, email

2:06

at any time, booksoftheyearatyahoo.com. We're on

2:08

Twitter at Books of the Year. I know it's X,

2:10

but we don't call it that. And we're on Instagram

2:13

and threads at PickanyPage. Our

2:15

special guest today is best-selling

2:17

author, John, I was going to say

2:20

friend of the show, but what that actually, because lots of programs

2:22

talk about friend of the show, it just means someone who's on a lot. Someone

2:25

who likes to come on the show. So let's

2:28

talk to best-selling author who likes to come

2:30

on our show, John Boyne. And

2:44

how fantastic to have John Boyne back in our

2:46

studio. John, how are you doing? Nice to see you. I'm

2:48

very well. Good to see you. Is that a goatee

2:50

beard you're growing there? It's my excuse for one.

2:53

As much as I can squeeze out. It

2:55

looks grand. So you've been only in the UK briefly,

2:58

I think, just on a little book tour? Yeah, I've

3:00

been here for about five days now. And in Leicester

3:02

and Cambridge and London and Southwold and

3:05

Tring, reading, doing

3:07

some festivals. It's been really

3:09

good. And how long has it been since you've done a

3:11

little book tour? Here

3:14

probably only a year ago, because All the Broken

3:16

Places came out last August. So

3:19

I think I did a bunch of cities then and some festivals

3:22

to promote that. I'm usually back and forth. Dublin

3:24

isn't too far. So

3:26

your book is Water. It's one of a

3:28

quartet, which you've been working

3:31

on the traditional elements. This is

3:33

not the periodic table, because I've done

3:35

that and you're not working on that. And also there

3:37

are 118 elements in the periodic table. Now

3:39

that's a series. Yeah, 118 books would

3:41

be beyond even me, I'm afraid. Come

3:44

on, that's a year's worth of writing, you know,

3:46

at least. I'm intrigued

3:49

as to whether the idea emerged

3:52

fully formed as a quartet or

3:54

whether you had an idea of an overarching story

3:56

and then divided it up. Where did this

3:58

idea come from?

4:00

It didn't start with the idea of a quartet, it started

4:02

really with just the first book, Water. And

4:05

I was writing that, and

4:07

I thought it was going to be quite a short book,

4:10

and I felt a very quiet book. And

4:12

as you know, I've written a lot of very long books and

4:14

some historical ones that I, in my head

4:16

are sort of loud and noisy books. And I just wanted to

4:18

write something short and quiet. And

4:21

when I finished the first draft of Water, and

4:24

that theme was running all the way through it, and

4:26

I was going to title the book that,

4:28

it just occurred to me one day that actually the four

4:32

classical elements, water, earth,

4:34

fire and air, and I thought, well, maybe I

4:36

could write four of these books. And

4:38

you know, I just sort of threw it around in my head for a while.

4:41

And I presented the idea then to my editor. And

4:44

I wasn't sure whether he would think it was a commercial

4:47

idea or not. But fortunately,

4:49

I had the draft of Water to show him. So

4:51

I could show him what exactly I was talking about. And

4:53

then the concept of a minor character from each

4:56

becoming the narrator of the next

4:58

one. So there were before standalone books,

5:01

but with themes in common, with characters

5:03

in common. And he read it and he said, yeah,

5:05

let's go for it. Sounds good. He's a very wise man. He

5:07

is a wise man. He has some good authors, Simon, doesn't he?

5:10

I should also mention that if you've

5:12

heard our Terry Hayes conversation, it's the

5:14

same editor. It's the same editor. Terry

5:16

is, this is the polar opposite. So Terry Hayes produces

5:19

hundreds of thousands of pages. And

5:21

John can do that, but he hasn't here. Just before we go

5:23

any further, Matt, just describe the cover

5:25

that we're looking at. Yeah. So as you'd expect, given

5:28

that the title is Water, Water

5:30

dominates this front cover.

5:33

And it's the bottom half is Bubbles

5:36

and the azure blue of the sea. And

5:38

then above it, the sort of steel grey sky.

5:41

Author of The Heart's Invisible Furies at the top.

5:43

Water is the big, bold title.

5:46

John Boyne picked out in White

5:48

and Bold at the bottom. And then from the Observer,

5:51

one of the most assured novelists

5:53

of his generation. So does your idea

5:55

make this kind of episodic almost?

5:58

It's almost like, so it's four stands. standalone

6:00

books, but they they connect with

6:02

each other. It also kind of feels almost

6:05

like a screenplay for for standalone

6:07

film. Yeah. And the way

6:09

we're actually doing it is because they're going to be produced

6:12

every six months, but they're going to be in hardback.

6:14

But at the end, we're going to bound them all up as

6:17

the elements. So then, you know, a reader

6:19

can read it from start to finish. But I

6:21

also think you can read them in any particular order, even

6:23

though it would be wiser probably to

6:26

read them in the order that I bring them out, I

6:28

was very clear in my head that they had to work as

6:30

individual stories themselves. I'm

6:32

not crazy about the idea of having

6:34

to read other books in order to read one book, you know, that

6:37

you I think it's better that they should

6:39

work individually. So I've kept

6:41

that in my focus as I've gone. That's

6:44

while there will be interconnecting characters and interconnecting

6:47

ideas that will work

6:49

best for the reader of all four, but it won't ruin the

6:51

experience if you haven't. Did you find

6:53

that quite exciting? I

6:55

did. I've never done something like that before. So

6:57

it was quite a challenge. But I guess there was a

6:59

moment around the start of number

7:01

three where, you know, I'm sort of too far away

7:04

from the beginning and too far away from the end. And

7:06

I found it because the third book, Fire, is

7:08

the most difficult, was the most difficult, thematically

7:11

to write. And there was moments there

7:13

where I really had to summon

7:16

all my writerly energy and tell myself, I can

7:18

do this, I can do this because I was

7:20

starting to get quite stressed by it. And

7:22

then the fourth one, writing that air, was

7:24

in some ways, I haven't finished that yet, I only just

7:27

finished the first draft, but it sort of

7:29

flowed along quite well in the first draft, maybe because

7:31

I could see the end in sight and I knew exactly

7:33

how I wanted to end the sequence. And

7:36

I was working my way towards that. Whereas with the first

7:38

three, I suppose, I never quite knew where the book was going

7:41

to end until I reached it. Matt and

7:43

I both responded with great enthusiasm when

7:45

your book arrived for two reasons. One,

7:47

most importantly, it's short. No, I'm

7:50

coming to that. Number two, one,

7:52

it's a new John Boyne book, which always very enthusiastic

7:55

about. Two, it's short. OK,

7:57

because after Terry Hayes, this is

7:59

a. It's just such a delight. And

8:02

I know it's like a truism that a story

8:04

is as long as it needs to be. But

8:07

this is just a fantastic, wonderful

8:10

story. Looking forward already to

8:12

the other three, which being the machine that you are, John,

8:15

as you just explained, you're almost there.

8:17

You're almost finished. Introduces

8:19

to Water, introduces to the woman at the heart of this story.

8:22

The narrator of Water is a woman called Vanessa

8:24

Carvin, and she arrives on

8:27

this island of the west coast of Ireland.

8:29

It's an unnamed island, but basically

8:32

based on Anishinaabeg, which is

8:34

one of the Oran Islands. It's where, when I was

8:36

a teenager, I went to the Gail Tacht. I'm

8:38

sure some of your listeners will know that's where it's kind

8:40

of a summer camp for kids in Ireland where theoretically

8:43

you go there at age 15, 16 to learn Irish. In

8:46

practice, you go there for other reasons, shall

8:48

we say, really. But

8:51

it's a very isolated community, 400 people

8:54

on the island. She's gone through a trauma

8:56

in her personal life. Her husband has

8:58

been, for many years, the head of

9:00

the National Swimming Federation, and

9:03

he has been tried and convicted and imprisoned

9:05

on charges of child abuse against eight girls

9:08

in his care. She goes there

9:11

having spent a year really in the limelight

9:13

in Ireland, in the newspapers, on the TV

9:15

shows, really being hounded all

9:18

the way. She doesn't know whether she has

9:20

enabled this behavior or not over the years,

9:23

and she wants to discover that. She wants to

9:25

go and just spend this time alone. She's never

9:27

really been alone in her life. She's lived,

9:29

you know, she's been a daughter, she's been a wife, she's

9:31

been a mother. She wants to be on her own

9:34

and just think. And in this book, over 15

9:37

short chapters, she just meets different people on the

9:39

island. And in her conversations with

9:41

them, each of those conversations kind of

9:43

makes a reflect on her life with

9:46

her husband, Brendan, and her life with

9:48

her two daughters, and really

9:50

come to terms with what has happened and answer the

9:52

question for herself, did I enable this behavior?

9:55

Did I know what was going on? And did I do nothing about it? One

9:58

of the delights of the book, although you've... you've explained

10:01

the territory that we're in is the way

10:03

you drip feed the information in. So when

10:05

we arrive with her at the beginning

10:08

of the book, and she changes her name right

10:10

at the very beginning, we are as lost as she

10:12

is, it feels. And we're visiting this island for

10:14

the first time because we haven't done the Irish

10:17

lessons that you have. And

10:19

I love that feeling of being remote,

10:23

cut off, no Wi-Fi, no

10:26

friends. I felt as though we were going through it with her. Yeah,

10:29

that's good. I'm glad because I wanted

10:31

the reader to have that experience to be sort of baffled

10:34

at the start by what was going on. The no Wi-Fi

10:36

thing was very important. I saw at the start

10:38

that it was one of those and she doesn't have a television set

10:41

either. And that when she first arrives in this cottage,

10:44

it's like stepping back in time for her. And

10:46

at first that's kind of a panicking experience.

10:48

But then she realizes actually, you know, this is

10:50

beneficial. This is something good.

10:53

You know, I can I won't be on my phone all

10:55

the time. I won't be, you know, on the internet

10:58

constantly, especially having had a year where she

11:01

knows full well that she has been, you know,

11:03

one of the they say, like, you know, every day there's a villain

11:05

on Twitter, you know, and to spend a year with her husband

11:07

being a year of that. So

11:10

I think that remoteness and that

11:12

isolation and just drawing

11:14

back to nature in a way is good for her,

11:17

her mental health and good for her helping to

11:19

understand the past. Simon,

11:22

John, I love that the the sort of

11:24

the opening pages of the book where you're not sure

11:26

what's what you don't know at all what

11:29

is going on. You just know this woman has come onto this island

11:31

and is changing her name. So you know, something

11:33

has happened. And on the way here, I was

11:35

thinking how we're going to talk about this book without

11:38

talking about what her husband has been

11:40

convicted of now you've you've sort of Well, I think

11:42

it's important to say because actually, it's the overriding

11:44

theme of the four months. And in the

11:47

four books, I'm looking at the issue of abuse, but

11:49

from four different perspectives. So

11:51

in this first book, water, it's about the idea

11:54

of the enabler. In the second book, Earth,

11:56

it's about complicity. It's about a crime taking

11:58

place in front of somebody who does nothing to stop

12:01

it. In the third book, it's from

12:03

the point of view of a criminal, somebody doing that

12:05

act. But in that book, it's a female

12:08

protagonist. And the fourth book from the point

12:10

of view of a victim, all

12:12

four different crimes, they're all abuse

12:14

related, but as I say, four different stories entirely.

12:17

But to look at it in the round from that and to try

12:19

to understand that subject of abuse

12:21

from these four different places. That's

12:24

right. So I had no idea that that was that that's

12:26

the route those full books are going to

12:28

take. That's really interesting. I wanted to talk

12:30

to you about this, a sequence towards

12:33

the end, but this is not going to give away any spoilers

12:35

or anything. But the central character is

12:37

confronted about whether she did know

12:39

whether, whether she was enabling it.

12:41

And she says something, never

12:43

even to notice, never even to suspect.

12:46

That's what shames me the most. That's what

12:48

makes me question myself was I blind

12:51

or just stupid. And it stopped

12:53

me in my tracks, because I was reading it thinking,

12:56

you didn't do this. It was

12:58

your husband that did this. And maybe

13:01

you might have suspected but how

13:03

quickly everyone decided that

13:06

you must have known your wife, you must have

13:08

known. And there are a couple of times

13:10

in the book where people just

13:13

basically decide we are lumping you

13:15

in with him, even though

13:17

you didn't know and there's no evidence

13:19

to suggest that she did know. It's

13:21

the you must have known. I think

13:24

we all do that, don't we? When we see something on television,

13:26

a crime that's been committed, maybe a public figure,

13:29

and we say, Oh, you know, the

13:31

wife she was in it, or otherwise, the husband

13:33

he was in it, there's no way they didn't know. We're very

13:35

quick to judge people. It's probably

13:37

just human nature to do that. But

13:40

the most important person who needs to judge that is herself

13:43

here. And she is asking that question.

13:45

And it's important for her to know, you

13:48

know, complicity is the theme that runs

13:50

through so many of my books, history of loneliness,

13:52

it's there all the broken places, it's there. Strike

13:55

pajamas, even it's there. And it's definitely

13:57

here. And I think a lot of that is because When

14:00

we talk about these crimes, growing up in Ireland in

14:02

the 80s and 90s, a very small number

14:05

of people were committing these crimes,

14:07

the priests or the lay teachers, whatever, but a very

14:09

vast majority of people knew they were going on. And

14:11

that's always been the thing that's fascinated me. Criminal

14:14

behavior doesn't interest me so much because I think

14:16

if you're, you know, a serial killer or something,

14:19

then there's probably just something wrong with you. But

14:21

it's the people who know that it's happening

14:23

and do nothing to stop it. To

14:25

me, that's always the thing like, why, why wouldn't you stop

14:28

it? Why wouldn't you stop that happening? So

14:30

that's why I wanted to go for these four different perspectives

14:33

in these books. Is there a moment in this

14:36

book or the introduction of a particular character, which

14:38

is the moment that you thought, oh, this

14:40

isn't a standalone book, that this is part

14:43

of a fall? I think it was

14:45

only when I finished the first draft of

14:47

it. And, you know, at the end of the book, what

14:49

I won't say at the end happens, but, you know, that she

14:51

gets to the end of her story. But I felt

14:54

I think

14:56

I just felt that the theme in it, there was so

14:58

much more to write about. And there's

15:01

a big park across from my house in Dublin. I walked

15:03

there several times a day and it was when I was walking around

15:05

it thinking about this. And it just occurred

15:08

to me, I just thought, Walter, you know, you've got

15:10

three others, you know, we could there are so many

15:12

ways I could I could do this. And I really loved

15:15

the idea of having some small

15:17

character in this book who would then pick

15:19

up the story in the next book

15:21

and moving on and on again, and

15:24

work its way all around. I thought that's an interesting

15:26

way to write a novel.

15:28

I love the people on the

15:30

island that she meets. I

15:33

can hear them speak. I'm not

15:35

sure what the colloquial Irish

15:37

is that you're describing to us. In my

15:40

head, I can hear

15:42

all these characters and I liked most of them. Like

15:44

most of them. Is there an Irish

15:46

dialect that we should have running in

15:49

our heads here? Not really,

15:51

but I do I do love writing dialogue, I

15:53

have to say. It's my favorite thing. And I

15:56

always think in a novel, the two things, you

15:58

know, when I talk to students, creative writing students. something.

16:00

I say if you're stuck, either make

16:02

people laugh or get people talking in

16:05

the book. And once characters

16:07

are talking, the plot will move along. And

16:09

a lot of this book is very conversationally

16:11

based. I think early

16:14

on the first moment when Mrs. Duggan,

16:16

the neighbour from Next Door, descends

16:19

into the house and starts screaming at her about the cat

16:21

that she's feeding, a cat with irritable

16:24

bowel syndrome and lactose intolerance.

16:26

And Willow

16:30

is sort of, I didn't know that cat could have

16:32

such refined notions. And

16:34

the important thing in those conversations

16:36

is that suddenly she starts to realise she thinks that

16:38

the people on this island are basically a bit thick,

16:41

and just don't know anything of the world. But they

16:43

surprise her time and again with the things

16:46

that they do know. And they put

16:48

her prejudices a little bit at bay.

16:51

But the dialect, probably

16:53

just a traditional kind of rural Irish

16:56

accent. I

16:58

wonder how much anger there is

17:00

in your writing here, because there is a fantastic

17:03

sequence where in fact

17:05

it finishes with, she's

17:08

known as Willow for most of the

17:10

time, our central character, she finishes off the

17:12

speech by saying, oh, I have such anger. And

17:14

she's been describing traditional

17:17

Catholicism, traditional Christian teaching

17:19

and how male it is and the disciples

17:22

and wondering what they might have done, what they might have done.

17:24

And there was, says on the front,

17:26

the heart's invisible furies. And I wonder if, I don't know,

17:29

I just wondered if you were still

17:31

furious. No, no, I'm

17:33

not, because I have been able to get out

17:36

a lot of my anger and,

17:38

you know, too early as I say, at

17:42

what happened in Ireland during those years and things

17:44

that happened to me is I've been able to get it out in

17:47

writing. And I've been really lucky that

17:49

somehow I've got that skill.

17:51

I can do that. You know, recently

17:54

in the last couple of years, I've been involved in

17:56

a court case against one of my teachers. the

18:00

substantial amount of us who were taking that case.

18:03

And it had been to the DPP and it

18:06

was brought to court. The trial date was set for

18:08

March. And then he died in August

18:10

of, you know, he was in his 80s, he died of natural causes.

18:13

So we don't have that opportunity to confront

18:15

him in court. Unlike

18:18

my fellow litigants in that I

18:20

have the opportunity to write about it, and

18:22

to talk about it, you know, in forums like this.

18:25

And in doing that, I've been very

18:27

fortunate because I can work all those

18:29

feelings out for myself in the

18:31

stories I tell. My

18:33

friends from that time, they're not so lucky

18:35

in that, you know, they don't have that

18:37

platform to do that. So

18:40

I feel my rage has

18:42

dissipated a long time ago. I think writing history

18:44

of lonionist that you mentioned,

18:48

I think that was around 2014 or something,

18:51

began that process for me of being able

18:53

to work all that out in my head. Whereas

18:56

before that say in my 30s, my 20s, even

18:58

to my early 30s, I was really

19:01

I was there was a lot of anger inside

19:03

me against the church against Ireland. And

19:06

I definitely needed to work through that.

19:09

So you've mentioned history of lonionist, which I adored

19:12

that book. And, and you've

19:15

talked about this, the almost

19:17

fastest that you've had through being able to write

19:19

about it. Would you recognize as

19:21

well that for people reading about it, I

19:24

would say that I love reading

19:26

books that are laced with righteous

19:29

fury. And that doesn't need to

19:31

be about abuse, it can be a there are a number of

19:33

books I read this year, which absolutely jump

19:35

out to me as grabbing me by the scruff

19:37

of the neck and pointing my face and telling

19:40

me this is wrong. And I'll tell you why.

19:42

And I wonder whether do you appreciate

19:45

how much of an effect that has on a reader

19:47

to be able to read a book where there is fury

19:49

coming off coming off the page. And

19:52

you're you find yourself confronted with

19:54

it to begin with. But you're

19:56

absolutely brought round. Yeah, I mean, and

19:58

that is what I mean, I want that kind of power.

20:00

on the page. I remember in

20:03

History of Loneliness a scene towards the end,

20:06

towards one of the court cases going

20:08

on, and a man in a cafe

20:11

shop or something just losing his

20:13

mind really, you know, in absolute

20:15

anger. And there's a moment here in Water, in

20:17

fact, where Willow was talking to a middle

20:20

aged man who has his

20:22

own backstory about something

20:25

terrible he's done in his life. And he's telling

20:27

her, you know, that my problem is, you know, I still

20:29

feel like I'm a teenager, you know, I just feel, you know,

20:32

and he's expecting her to say,

20:35

no, don't worry, you know, you're

20:38

forgiven for the things you've done. And instead, she blows

20:40

up at him. And she's like, no, you know, this is the problem

20:42

with people like you. You're not a teenager. You're 60.

20:46

You know, and it's women like me, she's saying

20:48

that have to pick up the all

20:51

the trash that you leave in your wake when

20:53

you commit these acts. And

20:56

in the first draft that ended differently, it was where

20:58

she actually did sort of offer some sort of forgiveness

21:00

to him. But in the really Yeah, and then when I got

21:02

to the second draft, and I read that, I was like, what am I thinking?

21:05

No, what we need here is for her to, you know,

21:07

basically overturn the table on him and say,

21:09

No, no, you know, so I think

21:13

when I read a book, I want to I want to feel that anger

21:15

in it as well, or, you know, some sort of passion

21:18

anyway, instead of blandness,

21:21

which of the I don't know if you

21:23

feel happy to tell us this, but of

21:25

the characters that we read in water, how

21:28

many make it through to

21:30

your other stories, some of them or all of them? Only

21:33

a couple like the narrator

21:35

of the second book is

21:38

a young man who's, who's in this book,

21:41

he's only 1617 in this book, but we pick

21:43

up his story a couple of years later. And there's

21:46

a priest in this that shows up again in

21:48

number two and number four. But

21:50

I think that's all okay. Can I ask you about

21:53

because the priest is Father Efeche. Have I got

21:55

his name right? Well, tell us about him.

21:57

I mean, I am intrigued. I'm glad that he's coming

22:00

back because it felt as though

22:02

he had a lot to say. Yes, and

22:05

when I got to the end of the first book, you know, I

22:07

felt that myself, that there were some characters and he was one

22:09

of them that I could

22:12

use again because he is a voice of,

22:15

he's sort of a moral voice in the book. He's

22:17

there to talk, he talks to Warder. She's not

22:19

religious in any way. She doesn't want any

22:21

part of religion anymore, but he's

22:24

a priest. I'm not

22:26

trying to be facetious. He's also a very good man.

22:29

There's wisdom in his countenance. Yes,

22:31

and he, like her, is a blow-in

22:33

on the island. You know, he's from Nigeria and he's come

22:36

there to be the priest on the island. She's come

22:38

from Dublin. And, you know, they can sit outside

22:40

the church on a bench and talk to each other.

22:42

And sometimes he upsets her with the things he says and

22:45

sometimes he challenges her. But he's a friend,

22:48

I think, and a wise friend. So I thought,

22:50

yes, I'll use him again. So I bring

22:52

him back in number two, again, just

22:54

in one scene, but an important scene. Alright,

22:57

Matt? Alright, Simon. I've been wondering a number of things.

22:59

I was also wondering whether you've heard about BBC

23:01

Maestro before. BBC Maestro?

23:03

No, no, I haven't. What's that about? It is a subscription-based

23:06

streaming platform with courses in music,

23:09

home, food, drink, film, entertainment,

23:12

and, most importantly, writing. Each

23:15

course is created by an expert in their field

23:17

such as Mark Ronson on music production,

23:19

Marco Piawite on cooking, but some

23:21

of the authors they have on here are really

23:24

rather good. Really? Okay, so we'd

23:26

know anyone that's been on this podcast perhaps? Well, how about

23:28

a friend of the show, Lee Child,

23:31

who has created a course on writing thrillers?

23:34

And previous guest Jojo Moyes has one too.

23:37

There are also courses from Mallory Blackman,

23:39

Ken Follett, and Carol Ann Duffy. Sounds

23:41

good. So if you're looking to write your

23:43

first novel or improve your cooking skills, are

23:46

we saying these are the kind of courses you should be checking out?

23:48

We're saying precisely that, because you'll

23:50

be getting first-hand advice from some

23:52

of the world's greatest teachers. Take our friend Lee

23:54

Child's course, for example. It contains 35 high-quality

23:57

video lessons on writing, which is a great way to learn about

23:59

the world over eight hours of content.

24:01

I thought it was a good thing to share with everybody because it's

24:04

never too late to follow your passion. And

24:06

of course we've got Christmas coming up so I thought this is

24:08

going to make a great present for someone. Go to bbcmaestro.com

24:11

and use the code MAYO to

24:13

get your 40% off your favourite video

24:16

course or 40% off a subscription

24:18

which gives you access to every single

24:20

BBC Maestro course. Let

24:23

the greatest be your teacher with BBC

24:25

Maestro. So

24:27

I was rather hoping Mrs Duggan was going

24:29

to come back because she was a

24:31

huge enormous fun as you say she

24:34

just she belts through the door

24:36

and you're just like oh I we are going to have fun

24:39

with her and whenever I'm

24:41

reading a book like this I always think which of

24:43

these characters has the author had the most fun

24:46

with when writing and it struck me that Mrs

24:48

Duggan she has a great line at one point

24:50

where she says you'll be one of those will

24:52

you and and and she replies what's

24:54

that readers one of those

24:57

readers you read the books I

24:59

think I will also ask so you know what's your

25:01

first name and she says missus missus

25:04

exactly so was she one of those that

25:06

you just yeah reveled in time with her

25:08

the funny thing is right so the last four or five nights

25:10

I've been doing readings every night in different cities here in

25:13

England and that's the section I always read

25:15

from in a way it's it's

25:19

it's a strange one from this book because it's not a comic

25:21

novel but there's a lot of jokes oh

25:23

yeah in that section and that's why I

25:25

liked reading it the last few nights because it's

25:27

I think if you can entertain an audience that's that's

25:30

always a good thing so I had a lot of fun with

25:32

her because she is she's she's

25:35

like the mad woman of the island but she also says

25:37

a couple of things that are quite wise

25:40

and she she kind

25:43

of is friendly eventually with with Willow

25:45

in some strange way but

25:47

she's a bit of light relief at times

25:49

yeah but she only makes it yeah

25:52

she doesn't reappear in other books maybe she

25:54

can have a standalone novel yeah maybe yeah

25:57

um there are a couple of things that that you

25:59

wrote Oh, that's interesting. I hadn't

26:01

heard. It's a reference to

26:03

a family of four being not quite a gentleman's

26:06

family. I hadn't heard

26:08

that idea of a gentleman's family. Oh, in Ireland,

26:10

yeah, we call it a gentleman's family is a family of four

26:12

where it's a mother and father and a son and a daughter.

26:16

Right. So they have two

26:18

daughters, but you don't have that phrase? No, no, no,

26:20

no. Yeah, we have that. It's a gentleman's family. Why would it be a gentleman's

26:23

family? I don't know. I don't know where it comes from, but it's a...

26:25

A kind of mythical idea of the perfect family.

26:27

Yeah, I guess because any time it would

26:29

just be one of those things if your friends like have a a

26:33

son say and then they have a daughter you go, ah, gentleman's

26:35

family. I don't know where it comes from. I'm

26:38

going to use it there. And

26:40

the other was one of

26:42

such a such a I mean, obviously, this book is

26:44

fantastically written. People who who read your

26:46

books will be familiar

26:49

with that and expecting that. But you there is an

26:51

observation that you make about there being

26:53

no word to define a parent who loses a

26:55

child. And there is a

26:57

word, obviously, for a wife

27:00

who loses a husband, a husband who loses a wife. We have

27:03

a child who loses a parent, an orphan.

27:06

Yeah. But there isn't a word to define

27:08

a parent who loses a child. It just struck me as such

27:10

a wise... Was that

27:12

one of those things that occurred to you as you were writing?

27:15

Yeah. It occurred to me as I was writing that chapter

27:18

and it struck me and I thought

27:20

to myself, that's true. There isn't.

27:23

And I thought, you know, that's a very strange thing that, yeah, you

27:25

know, we have these words for all these other

27:27

things. And I think I say in that

27:29

line in the book, something on the lines of, you know, maybe

27:31

because the language thinks that that's its own

27:34

natural thing, that we can't even have a word

27:36

for it. But it's a strange one, isn't it? That

27:39

there isn't such a... I wonder if there would be

27:41

interesting to find out, get in touch if you

27:43

know of a language which has a word for them.

27:46

Maybe other because English

27:50

has a habit of nicking words from, you know,

27:53

from all over. It's surprising that we

27:55

haven't stolen a word from somewhere else because

27:57

it would be of enormous use. I wonder does

27:59

no language...

27:59

have it though,

28:01

just because it's I think the worst thing

28:03

that could possibly happen, probably happen to any human

28:05

being is to lose a child. And

28:07

maybe we just don't want to have a word for that, so it doesn't

28:10

happen. So it's unspeakable. Yeah, pretty much.

28:14

We've made some reference, you know, you've talked about

28:16

the four books and the fact

28:18

that this is coming out here about under 200

28:21

pages. Was that always, was it always

28:23

going to be a short story? Did you know

28:26

that this was how it was going to turn out?

28:28

Yes, I said to myself at this

28:30

third 40,000 words is a good

28:33

novella, you know, a nice short book. And

28:36

I felt with the story in the book itself and

28:38

the very few characters, it

28:41

just felt to me that it needed to be short,

28:43

that I didn't want to, you know, just have any

28:46

filler in it, any printing at all, just as tight as

28:48

tight could be. And each of the books are 40,000

28:50

words. And I've been very

28:52

clinical on that in in

28:54

my writing of them, and to just,

28:56

you know, squeeze them tight.

28:59

And, you know, I've written

29:01

some very, very long books, you know, Hearts and Invisible

29:03

Furies is 2000 words longer than Moby Dick.

29:06

So, but you

29:08

know, you were saying about like a book has to be the length it has to be.

29:10

And sometimes a very

29:12

short book can read like it's 1000 pages, and

29:14

sometimes a very long book, I'm reading a book at the moment

29:17

that 650 pages long. And

29:20

I'm about halfway through it. And I would be great,

29:22

I would happily have another 5600

29:23

pages, it's just flowing so

29:26

brilliantly, and it's so witty and clever, and I'm

29:28

just loving it. But I've read very short

29:30

books that just, you know, take me five days

29:32

to flog my way through. But

29:34

I just I was feeling instinctively when I started

29:37

book, I know how long

29:38

it should be. I, as

29:41

Simon's already mentioned, the writing is so good.

29:44

And I knew from page one that I was going to love

29:46

this book, and not just because I've

29:48

loved your books in the past. However,

29:51

there is a sequence that I want

29:53

to talk to you about which I thought the writing

29:55

was impossible, because

29:58

it was just a very, very, simple

30:00

device. It's when the... Can I guess?

30:02

Go on, go on. Yeah, it's the politician coming

30:05

to the island and he talks of this,

30:07

he talks of that. Well, I'm gonna...

30:09

I've... While Matt is looking,

30:11

just... I think it's on page 115. It is

30:13

on 115. I know that because somebody asked me to read it

30:15

the other night and I had to look it up. So John, just describe

30:18

the scene that Matt... So an election

30:20

is happening and a politician comes to the island

30:22

and everybody gathers in the church to listen to

30:24

him. And the politician knows

30:27

that he has to appeal to everybody.

30:30

He's not going to annoy anybody. He's going to appeal to absolutely

30:33

everybody. So he just talks and

30:35

he talks and he talks. And he talks

30:38

of agriculture. He talks of emigration.

30:40

He talks of civil war politics. He

30:42

talks of Bono and Sinead O'Connor. He

30:44

talks of fishing quotas. He talks in English

30:47

of his love for the Irish language. He talks in

30:49

Irish of his love for Manchester United. He

30:51

talks of Ukraine. He talks of his hernia

30:53

operation. And it... Quite

30:55

apart from what you've already said about, you know, I

30:58

need to talk about all of these different subjects,

31:00

what that paragraph shouted out to me.

31:02

And I've only read small highlighted sections

31:05

from it. Is here is a man

31:07

who's desperate, who doesn't

31:09

know his audience. So he's just going to try. I'm going

31:11

to... It's grape shot time. I'm going to try and

31:13

hit every single base because hopefully

31:16

one of you is going to go, oh, yeah, no, no, maybe he's

31:18

talking to me. But it's also insincerity.

31:21

I don't really care about any of

31:23

these things, but I figure you

31:25

lot probably will. And it's just that

31:27

paragraph without having to say any of those

31:29

things, you just distill

31:32

it into this one paragraph and we know exactly

31:34

who this guy is. I enjoyed

31:36

writing that part. And he's also asked by

31:39

I think there's an elderly man in the church how

31:41

he voted on the equal rights marriage referendum.

31:44

And his answer is such a politician's one. He said

31:47

he voted no at the time, but now

31:49

he would vote. The world hasn't fallen off its axis. So

31:51

now we would vote yes. So basically everybody

31:54

in the audience is pleased with his answer, you

31:56

know, which is, I guess, what politicians do. Who

31:59

do you have in mind? Nobody

32:01

in particular, but there's a lot of those kind of old

32:04

rural TD's in Ireland, you know,

32:06

TD's are our MPs who kind

32:08

of pass the seat down from father to son to

32:10

son, you know, that it's, it's, it's

32:13

like it's the 18th of St. Beaudel. Yeah, the

32:15

thing that the politician in this book effect,

32:18

his father, he says was the constituency TD

32:20

before him and you know his son will be after him.

32:23

And it's a thing that would irritates me in Ireland when that

32:25

happens. I mean, you don't have some sort

32:27

of God given rights to, to

32:29

this seat. That is odd, because I'm not sure that really

32:32

happens. Obviously, we've got, you know, lords

32:34

and domes and stuff like that. But I don't

32:36

think we have MPs. There's not many MPs I can

32:38

think of who are sort of passing the seat down

32:40

father to son or mother to daughter. No, I don't think

32:42

so. It's pretty common in Ireland. That's

32:46

very interesting. I wonder if you

32:48

at the beginning of our conversation, John, you were talking

32:50

about, I think it was the third book and you were saying you were

32:52

kind of stuck or you were struggling or there was. Is

32:56

that because and given the outline of the four

32:58

books that you've given us, is that because

33:00

you're taking this into some dark places?

33:02

Is that is that why it was difficult? Yeah,

33:05

because as I mentioned, the third book is written

33:07

from the point of view of of a pedophile.

33:10

And it's a woman in her 30s who's

33:12

abusing 14 year old boys. And

33:15

I'm trying to write 40,000 words from her

33:17

perspective, trying to keep

33:19

the reader, not on her side,

33:21

but engaged with her and trying

33:24

to understand what would bring her to

33:26

that to do those things. And, you

33:28

know, inventing a backstory that will not justify

33:31

her behavior, but that will make hopefully

33:34

make the reader think about what's

33:36

happened to her in her life. Because I think we have

33:39

to ask those questions about those people about

33:41

what, you know, what brought them there. But

33:44

to spend, you know, eight months or whatever was

33:47

in that person's voice in that person's head

33:49

thinking about it all the time. I found that

33:51

quite weighed

33:54

down on me. It really weighed down on me

33:57

in a way that no book I've ever written before.

33:59

And perhaps that's why when I started Heir

34:02

the fourth one, which is, as I said, from the

34:04

point of view of a victim, I was filled with

34:06

a lightness because I knew I wanted

34:08

the victim to have survived,

34:10

to be a positive, I want to end this on a positive

34:13

note. This is going to be

34:15

thriving. And it sort of lifted

34:17

my spirits in a way in writing

34:19

that. There was just one other thing

34:21

I wanted to ask you, which is about

34:24

writing about life on an island. One

34:26

of my favorite TV series of recent

34:28

years, which I've got nothing to

34:31

do with your book at all, is called Midnight Mass.

34:34

And it's kind of a horror inflected book.

34:37

It's set in a small island

34:40

community off the west

34:42

coast of America, I think. Anyway,

34:45

and it goes into some seriously dark

34:47

places, but there is something about small island

34:50

communities which give a

34:52

story, a particular feel.

34:54

I don't know if it's an oppressive feeling

34:57

or whether it's a community

34:59

feeling. I don't know. Did it feel different

35:02

to you, to write this? Because

35:04

you don't really, we don't really leave the island,

35:06

do we? No, no, we don't. Other

35:09

than sort of the flashbacks to what brought

35:11

her there, but we start with

35:13

her arriving and we end with her leaving. And

35:15

it's her time there. It

35:17

is good, I think, for a storyteller to

35:20

limit themselves to that small

35:23

place and that small community. And

35:25

it was different for me because

35:27

I have written much broader books in

35:29

the past that have multiple characters and

35:31

storylines and things going on. It

35:34

was a challenge, but it was interesting. The only thing I

35:36

can kind of compare it to was, it must

35:38

be, I don't know, 15, 16 years ago when I wrote a novel on

35:40

the bounty and the long section

35:42

in it where I have Captain Bligh and the 16 guys

35:45

on the little dinghy, you know, going

35:47

back. It's just that after

35:50

the mutiny happens, and I think I wrote 30,000 words

35:52

of them there on that little boat and

35:55

nothing is happening. But

35:57

you still have to make it engaging. what

36:00

will I have them do today, you know, find a bird flying over

36:02

and try to kill it. But if

36:04

I did it right, you know, it would still make the research turn to

36:06

pages. So it can be challenging, but

36:09

rewarding at the same time. Do you know,

36:11

obviously, so you've told

36:13

us about the four books, do you already have a dream

36:15

of what's coming next? Yeah, I do. Of

36:18

course, of course. I kind of knew that. It's

36:20

been bubbling up my head for a while now. I won't say what it

36:22

is, but it's I know,

36:25

but it's a pretty good idea, I think.

36:28

And I've already told that by editor, our

36:30

editor, about it, and he's he's sold on it. So

36:33

I'm quite looking forward to getting to because it's going to be much more

36:35

lighthearted. And I can I

36:37

think it's good for me creatively to

36:39

move from something dark to something bright. Okay,

36:43

well, we're looking forward to all of those. So that's

36:45

already four books that you've that

36:47

we're looking forward to. But for the moment, the the

36:49

new book from John Boyne is water.

36:52

There'll be more conversation with you on in our standalone

36:54

podcast with our Q&A, which will

36:57

be available in a few days time. But for

36:59

the moment, John, thank you very much. Thank you.

37:13

Highlander 2, Spider-Man 3, Son

37:16

of the Mask. That's a bunch of terrible sequels

37:18

right there. Exactly. What if someone could

37:20

go back and assign any cast, crew and plot to

37:23

fix all those band sequels? That's a

37:25

Transformers film. That actually perfects the cartoon. Or

37:27

a Star Wars sequel that doesn't have the Emperor comeback? Or

37:29

a massive two part Mortal Kombat saga

37:32

directed by Peter Jackson? Oh,

37:34

what about a Goosebumps Hellraiser crossover? Yeah,

37:36

maybe not that. Yeah, that's fair. Yeah,

37:39

it's a shame that isn't a podcast. Sequelizers,

37:42

bad sequels,

37:43

sort it.