SECOND-BOOK JITTERS
We chat to publishing sensation Paula Hawkins about her much-anticipated new novel
IT’S a common problem. In the book world there’s even a name for it – “the second-book jinx”. This is when an author scores a major success with a debut novel and then goes into writing the second one bogged down by the weight of reader expectation. Will it be a bestseller? Will it be as good as the first, or is the author just a one-hit wonder?
You can see how all this could drive a writer mad. So spare a thought for Paula Hawkins. Her 2015 debut, The Girl On The Train, turned her into an overnight publishing sensation – it sold almost 20 million copies worldwide and was turned into a blockbuster movie starring Emily Blunt.
How do you follow this up? Imagine the pressure the British author must have been under as she began work on her much-anticipated second novel, Into The Water. We caught up with Paula (44) by email to quiz her about her writing habits and find out how she tackled the second-book jinx.
What is it like touring to promote a new novel? Where are you now and what are you up to?
I’m in Harrogate [in England] this morning; I’ll be passing through York and Durham today, finishing up in Newcastle for an event this evening. Back to London tomorrow and then I leave for New York the following day. It’s exhausting but fun, and it’s great to be talking about a new novel having spent two years talking about The Girl On The Train (TGOTT).
Your new novel is very different to TGOTT. What inspired it?
What I started with was the idea of writing about a familial relationship – I chose sisters – which has been deeply and irrevocably affected by something that happened to these women when they were young. I wanted to examine the way we remember our childhoods, the stories we tell about ourselves and our families, and to find out what hap-
pens when we discover those stories might not be true.
How long in total did it take you to write Into The Water?
I started writing in the time between finishing the TGOTT (early 2014) and its publication ( January 2015). I worked on it, on and off, for three years. Obviously since TGOTT was published I’ve had a great deal of touring and other work to do, so the process was rather interrupted.
You’ve got so many different characters to keep track of in this novel. Was it a hard book to write?
It’s a complex narrative with a wide cast of characters, so yes, it was tricky. But all these characters have relationships to one another, their paths cross at specific times in specific ways. Once you start to build up a picture of where you are in the town, everything falls into place.
What about the weight of reader expectation? Surely that must have made the process even harder?
I try not to think too much about the expectations of others while I’m writing. That way madness lies.
Were there ever days when you struggled to drag yourself to your computer keyboard? Do you ever suffer from writer’s block?
I don’t tend to get blocked – in the sense of the fear of the blank page – but of course sometimes it’s a struggle. Sometimes you might get stuck on a particular part of a story – on deciding how best to tell that part of the story – for days and days. Sometimes you sit at your desk and weep. And sometimes writing is a joyful thing. You have to push through the difficult bits. Or ask for help.
Like TGOTT, one of Into The Water’s main themes is memory. What is it that draws you to this theme?
I’m interested in the fact that, although we rely on memory – completely and with great confidence – to navigate our lives, memory is fallible. In TGOTT I looked at a specific way in which memory fails – due to alcohol consumption. But in Into the Water I’m looking at memory’s failures in a much more general way, at the way in which we all misremember things, the way we all reconstruct events from our past.
What’s your daily writing routine?
It’s a job and I treat it as such. I work in my office at home, at my desk, in silence. I usually write best in the mornings; by mid-afternoon I tend to run out of steam.
How does it feel to have written a book that’s sold almost 20 million copies worldwide?
Surreal.
Has fame changed you at all? As a person and as a writer?
I don’t feel famous. I am, thankfully, not recognised. I don’t think authors are, JK Rowling aside. I don’t feel any different to the person I was a few years ago.
Which novel by another author has had the biggest impact on your life, and why?
I find these questions impossible to answer. There isn’t just one. I’ll name three: And Then There Were None by Agatha Christie, which sparked an interest in crime writing; The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood, which was the first properly feminist novel I ever read; and A God In Ruins by Kate Atkinson, which is one of the best novels I’ve read in recent years. It’s the sort of writing that makes you want to improve; to be become more ambitious; to tell better, wider, more extraordinary stories.
If you could go back five years to when you were a struggling author, what would you tell yourself?
To persevere. That’s what I’d tell all struggling writers. If you believe in the story you’re telling, and in your ability to tell it, what else is there to do but carry on?
What’s next on the cards for you? What can readers look forward to?
After touring, writing! I have ideas for a few characters; I’m just not sure what I’m going to do with them yet. S