In this behind-the-scenes blog series, Sapere Books authors offer an intriguing insight into how, where and why they write.
Today, we are delighted to spotlight Marilyn Todd, author of the Julia McAllister Victorian Mysteries series.
Medieval castle at the bottom of Marilyn’s garden
Living on a French hilltop, with a medieval castle at the bottom of our garden, Roman remains beside a river in the valley, and with the Hennessey Cognac estate on one side, Martell on the other — I couldn’t ask for a lovelier or more tranquil setting.
Okay, there are diggers outside at the moment, replacing water pipes in the very same trenches the electricity people dug (then filled in) exactly one week before. But usually the loudest sound is birdsong, and the mewing of buzzards circling overhead. Just the ticket when you come home bursting with ideas that need to be turned into stories without distractions. From Sicily to Arizona, Sweden to Nova Scotia, I find inspiration everywhere.
Sweden? That was when we were walking a little out-and-back coastal path — worryingly easy to imagine two people going out, but only one of them coming back.
Nova Scotia? Who wouldn’t be inspired by the biggest disaster no one’s ever heard of, when a French ship carrying enough explosives to end the First World War collided with a Norwegian ship coming the wrong way up the channel? The explosion took close to 2,000 lives, injured 9,000 more, destroyed everything in a half-mile radius, spiked a tsunami, and scattered debris several miles inland.
Sicily drew me back to ancient history, inspiring the second book in the Claudia Seferius series, Virgin Territory, as well as Blind Eye — set in Ancient Greece this time, rather than Rome — and debunked the myth of the Cyclops.
As always, Arizona never fails to deliver, especially when my story ‘The Wickedest Town in the West’ scooped an Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine award, of which I am ridiculously proud.
But while we travel a lot, not everything I write is inspired by breathtaking scenery, adventures and legends. My first series with Sapere Books, which kicked off with Snap Shot, was influenced by the emerging science of forensic evidence at the end of the nineteenth century, and the importance of studying crime scenes. Hence Britain’s first crime scene photographer, Julia McAllister.
My new Firefly series, coming soon with Sapere, tackles the inequalities women faced in Edwardian times, especially domestic violence, which was banned between the hours of 10 p.m. and 7 a.m. because the noise interrupted other people’s sleep. Battling the system is Kitty Sullivan, who runs a gentleman’s club with a fleet of … let’s say exotic dancers, to fund a women’s refuge. Environments that, unsurprisingly, provoke dangerous situations, which Kitty faces down with charm, wit and, of course, a silver Derringer.
After all, there’s no point in having double standards, if you don’t live up to both of them.
