Today as part of Kate
Moretti’s The Vanishing Year blog
tour, author Kate Moretti talks about The
Thrill of Domestic Suspense.
When I started writing suspense, I realized I was more
attracted to the kind of drama that occurs inside your own home. For a while, I
thought this was maybe just called family drama, but I’d had a hard time
finding books that fit this narrow-seeming genre. A handful of Dean Koontz,
some romantic suspense authors like Lisa Gardner, JD Robb, Karen Robards were
selling by the zillions but their books were more about sexual tension and life
and death.
Then GONE GIRL
happened.
I read Gone Girl,
and like most of America went whoa. It’s not that the genre had never been
done, it’s not even that the idea of a missing woman was even all that
revolutionary. Gone Girl did three
things to really make the book community sit up straight. 1. It was incredibly
well-written, and the social commentary was excoriating. Brutal and accurate,
as evidenced by the controversial Cool
Girl passage. 2. It brought the danger inside the house. With only one live
POV and a diary, we got a very skewed version of what the Dunne’s marriage was
like. This kind of dichotomy was compelling and suspenseful. 3. It turned the
damsel in distress on its head. This
accounts for at least 50% of the success of this book, in my mind. Not that no
book has ever tried to have a female villain, but very few have done it so
brilliantly and coldly.
In 2011, I started writing a book called Binds That Tie, which is a couple in a
trouble marriage that accidentally kill a man and instead of calling the
police, they bury the body. It was
alternative point of view, and a few people told me, “you can’t write women’s fiction from a man’s point of view”. So I
doubted what I was writing was women’s fiction. But I didn’t have a name for
it.
Now, in 2016, the market is exploding with the kind of
books that I adore. Deeper psychological implications, untrustworthy narrators,
plot twists, and creative structure (think All
the Missing Girls, by Megan Miranda). I read a glut of books this summer,
from Emma Cline’s The Girls, to Lisa Jewell’s The Girls in the Garden, The
Widow, by Fiona Barton, Pretty Girls,
by Karin Slaughter, and the upcoming The
Marriage Lie, by Kimberly Belle. All of these books had a single thread in
common: they focused on the dangers in our own ordinary lives, our own
neighborhoods, and in many cases, our own homes. For me, this kind of story ups
the ante: the suspense feels immediate and very personal.
Sarah Weinman calls
these stories Domestic Suspense. I don’t know if she coined the term
necessarily, but she’s certainly had a hand in re-popularizing it. I’ve tried
to figure out why we, mostly as women, seem so drawn to this genre. I think
we’re drawn to this idea that we could be our own protagonist. We’re not FBI
agents or homicide detectives (although some are, I’m sure!), we’re not in
Witness protection, we’re just ordinary women. We have kids and families and
PTA meetings and carpool and girls nights out and bachelorette parties.
The appeal isn’t the external threat of danger. These gripping, fantastical stories could
happen to us. And that’s the thrill of it.
More information about the author and her website can be
found here. You can also find her on Facebook and follow her
on Twitter @KateMoretti1
The Vanishing Year by Kate Moretti is
published on 27th September by Titan Books
Zoe Whittaker is living a charmed life. She is the
beautiful young wife to handsome, charming Wall Street tycoon Henry Whittaker.
She is a member of Manhattan’s social elite. She is on the board of one of the
city’s most prestigious philanthropic organizations. She has a perfect Tribeca
penthouse in the city and a gorgeous lake house in the country. The finest
wine, the most up-to-date fashion, and the most luxurious vacations are all at
her fingertips. What no one knows is
that five years ago, Zoe’s life was in danger. Back then, Zoe wasn’t Zoe at
all. Now her secrets are coming back to haunt her. As the past and present collide, Zoe must
decide who she can trust before she—whoever she is—vanishes
completely.
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