Alison: - The last book was The Moment Before Impact and I wrote that expecting that to be the first in a new series. That was my plan. I absolutely loved the main character in it, the two main characters and I saw them as being the start of a new series. But both my agent and my publisher said no, we think it is a standalone by the way in which the story is told. It is still unfinished business, so that is something I would like to come back to later. But then I was left in a position where the publisher said that they would really like a new series, something related to the police rather than an amateur sleuth. So, I came at it from the point of view of thinking that well I did not want to do another version of the Goodhew books because that is its own thing and again, I do not feel that I am completely finished with that. So, I thought that as a starting point – do you remember Nancy Kominsky? She used to paint things and she would do a few daubs on the page and you didn't think that it is not going to turn into anything but she would gradually fill bits in and it was a bit like that so I thought that my starting sketch was to think that if I was going to go from somewhere which was the opposite to Goodhew I would be thinking of someone who doesn't love Cambridge the way in which he (Goodhew) loves Cambridge which implies somebody who has been forced to move to Cambridge for one reason or another. They do not naturally operate at the Cambridge pace or with the Cambridge mindset. So, it has a fish out of water element to some extent. Gary was new when he first joined in Cambridge Blue and that was his first murder investigation. So, I thought that I wanted it to be somebody a bit more experienced who had a bit of history in the police. I was coming from all these opposites really, a bit like a pendulum I was probably too far away at that point and so I rounded off some of those rough edges and I settled on this character Ronnie Blake, and she is new to Cambridge, she has family in Cambridge, she has reasons to stay without necessarily the enthusiasm to stay.
Ayo: - When we were chatting
earlier you were saying that there was a bit about the University It does have
lots of university elements in them. What made you decide to incorporate those?
I know that when everyone thinks of Cambridge they think of the university, but
I would have thought that you would or might have wanted to avoid that.
Alison: - I do tend to avoid it because I write about Cambridge the way that I see Cambridge. I do work for not the University, but the other University in Cambridge and I tend to avoid that. I like to approach Cambridge from what I see and what are my experience in Cambridge is which I believe are just as valid as the University angle. It is the day-to-day Cambridge that I see. But I also have this storyline where Ronnie's sister had been living in Cambridge for a period and it was natural, and it worked very well that she had come as a student
Ayo: - One of things, I mean
over the years I know that you have a BSc in Science degree with honours in
Crime and Investigation, how much did that help in writing this series because
when you started the Goodhew series you did not have that. Things have clearly
changed over the years. Did this help?
Alison: - I took my degree really because I wanted to write, I did not always want to be going to other people. I wanted to have a better base knowledge myself. So, when I first wrote the very first Goodhew book which came out third – The Calling now The Cambridge Calling I had the murder victims in quite exposed places where the bodies had been for quite a long time. So, I got away with there not being much forensic evidence. But what I did do always from the beginning was to seek out the right people from which to ask advice. There is no way that I had the same level of expertise than any of those. But I hope that I ask more informed and more plausible questions, and I can narrow down what’s viable and what is not more quickly. What I have found from doing my degree is that some people do really make things up, and I know it is fiction but it is interesting where the line is between fact and fiction and sometimes you can read a book where you think that ten minutes of research would have helped and that is really frustrating. When I wrote the last book there was a lot in there about seatbelt injuries and I had the idea originally whether it was plausible for the person to have been put in the driver’s seat after the crash. I quickly found out that there are so many reasons why not. Seatbelt injuries, the impact, the seatbelt locking, the airbags and so forth. And then part way through writing it I read somebody else's book and the big reveal at the end was that the people had switched places after she was unconscious. I felt for all those reasons, no. And I think that the research is massively important because everybody knows that you are reading fiction but, at the same time you have got to make them believe that it is viable. But if you stretch that too far then it doesn't make sense. I do try and do groundwork.
Ayo:- Groundwork is important
and as an author one of the things I wanted to find out from you as a general
point is on the one hand you have people that state that they really just want
to be entertained and on the other hand both you and I know that if you are
writing a crime novel then a lot of social policy will come in to it. So, how
do you juggle that—as in wanting to entertain and wanting to make people
realise what is actually going on.
Alison: - Okay, I compare it to a
drum. You know when you have got a drum, those little screw things which must
be tightened up, you must think about what all of those are for you. Obviously
setting, character, plot, things like the timeline, facts. You must look for
where the saggy bits are and tighten them up. But sometimes you must ditch an
idea because it is a great dramatic idea, but it doesn't hold water. Obviously,
it won't work and if you have seen that this is the case then you need to deal
with it. I have had lovely ideas that have gone in the bin. If you are not 100
% certain that you can tighten that drum, then throw it away.
The link to the full interview on the Shots website can be found here.
Because she Looked Away by Alison Bruce (Little Brown) Out Now.
After the sudden death of her sister, devastated detective DS Ronnie Blake relocates to Cambridge to help her brother Alex raise their sister's young son, Noah. She reports for her first day but instead finds herself being questioned by a special investigations unit, nicknamed the DEAD Team. With a small group of six, led by DI Fenton, the once-successful DEAD team has a single outstanding case, Operation Byron, and the failure to resolve it threatens the unit's existence. Their most promising lead is an anonymous note linking three seemingly unconnected people: a convicted fraudster, a dead academic... and Ronnie's sister Jodie. When Ronnie is denied information about Operation Byron, she follows a lead slipped to her by Malachi, the youngest member of the team, and makes a discovery which links Operation Byron to a disturbing unsolved murder. She is rapidly drawn into an intricate web of deceit, buried secrets and tragedy and the discovery that her connection to Cambridge is far darker than she could ever have guessed.
More information
about Alison Bruce and her books can be found on her website. She can also be found on X
@Alison_Bruce. On Instagram @alisonbruce and on Facebook.
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