Book Club Meets: Bringing back Miss Marple, with Lucy Foley

The iconic Miss Marple returns to the page with her first murder mystery in over fifty years. This time, it’s set against the mountaintop Grand Alpine Hotel. A guest has been killed. In the frame for their murder is a notorious actress, a high-flying politician, an inscrutable political wife, a reckless friend and a shrewd doctor… It’s up to Miss Marple to find the culprit before they get away…or even kill again. In this special live Book Club episode, recorded at The Pig near Bath hotel, Fearne is joined by author Lucy Foley to talk about her book, Murder at the Grand Alpine Hotel. They discuss the challenge of taking on Agatha Christie’s beloved character half a century after her last outing, going back to a more analogue form of storytelling and taking inspiration from our elders. Our November book pick is This is What Happens When Women Read, by Julianna Glasse. Thank you to Harper Collins for the use of the Murder at the Grand Alpine Hotel audio book, narrated by Hugh Kermode. If you liked this episode of Happy Place, you might also like: Book Club Meets: Susie Dent https://pod.fo/e/671f59 Book Club Meets: Imani Thompson https://pod.fo/e/4390eb Book Club Meets: Candice Carty-Williams https://pod.fo/e/4d8d3d Child on the line is a three-part documentary podcast series celebrating the Volunteer Counsellors of Childline, and the brave children & young people who contact the helpline service. Listen here: https://www.childonthelinepodcast.com/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy https://acast.com/privacy for more information.

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Fearne Cotton?

  Hi, I'm Natalie Dormer and I'm proud to be an ambassador for Childline. This year, Childline turns 40. To mark it, I've made Child on the Line, a three-part documentary podcast. We hear why children needed a helpline in 1986, how it was built against the odds and the challenges children face today, from abuse and mental health to social media and AI. Search Child on the Line and listen wherever you get your podcasts.

• 0:30Speaker 01

  The gondola rises silently through the bank of clouds into the frozen world at the top of the mountain. It is a wonder of modern engineering.

• 0:39Fearne Cotton?

  Hello and welcome to the Happy Place Book Club with me, Fern Cotton.

• 0:43Speaker 01

  There's someone in the gondola, one of the hotel guests most likely, eager to make the first tracks of the day.

• 0:51Fearne Cotton?

  Today, Murder at the Grand Alpine Hotel by Lucy Foley.

• 0:58Speaker 01

  The shadowy figure in the gondola sits with their head thrown back against the rear window, perhaps in awe-struck appreciation of the view. The mechanism grinds to a halt. The doors begin to open. The seated figure does not move. The attendant peers through the cabin window. Are they asleep? Are they not intending to get out? Perhaps they've come up here for the sights and will simply stay put and travel back the way they've come. More snow is on the way, after all, a great deal of it. And yet, there's something odd. A peculiar stillness about the scene.

• 1:39Speaker 01

  The attendant feels that he is just as alone as he was before the gondola and its occupant emerged through the clouds. Should he go and see? He doesn't want to see. He's struck by the sudden impulse, odd, he's a good Swiss Protestant, to cross himself. Just as he steps out of his cabin into the freezing air, the gondola gives the mechanical shudder that locks it into the final position. This is when the seated figure falls, stiff and inert as a Dresden doll knocked from a mantelpiece, keeling face-first onto the metal floor of the cabin. For a moment, the attendant watches in horror, then he springs into action, but he knows,

• 2:24Speaker 01

  even as he hastens along the ice-slick path, that it is no use. The gondola's passenger is already dead.

• 2:32Fearne Cotton?

  This month, we have been reading Murder at the Grand Alpine Hotel. Now, I love a mystery story, all the twists and the turns and double crossings and misdirections. And they don't come much more mysterious than a Miss Marple book. This time, there's a murder at the mountaintop Grand Alpine Hotel. And of course, it's up to Miss Marple to find the culprit. It could be a notorious actress, a high-flying politician, an inscrutable political wife, a reckless friend, or a shrewd doctor. Lucy Foley has written the first Miss Marple book, originally, of course, created by the

• 3:16Fearne Cotton?

  wonderful, legendary Agatha Christie in 50 years. It's her first outing in 50 years. Lucy grew up reading Miss Marple books and was introduced to them by her beloved granny. In this episode, live from our very special Happy Place Book Club event at the Pig Hotel near Bath, Lucy and I chat about the moral compasses of Poirot and Miss Marple, and what makes a proper writer, and whether the pen is sometimes mightier than a keyboard. Enjoy.

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• 4:51Speaker 05

  Hi, folks, this is Mark Bittman from the podcast Food with Mark Bittman. And I'm here to suggest that you host Thanksgiving with industry-leading quality standards from Whole Foods Market. There are, as usual, no antibiotics ever in their meat department, so carve up turkey and spiral-cut ham with peace of mind. Shop organic sides like stuffing mix and cranberry sauce from 365 Brand. And guess what? All of their fabulous, delectable pies are made with no high-fructose corn syrup. Where else are you going to find that? Gourmet Thanksgiving flavors with the quality you want, only at Whole Foods Market.

• 5:47Fearne Cotton?

  Welcome to not only the gorgeous Pig near Bath, but also the second Happy Place Book Club live event that we've ever done. We're so happy to have you all here, so thank you. As you enjoy your little piggy bits, my stomach is rumbling. I want that little... Is it a Brussels sprout? Is that what we're saying? Oh, my. A bit early, but we're going with it. We're going with a deep-fried Brussels sprout. We're so happy to see you all here because I have the gorgeous Lucy Foley, everyone.

• 6:19Fearne Cotton?

  Lucy, I am so thrilled to have you here for our second-ever live book club event. We did one last year with Elizabeth Day, which was so lovely. We want to do more of these because that's sort of the heart of any book club, is being able to actually get together and properly dissect a book and chat about it. So thank you so much for being here today. I know you are extremely busy on this mad book tour you're on. How's it all going?

• 6:43Speaker 06

  It's been great fun. I think I've only got a couple of weeks left, which sounds like a lot, but yeah, this is probably the highlight of the whole thing, though.

• 6:52Fearne Cotton?

  But it's such a mad extended journey because you wrote the book seemingly quite a long time ago, and then you've got, you know, this whole revisiting of it, going out and talking about it. So Miss Marple's been by your side for some time now.

• 7:06Speaker 06

  She has, and I've really loved having her as a companion for so long.

• 7:10Fearne Cotton?

  I mean, this is so exciting because in your brilliant book, Murder at the Grand Alpine Hotel, this is Miss Marple's first outing in 50 years.

• 7:20Speaker 06

  Yeah, no pressure.

• 7:22Fearne Cotton?

  The responsibility is in your hands. How did you feel having that responsibility handed over to you?

• 7:27Speaker 06

  So it's that thing where you say yes immediately to something that's this huge honour. I mean, it's an honour of a kind of writing career. I wished I could tell my granny, I was so proud. She was a huge Miss Marple fan. If she lost something, she would say, what would Miss Marple do? So that was all that, like, joy and sort of exhilaration and pride, and then quite quickly the fear set in. And it was that, can I actually do this? You know, I'd written a short story involving her, and that was great fun. And I'd sort of fallen in love with the character even more, doing my research for that. But then it was, can I do this across a whole novel? You know, the pressure. And as a Christie fan, I have to get this right.

• 8:09Fearne Cotton?

  Did you, and this is, I'm saying this because I would do this, did you sort of talk to Agatha Christie from afar and go, Agatha, what do I do?

• 8:17Speaker 06

  Oh, definitely.

• 8:18Fearne Cotton?

  Was there a bit of a chat going on, a dialogue?

• 8:20Speaker 06

  Yeah, okay. I mean, I'd already done that with my previous books. I'd be like, what would, if I got into a sort of plot hole, I'd think, what would Agatha do in this situation?

• 8:28Fearne Cotton?

  Send me a sign, Agatha.

• 8:29Speaker 06

  She's an old friend.

• 8:30Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah, I love that. Looking at your Instagram, I love that you're also giving us insight into how to write a book. It's a really niche thing and also very bespoke. Everybody has a slightly different take on it. You say that when you start to write a book, it's either an occurrence, a character, or a location.

• 8:50Speaker 06

  That's right.

• 8:51Fearne Cotton?

  In this case, it was location.

• 8:53Speaker 06

  Yes, absolutely.

• 8:54Fearne Cotton?

  So that came immediately?

• 8:56Speaker 06

  Well, I needed to find, I was very conscious that I needed to find my route into this book. And as a huge Christie fan, I needed, it needed a reason for being, you know, because there are so many existing brilliant Miss Marple books. So I had to, I felt that I had to do something additive. And it was when I learnt that Death on the Nile was originally meant to be a Miss Marple novel, not a Poirot novel, in my sort of early reading, I thought, well, that's it. I'm going to take her on another holiday because she got robbed of that one. I really felt that. Poirot gets all the sort of glamorous, globetrotting adventures, and she mainly stays in St Mary Mead or the UK.

• 9:34Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah, boring. Yeah, get her out and about.

• 9:37Speaker 06

  Exactly.

• 9:38Fearne Cotton?

  Why the snow? Why, because there is always this sort of lovely, glamorous side to these books. Why, why did that really speak to you, that setting?

• 9:47Speaker 06

  I think partly it's because the first Agatha Christie I ever read when I was 12, which actually a lot of people read her, read her very young, was Murder on the Orient Express. And I think for me, part That sort of Christie experience has always been the, the kind of glamour of that snowbath and the claustrophobia of that snowbound setting. So there was that. I also, she'd be in the hot holiday, so I wanted to take her on a cold one. She goes to the Caribbean, the Caribbean mystery. But also, as soon as I knew I wanted to do this post-war setting, I thought that the geography would be really interesting because you've got the Swiss Alps, but it's the French-speaking part of the Swiss Alps. So you're very close to the border with

• 10:29Speaker 06

  Italy and with France. And I was very interested in the sort of movement of people across those borders, those mountain passes, only really five years before, and how that would play into the sort of backstory of some of these characters.

• 10:41Fearne Cotton?

  Do you think having it set in the 1950s and it being a murder mystery, well, I guess it lends itself to a murder mystery because you haven't got a digital footprint, you haven't got the internet to quickly find out, well, just Google like who did what. It's like, there is this element of people having to look for paper trails and actual clues. So it really lends itself to a murder mystery, I'm imagining.

• 11:04Speaker 06

  Oh, absolutely. I love not having all the tech that you have to deal with now. I always have to find ways of, you know, self-service not working or, you know, cutting people off from their creature comforts. But, and I always think, what would Agatha Christie do with today's technology? Because actually, she was very much at the forefront of the science of the time. I think she would have had quite a lot of fun with it, but it was really nice thinking, I can do everything in a much more analog way.

• 11:31Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah. And I guess also, and I don't want to give anything away, because I know some of you have read the book, some of you are halfway through, some of you are eagerly about to start. So there will be no spoilers whatsoever. But it does allow you the time for it to unfurl quite slowly, which it probably wouldn't in modern day timings.

• 11:49Speaker 06

  Totally. Absolutely. Everyone's locations, you know, there'd be a helicopter there immediately. I did do a lot of kind of researching of how easy in 1950 would it have been to get a helicopter up the mountain? Not that easy, it turns out. So I was okay. So they really are trapped there for a while.

• 12:05Fearne Cotton?

  And let's talk about the characters, because one thing I just loved about this book is the characters are so vivid. I can picture them all. I almost felt like I could walk out of the house and I would bump into one of them. How easily did the characters come to you?

• 12:19Speaker 06

  For me, obviously, the plot is really important in this sort of book, especially in a Christie-esque book, where you want that, almost that Swiss watch perfection of the plotting. But for me, it's always characters first. I have to know them really well. As you say, I have to feel I would recognise them if I bumped into them in the street. And really, plot should come from character. So in my books, I feel anyway. So I spend quite a lot of time with them before I start writing, if that makes sense, sort of talking to them in my head.

• 12:48Fearne Cotton?

  Nice. And what, so you're just trying to learn about like who they are, what their backstory is, and, and build the character from there?

• 12:55Speaker 06

  Exactly. Just sort of accumulating more and more of a sense of who they are. Obviously, some characters, some characters come to you really fully formed. So Sylvia Sinclair, who is this sort of Hollywood silver screen icon, I suppose, she, I heard her voice so clearly from the off. Whereas others, Diana Glass, who is a Dolly Bantry and Miss Marple sort of ladies' help, I guess.

• 13:18Fearne Cotton?

  I want one of them, by the way.

• 13:19Speaker 06

  I do too. She's very efficient.

• 13:21Fearne Cotton?

  I need one. I need her in my life, please. Thank you.

• 13:24Speaker 06

  Absolutely. She would sort it out. But she is a little bit more mysterious as a character anyway. So she came to me a little bit more slowly. She took more drawing out.

• 13:35Fearne Cotton?

  I love Sylvia's character.

• 13:37Speaker 06

  Thank you. I love writing her.

• 13:39Fearne Cotton?

  I just love anything about like a glamorous movie star from yesteryear. So fun.

• 13:45Speaker 06

  Doing the research on that character was such fun. Actually, she's very inspired by women like Rita Hayworth and Ava Gardner, and obviously Marilyn Monroe, big stars of the era. I loved reading that there are these wonderful interviews with Ava Gardner, where they were obviously fuelled by a lot of red wine. And she just felt like, you know, today's like, she felt she just wanted to set the record straight on everything, like ex-husbands. She didn't care. She was just going to stick the knife in. So good. I highly recommend reading them. But also, those three women were very interesting in that they were obviously thrust into the spotlight, but had all had quite difficult childhoods, quite traumatic childhoods in some ways. So I

• 14:26Speaker 06

  was very interested in, you know, who, who are you? You know, you do embody this sort of icon of silver screen femininity. But who are you when you sort of shut your hotel room door and you're on your own again and the past catches up with you? So there is a darkness there as well. She's great fun to write as a character and there is humour in her voice and things, but there is also a darkness there, a shadow.

• 14:49Fearne Cotton?

  It's amazing. And obviously, or I'm imagining, you know, from the get-go, who did it? Is that something you work out immediately?

• 14:57Speaker 06

  No.

• 14:57Fearne Cotton?

  What?

• 14:58Speaker 06

  No, I don't. So, and that's weirdly now, when I know it's working. So with all of my murder mysteries, I've started out, so everyone has a motive, right? So I've started out with an idea of, okay, well, I think this person did it. And that makes sense because they've got this motive and, you know, it all tracks. And then about a third of the way into writing, it's like the real murderer emerges from the shadows. It's this sort of slightly spooky feeling and it's like, you did it.

• 15:26Fearne Cotton?

  Wow.

• 15:26Speaker 06

  And I always think, well, that's great. Because if I'm surprised, hopefully the reader will be too.

• 15:31Fearne Cotton?

  Definitely. That's surprising for me to hear, because I would have imagined, I've never written a murder mystery, but I would imagine that you would know the ending and then you have to work backwards. But you're kind of just letting the story evolve as you go?

• 15:43Speaker 06

  A little bit. I did plot this one out. So I plotted it all out. It's actually the first book I've fully plotted out, eight books in. And I've learnt, that's a much calmer way to write a novel. There's a lot less crying.

• 15:55Fearne Cotton?

  But on your Instagram, you have admitted that you've at times felt like you weren't a proper writer, because you don't do the planning. But I think that's a load of old bollocks, quite frankly. Like, you write how you want to write.

• 16:05Speaker 06

  A hundred percent. But it's taken me a long time to learn that, because I would sit and do events with other authors and they would say, well, I have my spreadsheet, so I know what I'm doing. And I'd have, I mean, I do love the aesthetics though.

• 16:18Fearne Cotton?

  We got into this line of work, so we don't have to deal with spreadsheets. I don't want to ever do one, ever. I never will.

• 16:25Speaker 06

  No, like, there's no reason for me to go into Excel. No.

• 16:28Fearne Cotton?

  Absolutely don't know what it is. Never seen it. No.

• 16:32Speaker 06

  But, you know, so you, so you hear about other people's processes and you think, oh, that sounds like the proper way of doing it. And it has taken me a long time to realise that there is no proper way of doing it. Actually, I have learned with this book that maybe it does make things easier if you plot things out at the start. So I am going to try that one from now on. And that's the thing, your process can always change as a writer. And you can sort of add things in along the way. But I also used to think, you know, I had to get to a certain word count every day, or I had to be sitting at my desk for it to look like work. And actually, I've realised, the more it feels like play, often in a coffee shop, you know, some writing might happen, some people watching might happen. That's what works for me.

• 17:09Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah, you have to go and see life and experience humans to get those little markers. I completely agree with you. So at what point in your writing process for this one, did you go, oh, I know who's done it? When did that start to happen?

• 17:23Speaker 06

  About a third of the way into writing. Yeah. And I was like, going along this track of, I think it's this person, but is that a bit too obvious, maybe? You know, it all, it all tracked, but it maybe felt a bit too like cut and dried. And then, thank goodness.

• 17:38Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah, this thing happens, which we're not going to say. You very cleverly keep us guessing and assuming, and it just keeps unfolding, unfolding, unfolding. Miss Marple, obviously as set by Agatha Christie, is the sort of person that works with a very sturdy moral compass. Like, that's always going to be guiding her decisions and how she unpicks a crime and a mystery and the conclusion of that. That's what we very much see within the pages of this book, without saying anything at all. Without you saying anything at all in your answer, do you agree with her actions towards the end of the book?

• 18:24Speaker 06

  Gosh, I do, in a sense, because they are true to her and to who she is. And to her, as you say, her moral compass. It's interesting, because Poirot, without naming any particular books and giving spoilers, Poirot sometimes decides to take the law into his own hands a little bit more.

• 18:41Fearne Cotton?

  Is that because he's a man?

• 18:43Speaker 06

  Very possibly. He thinks he knows best. He does. I think it can be. And, but Miss Marple, she has her own particular, so I get it. I'm not sure I necessarily agree with it.

• 18:54Fearne Cotton?

  I just found, again, I thought that was so clever of you. And I, I was just, oh, I can't say things. I was just left thinking about a million things towards the end of the book. It's so hard not to say. I'm not going to spoil anything, but it's just, it's spot on. It's so, so brilliant.

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• 21:18Speaker 05

  Hi folks, this is Mark Bittman from the podcast Food with Mark Bittman. And I'm here to suggest that you host Thanksgiving with industry leading quality standards from Whole Foods Market. There are, as usual, no antibiotics ever in their meat department. So carve up turkey and spiral cut ham with peace of mind. Shop organic sides like stuffing mix and cranberry sauce from 365 brand. And guess what? All of their fabulous delectable pies are made with no high fructose corn syrup. Where else are you going to find that? Gourmet Thanksgiving flavors with the quality you want only at Whole Foods Market.

• 22:05Fearne Cotton?

  Let's talk about your writing process as well, because we have a lot of people who listen to these particular episodes of the podcast. Who will, you know, send in questions and ask like, where do I start? How do I begin with writing? Like you say, you didn't initially start with this whole plot and this, this method that you're now using. But you don't feel necessarily intimidated stepping into a book, not having it all figured out. Do you think that is just time and practice that you get to a place of confidence where you can go, let's just see what happens?

• 22:36Speaker 06

  I think so. I mean, with every book, I think, how did I do this last time? So I don't know how reassuring that is, but in a way I find it reassuring because, and I heard, you know, the great Anne Cleve say she struggles with the same thing. That with each book, you have this new set of challenges. So you're kind of always sort of slightly falling back on, I'm just going to put one foot in front of the other and just start writing and sort of hope it all comes together. But I think knowing that it has before really helps. So you gain confidence in that sense. So you think whenever you get into a plot hole or something doesn't seem to be working, you have strategies that you've used before. So I would say that comes from sort of habit.

• 23:16Speaker 06

  But I don't know, I would say, I would say the biggest thing is just to get over that hurdle. If you're thinking about writing is just to start writing and to write every day and make it a habit. And don't worry about it feeling, you know, cringey or not like the best prose that you've ever read. Just sort of, just, just make it a habit, I think.

• 23:39Fearne Cotton?

  I mean, how did this one differ in terms of knowing that you've got a character that preexists that you want to keep in pristine condition as Agatha had set her to be? Did that feel like a sort of an extra element that you needed to consider throughout the writing process?

• 23:54Speaker 06

  Oh, totally. I mean, I think, so the commission to this book was lovely, actually, because it was, we want you to write your take on a Miss Marple mystery, not a paint by numbers. Agatha Christie, Miss Marple, which, which made sense to me creatively, because I think trying to write exactly as Agatha Christie would feel like a weird act of forgery or passing off. It wouldn't, it wouldn't ring true. But I knew if I were going to bring in any of my own creative stuff, I had to get Miss Marple on the page as close as I possibly could to Agatha Christie's Miss Marple. And that was by basically reading and rereading all of the existing books.

• 24:33Speaker 06

  Yes, watching the adaptations, because I think people have an idea of her from those that's very important, but really reading and rereading the books, writing down sort of Marpleisms in a notebook. Things that I liked sort of squirrel away for future use. And then like all research, you have to sort of imbibe it all and then almost slightly forget it in order to create that space for yourself to just have fun and write the book.

• 24:59Fearne Cotton?

  You need to feel free and liberated, I'm imagining for it to go off on all of these magical tangents.

• 25:04Speaker 06

  Totally. I sort of had to make her my own in a way, you know, I had to sort of take her from Agatha Christie and make her my own. And then I knew, I knew, you know, if I'd got things wrong, that's the wonderful thing about the drafting process. You know, when you write that first draft, that is not luckily going to be the book that hits the bookshelves and people buy. You have a chance to sort of correct your mistakes, but in that first draft, I try and be really free, make mistakes and just play.

• 25:26Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah. What do you love about Miss Marple the most?

• 25:29Speaker 06

  Oh, my goodness, let me count the ways. I mean, I love that she's actually very enigmatic. So I think it's so interesting that we're often seeing her, we're always seeing her through other people's eyes and often colored by their ageism and their sexism. I think that's really interesting and she has so many different layers. So yes, she is this very sweet old lady in one sense, but she also has this sort of slight spookiness to her other times. There's a scene in the last book, Nemesis, where she sits up in bed and she's simultaneously this little old lady in a frilly bed jacket, confronting this murderer. And she is also, she becomes Nemesis, she becomes this figure from ancient myth.

• 26:13Speaker 06

  And there's this sort of dark power to it. And so she has that sort of slight spookiness or in a pocket full of rye, she's really angry and she's motivated to solve the murder by anger. I love the way that she uses her invisibility as an older woman to solve, to solve the mysteries. You know, it's almost like she creates this blind that allows her to just work her magic behind the scenes undiscovered. Whereas Poirot is always stepping into a room going, I am the world's greatest detective.

• 26:43Fearne Cotton?

  I am a man.

• 26:46Fearne Cotton?

  I agree, and I also think it culturally is such an interesting talking point, because in many other cultures, elders are really upheld. And storytelling is such a huge part of being an elder. And I've actually got a really good friend who's a bit older than me, who is, she calls herself an elder in practice. And she is somebody that loves to impart wisdom and she mentors me sort of with a friendship part of that kind of in the middle, in the mix of it all. But she, she's a mentor to me and a few other people. And it is all about that sage wisdom and storytelling that you pass on to younger generations. And in our culture, it's like, oh, cute little old person. And that's it. And it's like, wait a minute, let's not forget about Miss Marple.

• 27:29Speaker 06

  That's so true. That's a really good point and I absolutely agree. You know, I, I, my grandmothers, who I both used actually as the sort of a little bit as the Miss Marple model, because they were quite Miss Marple. You know, they had this incredible understanding of human nature, kind of garnered across a long life, you know? And, and people are always saying with Miss Marple, oh, but Jane, you're so innocent. You've lived your whole life in this little English village. And actually, that's the perfect grounding, because you've seen everything that humanity can be, good and bad. But I do think it is that weird thing that we sort of ascribe this innocence to old age. And actually you've seen it all. It's so strange, isn't it? And I do think that's something specific to our culture, to maybe Western culture.

• 28:14Fearne Cotton?

  It is, and I, I really, I agree. Like I had two brilliant matriarchal grandmothers who were completely different, but full of stories. And, you know, they'd been through all sorts of hell in the war and I would get little tidbits from them. I wish, wish, wish that I'd quizzed them more and heard more of their, you know, their childhood stories and lessons learned that I could have taken on and, you know, passed down to my own kids. But, you know, you, you sort of see, or like my nan Ruby, for instance, you know, she had the classic sort of tightly curled hair and she'd wear her cute little jacket. And people would be like, oh, Ruby, I was like, you have no idea.

• 28:50Speaker 06

  Absolutely.

• 28:51Fearne Cotton?

  You have no idea. She's got the most cutting tongue of all time and she will just literally, she will demolish you in one sentence. Like you've no idea. But it is strange how, yeah, we sort of dismiss people sort of, I don't know, 70 above as, you know, oh, there, there's nothing to be learned or nothing to be extracted from their, their life stories. Bizarre.

• 29:13Speaker 06

  It's, it's so interesting you saying about the hair and things though, because I, I sort of discussed that in this book, the sort of signifiers that we don't look beyond. So the signifiers of old age or the signifiers of the actress or of the, the sort of society wife, you know, we see, or even a nun, you know, we see this sort of icon, I suppose, not what's beyond the icon, not the real person.

• 29:34Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah, I loved that in the story, the politician's wife, who is another big character in the book. Again, you get to explore what on the surface we think we're seeing, which is someone who's very uptight and very controlled and very considered. But there's always a backstory and actually something else lurking beneath. Was that a really fun element to sort of dive into? Ah, you think this about the character, but this is really what's going on beneath the water.

• 29:58Speaker 06

  Absolutely. That's something I'm always interested in my books and actually something I think Christie does so well. It's funny, because sometimes you hear people say, well, she just writes stereotypes, but actually what she does is so much more clever. She takes these archetypes, these recognizable figures, and she shows you what's really going on behind the mask, behind closed doors. Which is endlessly intriguing, I think, seeing behind the type. And, and that's absolutely something I tried to do in this book.

• 30:28Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah, I, without a doubt, even the fact that with each chapter heading, you've put the, the character's name and then the archetype, you put the star, the help, the friend, the politician's wife. So whenever we return to those characters, it's set in stone. We know, well, we know what we think we're getting from that character.

• 30:46Speaker 06

  Totally. And I think in the 1950s, that, that really interested me, you know, I think those roles were even more regimented. That idea of, you know, are the, are you sort of almost actually Victorian idea of, are you the angel in the home? This sort of perfect wife, or are you this loose woman, this sort of actress figure? Or, you know, I've got this character, Diana Glass, who is the, the lady's companion. And she's one of these women that had this, I mean, she had a very difficult and a very tragic war in many ways. But she also found a sort of age, agency and a freedom in the war that is now no longer available to her. She's very adventurous and she's very intelligent, but she's been sort of forced back into this role in society that doesn't really fit her. And she's sort of kicking against that.

• 31:30Fearne Cotton?

  Yeah, I love that. Did, did that come quite easily, that, that character for you in her, her backstory?

• 31:36Speaker 06

  Yes, and I don't know how much more to say about it.

• 31:39Fearne Cotton?

  No, I keep forgetting. Don't say the thing.

• 31:42Speaker 06

  No.

• 31:43Fearne Cotton?

  What I'm also fascinated by is within your writing process, you have, much like my little nerdy notepad, you have a notepad and a pen and your first draft of, I'm imagining each chapter, do you do it by chapter? Is with a pen.

• 31:55Speaker 06

  I am all over the place in terms of what's actually in the notebook.

• 31:59Fearne Cotton?

  Right.

• 31:59Speaker 06

  So it's just sort of whatever I happen to have written on that day.

• 32:02Fearne Cotton?

  Okay.

• 32:03Speaker 06

  And then I sort of stitch it all together at the end because I don't write chronologically. I don't necessarily write from one point of view the whole way through. I just write whatever comes to me that day in a notebook and then try really hard not to lose the notebook before you get it onto the computer.

• 32:18Fearne Cotton?

  That would be bad. I think that would stress me out. Like, I don't know if I could have it not chronological. I don't know how I'd feel about that, but I love that. This is like your creative genius is just flying out of you.

• 32:30Speaker 06

  Well, this is what I've learned is it, that's what works for me.

• 32:34Fearne Cotton?

  Yes.

• 32:34Speaker 06

  You know, and actually I would say it's a great cure for writer's block because if you don't feel like writing, it's a bit like what they used to say with an exam paper at school, like answer the questions that you can answer first and then go back and fill in the others once your sort of brains got working. And so that's really what I do. I see some scenes very clearly in my head from the outset and others, the sort of linking scenes maybe less so. And so I, I kind of answer those questions first. I write those scenes and then I come back and fill in the rest. Um, which I found really works.

• 33:06Fearne Cotton?

  Is there something about writing with a pen that is also slightly more freeing? I think when we're at a laptop, and it's like if you look at Julia Cameron, right? Who's like, it says to do the morning pages. You get up and you get a pen and you just write whatever is in your head without sitting there going, hmm, how should I write this? You are just free flowing. Does that help you sort of loosen up with your writing?

• 33:27Speaker 06

  Absolutely. And I think they've even done sort of scientific studies on this. There is some connection, some kind of kinetic connection between your brain and your hand that you're, I mean, you are then physically sort of creating something, almost in the way a painter would or, you know, a sculptor. Um, so for me, it feels much freer. It also means it feels less pressured, I think, just the notebook. I can sort of scribble things out. And I literally I'll put words in brackets and put things like this, but better in the final version. Because you know, you can come back to it at a later stage.

• 34:01Fearne Cotton?

  That's so good. I am.

• 34:02Speaker 06

  Not this, this is rubbish.

• 34:03Fearne Cotton?

  I'm all for the pen. Like I get slightly panicked. Like all the kids now in schools are using tech and I'm like, we need to keep the pen alive. I'm of the generation where I've got, and it will be extinct at some point. I've got a writer's bump on my middle finger from drawing with a pencil so much as a kid. Oh, kids won't have a writer's bump. They'll have like iPad thumb or something. I don't know.

• 34:26Speaker 06

  Something's being lost. And it's a bit like, you know, I love reading on Kindle. I don't know if you say it, but, but I love, nothing will replace the printed, you know, the feel of tiny pages. Yeah. Are you, are you?

• 34:38Fearne Cotton?

  I'm exclusively book. Especially, can I just say, not only a hardback, but one with a lovely little print on the pages there. Look at that. Look at, I'll just view back here. Look at that. Oh, look at it. Oh, look at those pages. Stunning.

• 34:56Speaker 06

  Well, it's funny.

• 34:57Fearne Cotton?

  Only book nerds would understand. And we're in a room full of them. It's fantastic. Oh, I absolutely love it.

• 35:02Speaker 06

  Because I worked in publishing before writing and when I started in publishing, the whole story was, print books are over. It's all going to be about ebooks. And actually what's just happened since is they've become more and more beautiful and more and more comfortable as objects. And I love that.

• 35:18Fearne Cotton?

  Oh, me too. I love it. Um, before we wrap things up, Lucy Foley, I would love to know, where is your happy place?

• 35:27Speaker 06

  My happy place is a coffee shop with a little flat white on hand and a pastry and my notebook in front of me. And ideally it's sort of 30 minutes into that experience. So I'm kind of, I've done my sort of people watching and looking around and, I don't know, chewing the end of my pencil. And I've actually got into the flow state of writing.

• 35:48Fearne Cotton?

  Do you, I'm so intrigued about that because whenever I interview writers or I'm sort of slightly stalking them online, I find it fascinating as to what that environment is that really gets people's creative juices going. For you, you need a bit of bustle, it seems, and inspiration. I need to be literally like in a cave on my own to concentrate. I can't think straight. Even sat here doing this, normally I'm in my little happy place studio and it's just me and the guest and that's it. I'm like, oh my God, there's a lady in a beautiful red beret and I can hear someone eating some Brussels sprouts over here. I'm like literally constantly being distracted. Like, what am I doing? Fuck, I'm interviewing Lucy. You're right. Shit, where's my notebook?

• 36:29Fearne Cotton?

  Like, I cannot focus with stuff going on around me. How? How are you doing that?

• 36:34Speaker 06

  I don't know. I think I'm endlessly nosey. That's why I write. I'm intrigued by people. So the lovely lady in the red beret.

• 36:41Fearne Cotton?

  Such a focal point today.

• 36:43Speaker 06

  The book, I think. I'd be like, what is her story?

• 36:45Fearne Cotton?

  What's her backstory? What is it? How did she get her fringe in such a neat quaffed little collar? How did we make that happen? I hear you. No, I'm the, I just, I'm so distracted. I can't, I can't focus. I can't even have music or like nothing. I need like cats. Shut up. Everyone, leave me alone. Otherwise I can't do it.

• 37:04Speaker 06

  Cats really don't want you to do any work. Mine, that's partly why I don't write at home. They'll come and sit on my notepad.

• 37:08Fearne Cotton?

  They sit on it or on your laptop. They know.

• 37:10Speaker 06

  All my children, they'll also do that.

• 37:12Fearne Cotton?

  All your kids. Yeah, that's exactly. Slightly more distraction. Um, well, look Lucy, it's the most brilliant book. Please give it up for Lucy Foley.

• 37:19Speaker 06

  Thank you.

• 37:23Fearne Cotton?

  Oh, thanks again to Lucy for joining me at the pig. Oh, that hotel was so lovely. I wish I could forget who the killer was in the end. So I could be shocked by it all over because it was so good. But, oh my God, what a lovely chat. I love chatting about the responsibility of taking on the legend, Miss Marple. Also, we talked about her inspiration and chatting about working in the arts and media to get out of making spreadsheets. It's very much how I've run my whole career and getting lost in the world of the past without the tech of today. Also, thank you to just all the lovely people that turned up. We want to do more live book club events all over the gaff. And it was so nice to have the people of Bath come join us for a Happy Place Book Club.

• 38:08Fearne Cotton?

  Next month on the Happy Place Book Club, we'll be getting stuck into, This is What Happens When Women Read, a memoir by Juliana Glass. Oh, this book is so good. If you're reading it now, we would love to hear your thoughts because there's so much to chat about with this subject matter. You just need to head to our Instagram, Happy Place Book Club and drop us a DM. Thank you again to the wonderful Lucy Foley for joining us and thanks as always to you for listening, you blimmin' brilliant bookworms.

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