A Winter Bride.
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Can you tell us a little about A Winter Bride?
It starts in the late fifties. It was roundabout then that teenagers first emerged -before that you were young, then, without a gap, you became an adult. Nell is seventeen and full of notions and daydreams. She lives for Saturday nights when she goes to the Locarno, a wildly disreputable dancehall, with her best friend Carol. There she meets Alistair Rutherford, and, as he walks her home, she discovers he is rich, owns a car and wears Buddy Holly glasses. What more could a woman want? She decides she will marry him. Eventually, she does. But, in fact, more than she loves him, she loves his welcoming, chatty and lavish with their money family. She is particularly entranced by Alistair’s mother, May who fuels her daydreams to such an extent she doesn’t wonder if the Rutherford’s money might be dubiously gained. Why, for example is it kept in a vast pile of cash in the kitchen cupboard? Lost in May’s promises, Nell fails to notice what is happening around her. When reality finally bites, it bites hard. She loses everything. And then…well, it’s in the book.
I have to say I have nothing against daydreaming. I was prone to it myself, Can't tell you how many times I've won Wimbledon, played the violin to enraptured audiences in New York, Milan and London, been the only woman who really understood Jimi Hendrix and Marlon Brando. Ho, hum, a bit of fantasy can't be all that bad.
The 1950s was an exciting time to be a teenager like Nell McClusky, with the change in the music scene and rock’n’roll. What are your memories of being 17/18?
I bought my clothes from Biba (they did mail order, and if anybody asked where I got my shirts and trousers, I wouldn’t say) and loved The Rolling Stones. I thought myself chic. I was full of notions and believed I was right about everything. Oh, how things change. The older I get, the less sure of anything I become. Saturday nights I went to clubs in Edinburgh. One, was just off the High Street was an underground labyrinth of rooms. The music was live and bluesy. We hung about desperately trying to look intelligent and interesting drinking Coke. The place didn’t sell alcohol, but we went to the pub first. I drank half-pints, couldn’t afford anything else. I remember the long walks home at about one in the morning, talking and talking and not feeling remotely tired. I never did find a bloke with a car. I remember being passionate about music, books and films. I daydreamed about becoming a rock’n’roll megastar (though how I’d go about this, I don’t know – couldn’t sing, play an instrument or write a song). Later I decided being a megastar was a big naff. I decided to be an obscure cult figure who wore outré clothes and wrote exquisite poetry and was misunderstood. This (as you may have noticed) didn’t happen. Writing exquisite poetry is hard.
What are you writing now?
I am writing a book about Martha whose husband has suddenly walked out on her and her daughter without saying where he has gone, or even, that he was going. To ease her new financial difficulties, Martha moves back to her mother, Sophie’s flat. Sophie, a widow, bakes cakes – any size, any shape as long as it’s not rude – for a living. Hoping to find out how to trace her long lost husband, Martha takes a job at the Be Kindly Missing Persons Bureau run by Charlie Gavin. She finds a certain solace in the files and files of missing people. She realises is not alone. This helps with her guilt, pain and shame.
She forms a relationship with Charlie. They share jokes, sandwiches, walk his dog Murphy. And they bicker. Together they find people, some of whom to do want to be found and some are up to naughty things. They do this by following trails, asking about daydreams and hopes and unravelling unhappiness. But mostly Martha begins to understand that some people are living lives they did not want or plan. Probably, this includes her missing husband, Jamie.Along the way, she is becoming happy, or happier. And when she eventually finds Jamie, her husband…well, I haven’t got to that bit yet. But there is a lot of music in the book and quite a few sandwiches. And I am very fond of Murphy.
Are there any books you are hoping for in your Christmas stocking?
Oh yes, I’m dropping hints already. I want to read Alan Hollinghurst’s The Stranger’s Child, Gillespie and I by Jane Harris, The Impossible Dead by Ian Rankin, Before I Sleep by S.J. Watson, Great House by Nicole Krauss and more – too many to list, really. At the moment I’m reading When God Was A Rabbit by Sarah Winman and loving it.
Thank you to Isla for answering my questions, today.
You can find out more about Isla and her books here
Thank you to Isla for answering my questions, today.
You can find out more about Isla and her books here
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