Truly Darkly Deeply is an Instant Sunday Times Bestseller

​Utterly thrilled, delighted and everything in between to announce that my latest novel, Truly Darkly Deeply is an instant Sunday Times bestseller!

I wrote Truly, Darkly, Deeply during lockdown whilst home-schooling my two children - multiple murder providing a welcome break from endless snack making and BBC Bitesize.

It taps into my fascination with true crime and the criminal psyche, although what intrigues me just as much as the mentality of evil is how serialists are able to dupe those close to them. That it’s possible to share your life with one without ever suspecting it.

How would finding out that you have done so affect a person?

How could you ever live with the guilt?

Or trust anyone again?

Much has been written from the perspective of the serial killer’s wife, but it struck me that very little has been penned from the viewpoint of a child. I wanted to explore that relationship and its legacy without in any way celebrating ‘the killer’ whilst also as looking at what it means to be a monster - and to love one.

This allowed me to trip down Memory Lane reliving TV dinners in front of Dynasty and dancing to Madonna (which I still do when no-one’s watching). Like my protagonist, I also made a Royal Wedding scrapbook and still remember vividly coming home from school to be told we were at war with Argentina.

The 1980s backdrop also serves a dramatic purpose, a metaphor for what is happening in the book at the time. The Royal Wedding juxtaposes with the lie behind the fairy-tale of Amelia and Matty’s relationship. The law requiring seatbelts to be worn, reflects the dangers lying in the road ahead.

And like all roads, there are two sides to Truly, Darkly, Deeply: a coming of age narrative and a serial killer thriller. A tale of the triumph of hope over despair; of losing everything only to find what you really need is inside you all along.