Books
Brooke Robinson: books that inspired my writing
It’s said that behind every writer is a great English teacher, and that is certainly the case for me. Reading and writing were always my strong suit at school, but in year 11 in secondary school in Sydney, Australia, I had a teacher who was particularly passionate about crime fiction. For a whole year, as part of a small group extension class, we studied nothing but the crime genre. This class, and the books it introduced me to, have stayed with me over the decades. Here are some authors and books that have inspired my own writing.
An Unsuitable Job for a Woman by P. D. James
An Unsuitable Job for a Woman by P. D. James
I read this novel and P. D. James’ The Skull Beneath the Skin at the same time. Both feature Cordelia Gray, James’ smart, tough, sometimes vulnerable, private investigator. Gray, I believe, is considered to be the first woman in fiction to run her own detective agency. At least that’s what my seminal English teacher told me as she passed a very well-worn copy across my desk. Unsuitable Job is a sophisticated, twisty mystery with vivid descriptions of 1970s Cambridge and the perfect place to start if you’re new to P.D. James.
A is for Alibi by Sue Grafton
A is for Alibi by Sue Grafton
Sue Grafton’s book series is called the Alphabet Mysteries and it covers (almost) the whole alphabet, eg. B Is for Burglar, C is for Corpse. Kinsey Millhone is Grafton’s clever, independent and adventurous gumshoe Private Investigator in 1980s California, and sixteen-year-old me definitely wanted to be her. Sue Grafton sadly died before she could complete the final book in the series, Z is for Zero, but the novels are stand alone and you don’t need to read them in any particular order.
Engleby by Sebastian Faulks
Engleby by Sebastian Faulks
You might know Sebastian Faulks as a literary historical novelist, but I would urge thriller fans to pick up Engleby, his foray into the psychological thriller genre. When my first play was produced, the theatre director helped me realise that I’d accidentally written a psychological thriller, and gave me a copy of this book. It features a deliciously despicable narrator who makes some terrible, terrible choices, and I drew on this when writing The Interpreter.
Postmortem by Patricia Cornwell
Postmortem by Patricia Cornwell
In the 1990s and early 2000s, as the human genome was edging closer to being fully sequenced, DNA was first being used to solve real-life crimes and forensic crime fiction was booming. Cornwell, who had herself worked as a medical examiner, is the original queen of the forensic crime fiction sub-genre with her iconic character, Dr. Kay Scarpetta. I was working in bookshops in the early-mid 2000s and you knew when a new Scarpetta novel had been released because readers would already be queuing out the front when you arrived to open the shop in the morning.
The Virgin Suicides by Jeffrey Eugenides
The Virgin Suicides by Jeffrey Eugenides
The five Lisbon sisters, home schooled by their overbearing parents, make a suicide pact in suburban America. It sounds grim, but this is such a gorgeous, delicate book which uses a lot of the ingredients of crime fiction. Eugenides is a master of restraint and the unsaid, and this novel is pure atmosphere and mood. In today’s parlance, it’s ‘a vibe’.
The Big Sleep by Raymond Chandler
The Big Sleep by Raymond Chandler
This novel was my introduction to the world of noir and hard-boiled crime fiction. Chandler’s Philip Marlowe is a Private Investigator in a mob-controlled Los Angeles investigating blackmail, extortion, kidnapping – a smorgasbord of organised crime. This novel was adapted into the classic film by Howard Hawks, with Lauren Bacall and Humphrey Bogart, and often appears on lists of ‘best of’ Hollywood films of all time.
Brooke Robinson’s debut thriller The Interpreter is out now in hardback, ebook and audiobook. Read an extract from the book here.
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