Today I am joined by author Wade Brown, whose psychological thriller A Good Daughter is available now.
Can you tell me a bit about yourself?
My name is W H Brown, I’m 46 and live in Leicestershire in the UK. I used to be a rock musician but an English degree, song-writing and my love of books has led me to try to be a novelist – sometimes you have to try for your dreams, even if the money’s rubbish!
What was you favourite book from childhood?
I think my favourite is The Hobbit (though I also loved The Chronicles of Narnia – who didn’t?!) – I was a bit young for Lord of the Rings but that book enraptured me completely. I also loved the Hardy Boys and Nancy Drew books!
What type of books did you read as a teenager?
I got very serious as a teenager and started to read the classics, esp. Russian writers like Dostoevsky and the French existentialists like Jean Paul Satre and Albert Camus along with a lot of philosophy by Nietzsche and the above French guys.
When you were at school what was your favourite book you studied?
1984 by George Orwell. It changed my view of the entire world and still does.
What is your favourite classic book?
Wuthering Heights. It’s darkness and complexity is still way ahead of its time – every contemporary psychological suspense novel owes this book a debt with its multiple unreliable narrators – at the end of the book, the whole thing was just from various dubious, subjective viewpoints. Genius.
What would you consider to be one of the best books you have had over the last 5 years?
Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell just blew me away with its detail and world-building – on a par with Tolkien. It took Susanna Clarke years to write and these kind of books only come along very, very rarely.
What book do you think you should read but never get round to?
Marcel Proust’s Remembrance of Things Past – and I even own the books! I don’t know anyone who’s actually read all of it!
What do you consider to be your favourite book ?
Impossible question, it changes every day. Maybe 1984.
Is there a book that you have started but been unable to finish?
Oh, God, loads! Dr Faustus by Thomas Mann was the first book I ever gave up on – so tedious!. Anyway, he missed his own son’s funeral because he was writing, so screw him!
If you were stranded on a desert Island which 2 books would you want to have with
you
Everyone says the complete works of Shakespeare and the Bible but for me it would be Robinson Crusoe, obvs – desert island? – and the biggest anthology of John le Carre thrillers I could find!
Kindle or Book?
I love ebooks, especially their space conservation properties, but there’s nothing like the touch, smell, feel, fondle of a brand-new paperback book: a thing of true beauty.
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