Rose Carlyle is a lawyer and adventurer with first-class honours degrees in law and creative writing. She has crewed on scientific yachting expeditions to Antarctic islands and sailed her own yacht from Thailand to South Africa. She currently lives in New Zealand with her three children.
Her debut novel, The Girl in the Mirror, was an instant number-one bestseller in New Zealand, was translated into eight languages, and has been optioned for the screen. No One Will Know is Rose’s second novel. Rose talks to NZ Booklovers.
Without doing any spoilers, tell us a little about your new novel.
No One Will Know is a thriller about Eve, a lonely young woman who receives an intriguing offer to move to a windswept Australian island and take up a dream job. Eve travels to Paradise Bay, where she meets Julia and Christopher Hygate, an attractive and friendly couple who seem to have the perfect life. Living in a beachfront mansion, they have a fleet of yachts and stacks of money. The Hygates invite Eve to become their child’s nanny, even though she has no experience or qualifications. Eve becomes concerned that this opportunity is too good to be true, and of course, this is a thriller, so things are about to get very bad...
What inspired you to write No One Will Know?
It’s a mystery to me where my ideas come from. They float into my mind at the most unexpected times. No One Will Know started when I came up with a twist that I felt was unique and truly unguessable. I immediately knew I wanted to write a novel with that twist. It’s funny how things come together once you start dreaming about a story. My protagonist, Eve, felt like a real person to me right from the start. Eve grew up in foster care, and her backstory is inspired by my own grandmother’s difficult childhood. Thrown into the mix is a little-known type of organised crime that is the very thing people might get up to on a remote island. There is little written about this type of crime, even though it’s fascinating. I don’t want to reveal too much about it—you’ll find out if you read the book.
What research was involved?
Researching this novel was so much fun. I travelled to Tasmania to attend a crime-writing conference and took the opportunity to scout out the locations in the novel. Breaksea Island is fictional, but it’s loosely based on Bruny Island off the Tasmanian coast. I visited Bruny’s majestic lighthouse and soaked in the atmosphere of loneliness and desolation.
Although I write fiction, it’s important to me that my writing is grounded in truth. The type of organised crime Eve encounters in the novel does happen in real life, although many people have never heard of it. There is little on the internet about this type of crime, so I phoned Carey Knox, one of New Zealand’s leading scientists in this area, who was happy to give of his time to answer my questions. I also attended a class in Auckland on crime scene forensics run by Thomas Coyle, a specialist crime scene examiner formerly of Scotland Yard — I totally recommend this to anyone interested in crime fiction whether as writer or reader. Another expert I consulted works in medical science, but her area of work was so sensitive that she preferred not to be named in my acknowledgements.
What was your routine or process when writing this book?
I start each day by rising before dawn and writing for two to three hours. I often have to force myself to stop. But I’m working on the book all the time, not just when I’m sitting at my laptop. My characters live in my head and I often find that the next scene to be written pops into my head while I’m going for a run along the beach, or late at night while I’m trying to go to sleep.
Once I’m happy with my first draft, it’s read by my sister, then my agent, then my editors in New York and Melbourne. At each stage, lots of editorial suggestions come back. Some authors find editing challenging, but I love collaborating with experts to make the book even better.
If a soundtrack were made to accompany this book, name a song or two you would include.
Sloop John B by the Beach Boys. That song has such a beautiful combination of joy and yearning — the kind of feeling you might have when you’re setting out on a beautiful adventure, but really you just want to be back home. There’s a scene where Eve goes sailing — I won’t say with whom — and she is feeling joyous about the person she’s spending time with, but also deeply sad. The song captures her vibe perfectly.
If your book was made into a movie, who would you like to see playing the lead characters?
Sarah Snook, who played Shiv Roy in the HBO drama series Succession, would be perfect to play Julia. Not only is Sarah a gorgeous redhead, but she’s also able to convey complex emotions. Julia is such an intriguing character, constantly suppressing her feelings, and I think Sarah would capture her brilliantly.
For Eve, Kiwi actress Thomasin McKenzie would be a great casting choice. In the movie Jojo Rabbit, Thomasin conveyed that sense of youth and insecurity which are key to Eve’s character, but I think she would also be great at showing the growth that Eve undergoes in the course of the story.
Australian actor David Wenham would make an excellent Christopher. A dashing older man with blond hair and piercing blue eyes — we would all understand why a certain woman fought so hard to win him!
What did you enjoy the most about writing No One Will Know?
There were so many different things to enjoy. I loved writing Eve because she’s such a well-meaning, loving person, and I loved writing some of the other characters because they’re the opposite — evil characters are always fun. But I think my favourite thing was letting the ocean creep into the story. Eve has some unique experiences while crossing the Pacific Ocean in a small yacht, and then there is the lighthouse on its rocky outcrop. It was such a beautiful place in my mind and I loved bringing it alive for readers. Some of the key moments in this story take place in the ocean, and I was able to draw on my own experiences as a blue-water sailor to make them real.
What did you do to celebrate finishing this book?
I always plan to celebrate finishing a book by giving myself a holiday from writing. I resolve to take a couple of weeks to catch up with my friends and indulge some of my other hobbies. Everything goes well for a few days… and then I get another story idea. And I realise I don’t actually want to take a holiday from writing. It’s my favourite thing to do. Before I know it, I’m back at my laptop, loving it!
What is the favourite book you have read so far this year and why?
I like to torture myself by reading Tessa Hadley’s short stories. She has a rare ability to capture her character’s inner lives, but reading her stories is torture because they are so brilliant that I get completely caught up in them… and then they end. A few months ago, I read her latest collection, After The Funeral, and I still desperately want to know what became of some of the characters. If I ever meet Tessa Hadley, I will plead, beg and bribe her with chocolate to turn her short stories into novels.
What’s next on the agenda for you?
I’m always writing. I’m currently working on a new thriller which will be set in a valley on the West Coast. I love that part of the South Island and I’m so glad that my next story idea seems made for this beautiful setting. It’s about a young woman who begins to doubt the official story of her aunt’s murder, only to find she is in danger herself — and once again, I love the twist in this story!
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