So, here is the inside scoop! Alys Clare is not really Alys Clare
at all and neither is she that burly chap and well known writer of
medieval fiction, as has been widely rumoured in the book trade. Alys
Clare is in fact the delightfully mannered, friendly and attractive
Elizabeth Harris, better known perhaps as the author of seven steamy,
spooky and quite violent, some would say, novels published by Harper
Collins in the Nineties.
Liz, as she is quite happy to be called, lives in the summer
shaded, leafy, narrow-laned countryside a good couple of bow shots
from Tunbridge Wells, in a friendly house surrounded by scenery not
far removed from that which is often so delightfully described in
her popular Hawkenlye Mystery Series featuring Josse d’Acquin
and Abbess Helewise, the latest of which THE FAITHFUL DEAD has just
been published by Hodder & Stoughton. Liz, who has been hiding
behind the pseudonym of Alys Clare these last five years has decided
to pop out of the closet just in time for this interview and, moreover,
she has kindly agreed to sign my books in both names – so get
your order in quickly.
My first question of Liz, sitting in her parlour and hiding from
the rain which drifted down across her well kept garden is an obvious
one…or should it be be three?
Q:Why the pseudonym?
A:With the Hawkenlye Novels I was breaking new ground. Writing as
Alys Clare helped me to foster the illusion that I was drawing on
a fresh aspect of myself. In addition, I wanted to make it clear that
the new series would represent a change of genre from the Elizabeth
Harris titles. My long-term aim when I first began writing was to
have several types of novel on the market simultaneously, each under
a different name.
Q:…where did the name Alys Clare come from?
A: I discovered a book in Tunbridge Wells reference library that
listed popular Christian names through the ages. Alys was a medieval
spelling of our present-day Alice, and I just liked it! Clare is the
place in Suffolk from which the early lords of Tonbridge Castle took
their title. Also I know one or two very endearing people called Clare.
Q:.. and why have you decided to ‘come clean’ at this
particular time?
A: Because you asked so nicely.
Q:Doh!!! Why did you abandon – if indeed you have
abandoned - ‘Elizabeth Harris’ and the genre in which she
appeared to flourish?
A: At present I see 'Elizabeth Harris' on hold. I believe that the
early series of titles had come to the end of its run - it certainly
had with that publisher. The basic concept - of plunging a present-day
hero and/or heroine into the past with a few ghosts thrown in - was
not something that I felt I could go on doing for ever because both
the readers and the author would probably become heartily sick of
it. However, I still look back on those titles fondly and that style
of writing will probably creep back in due course. When I'm not working
on Hawkenlye, I have another project on the go to which I constantly
return. It's a trilogy (and very long!) and I'll probably offer it
(when I eventually complete it) under my own name. There's a good
deal of plunging people into the past in it and, when writing, it
has the 'feel' for me of my earlier work but progressed one stage
on.
Q:What made you choose the particular period you have in which
to set your Hawkenlye mystery stories?
A:I have always greatly admired Eleanor of Aquitaine, who must rank
as a heck of a woman in any time but particularly the twelfth century.,
when the role and the lives of most women was so very restricted.
Because I wanted to set the novels primarily in England (indeed, in
my own back garden, where the fictitious Hawkenlye Abbey once stood)
I had to choose a time in Eleanor's life when she was in England.
During her marriage to Henry II of England she was busy having children
and plotting with them against their father, whereupon he had her
put under house arrest. I thought that the time just after Henry's
death, when Eleanor came into her own and set about preparing the
way for her favourite son, Richard, to become King of England would
be a great year in which to set the first Hawkenlye mystery.
Q:How do you set about researching a particular story?
A:I have several excellent history books, including a couple of biographies
on Eleanor, to which I refer. The first step is to see what is happening
in England and Europe at the time I'm setting the next novel. The
research is then governed by what the story deals with - back to the
trusty reference library and usually to the book shop as well since
I can't resist new books. I usually spend quite a long time reading
around whatever the subject is and I find this very valuable in that
one thing leads to another and I end up with a hatful of new ideas
and directions. Sometimes looking up one thing leads accidentally
to a discovery. For example, I was reading through Doreen Valiente's
ABC of Witchcraft to see what she had to say about royalty and the
Old Religion when I came across an item on a famous talisman that
gave me the raw idea for The Faithful Dead. If I can convince myself
that it's necessary, I try to visit any place that is mentioned in
a novel. Quite a lot of the French locations were discovered on tootles
through the landscape looking for a nice place for lunch.
Q:Were Hodder the first to find the Hawkenlye stories of interest
or did your agent have to tout them around?
A:I was very lucky in that we didn't have to tout them at all. My
agent was lunching with a Hodder & Stoughton editor who wanted
to start a new medieval mystery series. She asked him if he had an
author who might be interested. As soon as my agent mentioned it to
me I was excited by the idea and I supplied a very detailed background
for the series and outlines for the first three books. The editor
liked them and commissioned me to get started.
Q:How long does it take you to write a Hawkenlye mystery?
A:The actual writing I do very quickly; probably about a month or
six weeks (including breaks of a day or two here and there when my
back gives out). The reason I can get the words down so quickly is
that I do so much preparation beforehand. I'll spend time just thinking
about the plot, then I do a page of notes on any new characters, then
I work out what's going to happen chapter by chapter. I find I have
to keep a note of who knows what when. However, even with so much
forward planning I still find that I often think up something new
that hopefully strengthens the novel. I have a thick book full of
Hawkenlye stuff - locations, history, background, biographies of regular
characters, details of their appearance, even, in the case of Josse
and Helewise, their birthcharts (he's Libra, she's Leo). I taught
myself to cast birthcharts and now do it regularly for both friends
and fictional characters.
Q:Do you have any input to the rather attractive jacket designs
– I particularly like the numbering of each volume?
A: I agree about the numbering; I like it too. Yes, I do have input.
I was asked at the outset if I had any suggestions and I said I liked
the illustrations of the Danish artist and fable teller, Kay Nielsen.
The Hodder illustration team picked up on that and came up with the
style. I usually supply an illustration or two from my library of
books on the medieval age, which the artist studies before coming
up with his or her own version. Hodder also took up my suggestion
of having a map at the start of each book and I supply the rough idea
for those too (I always knew A level art would come in useful one
day).
Q:How do you feel about the comparisons with the late Ellis Peters…some
claim you to be her heir? Is that a burden?
A:It's an enormously flattering comparison and I'm delighted by it.
I might find it a burden were I the only author who is lucky enough
to be compared to Ellis Peters, but I don't think I am!
Q:Do you think you will ever be tempted to go back to that setting
or even, at least, venture away from Hawkenlye and write some stand-alone
novels?
A:As I explained in answer to your earlier question, I have a prototype
Elizabeth Harris novel on the go but at present it's on the back burner
as I want to go to Santorini to research a part of it, then to La
Rochelle and various other places and the trip will take quite a bit
of planning (and money). I'm also writing a book for older children,
for which my two nieces of 13 and 11 are going to be readers and suggestion-makers.
A recent trip to Paris has sparked off another idea, and I'm working
on that as well. Much as I love writing the Hawkenlye novels, I enjoy
the challenge of coming back to the 21st century from time to time.
When I was still with HarperCollins I published two contemporary novels
under the pseudonym of Lauren Wells, and one day I'd like to do another
of those.
Q:How do you write…word processor, typewriter – remember
them? – or longhand?
A:My first book (which was later published by Severn House) was written
longhand with a Parker fountain pen. The book was originally over
120,000 words long and I developed a bump on my middle finger and
turned the barrel of the pen, where one holds it, into a eggtimer
shape. Then I went on to a little Boots portable typewriter, then
my dear old Dad took pity on me and, realising I was serious about
this writing business, bought me one of the early Amstrad word processors.
I've had several WPs since then and now I write on a laptop which
is small enough to go everywhere with me. I've used it so much that
the letters are wearing off the keys.
Q:Do you recall the first thing you ever had published… if
so what was it?
A:Yes I do! I sent a short story entitled The Things You Remember
to Bella, I think it was, and earned myself £200.Actually there
was something before that - I had a piece about an elderly woman visiting
St Peters, in Rome, in the Tonbridge Girls' Grammar School magazine
in 1968.
Q:Did you have difficulty in getting your first novel published?
A:Not compared to the huge hurdle it seems to be for first-time novelists
today. I had completed the aforementioned 120,000 word novel, which
was picked up by an editor from the old publishers MacDonalds. He
liked it enough to ask me out to lunch and tell me how to cut it and
make it commercial. I spent a long time rewriting it, only to find
that the wretched man had since retired and gone to farm llamas in
the Shetlands. I put the long novel aside and studied what appeared
to be meant by 'commercial fiction', reading through the bestsellers
of the time (this was the late 1980s) whether I liked them or not.
Then I wrote The Herb Gatherers, which HarperCollins picked up on
after I had won a short story prize.
Q:Bearing in mind how difficult the Harris books are to find –
I’ve been on the look out for them constantly – is there
any chance that Harper will reissue them given your newfound and well-deserved
status as a collectable writer of historical fiction?
A:Thank you, but I can't imagine that HarperCollins would do that,
although to be fair I haven't asked them. The rights for all seven
have reverted to me and I do indeed live in hope of someone picking
up on them. At one time I understood that The Quiet Earth was being
turned into a screenplay. My aforementioned Dad often asks when someone
is going to republish that one, which is his favourite, and I'd love
to be able to present it to him in a new guise (and a better jacket!).
However, since Dad is now 87and a half, whoever it is had better get
their skates on. (He is the Geoffrey to whom The Faithful Dead is
dedicated - I called Josse's father Geoffroi and there are certain
similarities.)
Q:How have your immediate family adapted to your status as a collectable
writer?
A:I'm not sure that they know I am one! They've all been hugely supportive
of my writing, however. My sons, now aged 23 and 21, have grown up
with it - I started writing seriously when the younger one was just
about to start at primary school - and it doesn't embarrass them any
more. They have read quite a few of the novels and they sometimes
stun me by how accurately they assess which real life friends, relations
and acquaintances have been translated into the fiction. My parents
have always been greatly encouraging and my Mum, who reads for England,
always races through each new novel and reports back with very pleasing
flattery. My husband reads through at manuscript stage, before anyone
else sees the work, and is very good at tactfully pointing out the
bits that don't make sense.
Q:What do you watch for pleasure….
A:Timeteam, Timewatch, Horizon, Casualty, The Bill (till Chandler
pushed his way to the front), Ruth Rendell and P.D. James adaptations,
Silent Witness, Ab Fab, old films, new films, War Walks, Father Ted,
anything about old civilisations, anything about history unless it's
post-Tudor, anything to do with the old religion (not that there's
much of that), anything on medieval architecture, adaptations of novels
I've enjoyed, Waking the Dead, the Simpsons.
Q:…and what do you read for pleasure?
A:Murder mysteries, especially P.D. James and Ruth Rendell; Patricia
Cornwell, Kathy Reichs, Nikki French, Robert Goddard, Tolkien (again
and again), Philip Pullman, Harry Potter, C.S. Lewis, Marion Zimmer
Bradley, Jean M. Auel, Clare Francis, books on Fung Shui, space clearing,
crystals, bells & smells, etc.
Q:Do you have any great literary ambitions…The Booker, The
Whitbread or, perhaps a CWA Dagger or two…?
A:I wish! The latter certainly, me and every other crime writer!
I left those leafy lanes to Elizabeth and Alys and the wagtails
that were exploring the early winter puddles that would, no doubt,
eventually flood the high-banked byways and make access difficult.
I left with a warm picture of a charming woman happy in her work and
her surroundings still reaching out, still growing, but most of all
of a talented writer, a real storyteller with a deserved 'dagger'
well within her reach and a writer who actually appeared to quite
enjoy talking to a bookseller about her craft, the industry and the
price of books.
Copyright Chris Adam Smith November 2002
He was a successful London based magazine publisher and editor. A wanderer, he worked as a gamekeeper, local government officer and served in both the merchant navy and the military police before turning to publishing. He has lived and worked in both South Africa and the United States. He has a special interest in American law enforcement and was a member of the Western Writers of America with ten western novels to his credit – five under the pseudonym of Harry Jay Thorn. In 1996 he won the prestigious Ian St James Countryside Short Story Award and in the same year the title of Littlehampton’s Pub Poet. He has three times been a finalist in the David Gemmell short story competition. Still a freelance journalist, he now resides and operates an internet bookselling operation on the south coast of England where he lives with his wife and two children. He has now hung up his Stetson and is currently working on a series of mystery novels.