Thrown Into the Deep End: A Guest Post by Camilla Barnes
Our favorite book families tend to be delightfully dysfunctional, and there’s no one quite like this one. With two sisters, a pair of aging parents and barn animals aplenty, The Usual Desire to Kill is a quirky and heartfelt novel that reminds readers our parents had lives before us. Read on for an exclusive essay from author Camilla Barnes on writing our latest Discover pick, The Usual Desire to Kill.
Hardcover
$24.99
$27.99
The Usual Desire to Kill: A Novel
The Usual Desire to Kill: A Novel
In Stock Online
Hardcover
$24.99
$27.99
An often hilarious, surprisingly moving portrait of a long-married couple, seen through the eyes of their wickedly observant daughter—for fans of A Man Called Ove and The Royal Tenenbaums.
An often hilarious, surprisingly moving portrait of a long-married couple, seen through the eyes of their wickedly observant daughter—for fans of A Man Called Ove and The Royal Tenenbaums.
The Usual Desire to Kill is my first novel. I don’t mean the first to be published, nor the first I have ever written – it is the first one I even tried to write.
I am English but have lived in France for over thirty years. I came to writing in my fifties – not “late in life”, but perhaps later than most. Before then I had pursued a career in the theatre in Paris – costume and set design, stage direction and production. I am also a backstage photographer and it was this that taught me how, by sometimes choosing a different angle or a different light, I might capture what I myself could see and wanted to share with others.
I kept that in mind when I moved from pictures to words. My first lines were in French and, naturally, for the theatre. Just dialogue and stage instructions: what people say and do, nothing else. A playwright is only responsible for part of the end product; the rest must be created by the director, set designer and actors. To write a novel I discovered that I had to wear all of those hats at the same time. Questions fizzed left, right and centre “How long is Mum’s hair?” “What colour are Dad’s trousers?” “Why are they wearing shorts? You said it was snowing outside!”
Of course, being responsible for everything has certain advantages. Sitting in the stalls, watching a play of mine on stage, I may groan “What on earth were they thinking when they gave Dad those dreadful pink trousers?” but there is nothing I can do about it. In a novel I can make him wear whatever trousers I want, or none at all. I can have him parade around the garden in his underpants if it pleases me, and have only myself to blame.
Deciding – and trying – to write a novel is one matter. Getting it published is quite another. I asked myself, what is the best road to follow? Make it short, make it funny, I decided. And that is what I hope it is – although the characters quickly broke free of their comic shackles and came out with some darker truths that I knew nothing about at the beginning.
To my amazement, my recipe worked and in a matter of weeks I found myself a soon-to-be-published author. I was thrown into the deep end of the world of publishing about which I knew nothing. I had to learn at lightning speed – and how thrilling it has all been. My brilliant publishers threw me armbands to keep me afloat and I am keeping my head above water with a recently mastered and unsophisticated doggy-paddle.
The Usual Desire to Kill took me two years to write, but before that it had been marinading in my mind for forty-eight years. I just hope the next one doesn’t take quite as long to mature.