Tag Archives: Spare me the Truth

A Day In The Life of CJ Carver

Posted on by

Being an author, people think I get up around midday, go for a long lunch and return home to bang out a few pages before pouring myself a glass of wine and finishing for the day.

Hmmm.  Nice thought.  If only it didn’t take me quite so long to bang out those pages . . .

A Day In The Life of CJ CarverToday I’m woken by the bin men at seven-thirty.  Eyes closed, I’m lying in bed listening to them crashing and banging down the road when, seemingly out of nowhere, an idea begins to form about the next book.  I let it drift.  I don’t try and pin it down.  Gradually it takes a firmer shape and I study it carefully before letting it drift again.

It is this state between waking and sleeping that I find the most valuable for creative thought.  It’s almost like meditation, but not quite, because instead of being clear of thought my mind is occupied with the story I’m trying to tell.  By the time I’m fully awake, I’ve made a handful of notes and am ready to leap into the day.

After a shower, breakfast and a brisk walk, I get stuck in to emails, wanting to clear my mental desk before I start writing.  I’m working on the sequel to Spare Me The Truth, or at least I was until my postie arrives and hands me three parcels, each containing a brand-spanking new hardcover book.  They all look fantastic and although I know I have to read them – I’m on several panels at CrimeFest in Bristol this year with the authors – I really shouldn’t start now.  Or should I?  I flick one open and am immediately captivated by the first page.  This sort of temptation is ever present being self-employed, and I have to force the books away and out of sight.

pic 2 Carver, Caroline 2 credit Steve Ayres

Credit: Steve Ayres

Soon, I’m completely absorbed in my work and don’t notice the time passing until my email pings.  It’s from a psychologist who is helping me research the psychopathology behind serial killers.  Another arrives, this one from a detective inspector in Manchester.  I know it drives the police crazy when writers get things wrong, so I do my utmost to get my facts right, but I have to be careful with research as it can be so riveting, I never get any writing done.

I work on my manuscript until early evening when I have a quick look at Twitter (another terrible distraction) before deciding whether it’s cold enough to light the wood burner.  Or shall I go to the pub?  Writing is a solitary occupation and aside from the postie, I haven’t spoken to anyone all day.  I’d better go to the pub, I decide, and talk to someone or I might go quite mad.

 

©CJ Carver 2016

 

 

Spare me the Truth by C J Carver Reviewed by Margaret Graham

Posted on by

Spare me the Truth by C J Carver Reviewed by Margaret Graham, book review
Simon Kernick says of this novel ‘it is right up there with the best.’   So is it?

I have become a picky reader. I become impatient at any hint of  sloppiness by an author,  my attention is on the whole, increasingly hard to hold. So is Simon right?

Yep, I couldn’t put Spare me the Truth down. I read until too late at night, which made me grumpy, but I picked it up again as soon as I could.

Spare me the Truth is clever. As an author myself I could imagine the intricacies of the plotting as Dan Forrester is approached in a supermarket by a woman to tells him everything he remembers about his life – and his son – is a lie. We are in Dan’s point of view, his body, and are rocked as he is by this news. We know nothing more than Dan. Is this a lunatic? Or is there something nudging at his memory.

We are led into the point of view of Stella Reavey who has so unsettled Dan,  and begin to see that there is indeed something strange about Dan, some other life. What on earth has he done? Is he good or bad? And what about his wife? Is she who she seems?

We are as lost as Dan, but such is the writing that rather than feel confused and irritated, the reader totally buys into the mystery.

Then enter another character enters – stage left. , Grace Reavey who is Stella’s daughter, a doctor who has plans for her life, plans which are superseded by this tangled web that wraps itself around her, when her mother dies. Who is good, who is bad we ask again, and the what hell is going on?

A policewoman becomes involved, Lucy Davies – such a fascinating and complex character who shoves the book along.

This is a confident thriller, one that is written by an author who has a unique voice, a magical plotting ability, and a clarity of presentation that keeps us fully on track. I felt there was room for a series here. I do hope that is planned.

Brilliant. Read it, and lose yourself, and be glad you live in a simpler world.

Spare me the Truth Published by Zaffre, established in 2014 by Quercus founder Mark Smith. Available in paperback £7.99