My seventh book, Someone Is Lying, is out March 27th 2024.
Wahoo – not long to go now! It’s always exciting but at the same time incredibly daunting when a book is due to go out into the world, wondering what readers and reviewers will think of it, praying they’ll love it, especially when so much hard work has gone into writing it.
Every book is a huge amount of work.
They take me a year to complete from the conception of the idea to making the final copy edits and proofreading it for the very last time, knowing that’s the last time I’ll ever read the story all the way through. But this one was a whole different experience.
I wrote the first draft of Someone is Lying in 2023 and sent it to my agent and editor that July. I was thrilled with it. I loved the idea – your teenage daughter goes travelling around Europe with a boyfriend you just do not trust, but what can you do? She will turn eighteen while she’s abroad, and your relationship with her is already straining because you simply don’t like or trust him, and she knows it. But if you try to stop her going you will lose her just that little bit more, so aren’t you better off telling her to go, to be safe and have a good time, making sure she knows she can call you if and when she needs you?
Only then she disappears. You cannot get hold of her, but no one else, at least no one in authority, believes she is missing. And especially not that her boyfriend has anything to do with it. After all, you trusted them enough to drive them to the airport.
I loved the idea and was excited about the true crime podcast that weaves through the book, and so did they! But, they weren’t sure that the rest of the book was working. After listening to their concerns, I realised that I had spent the last four months getting carried away with the premise of the book and what I’d wanted the story to be about, that I had lost sight of the overall picture.
Much needed feedback
They were right, and I knew I had a decision to make - re-write 60% of the book or scrap the idea and start a new one. It wasn’t actually a hard choice at all, because there was no way I was going to let this one go, and once I had gone back to the drawing board and figured out what needed to change, I was completely invested in the new direction of the story.
And I couldn’t be more thrilled with it. I am so excited about my seventh book, and can’t wait for you to read it and let me know what you think of it!
Heidi x
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