Crime writer Sherryl Clark talks to me about her books and the authors who inspires her.
Please tell me about your books. What drew you to crime fiction?
I started reading crime fiction when I was a teenager so I think it was the early influence, which has lasted my whole life. I enjoy some true crime, which is where I get a few of my ideas, but mostly I read fiction. I like darker stories now, although I did start with some Agatha Christies, but I also loved books by Mickey Spillane and Ed McBain. I like trying to work out who the villain is, although I’m hardly ever successful – I learn from those novels that hide the villain really well. I also write children’s books, but they are very different and I can keep them apart without too much trouble. The ideas for them develop in a different way.
Talk to me about your books. You write short stories and novels: which do you prefer?
I mostly prefer writing novels. It’s really hard to write a good crime short story, because you don’t have much room to hide clues and put in red herrings. I love diving into my characters in a novel, developing backstories for them and families, and again, there’s not time to do that in a short story. But if I get a really good idea, I’ll definitely write a short story. I try to enter our Sisters in Crime competition every year.
What books do you like reading yourself? Any authors you’re particularly fond of?
I read a lot of what I would call traditional crime fiction, which means authors like Ann Cleeves, Stuart MacBride, Ian Rankin, Michael Connolly – all the writers whose books make the bestseller lists. But I love discovering books that do something different in the genre. In this I’d include authors like Lou Berney, Belinda Bauer, Chris Whitaker and Tana French. In Australian crime fiction I don’t think anyone is better now than Garry Disher.
If you could collaborate with anyone, living or dead, on a writing project, who would it be and why?
That’s a hard question because I’m trying really hard not to write like anyone else – to develop and strengthen my own voice and ideas. I think I’d actually like to work on a TV series with Jed Mercurio! Especially if that meant learning how to adapt one of my own books.
What books are you looking forward to in the future?
I’m living in New Zealand these days, and I love seeing what is coming out here in the crime genre – some really good writers drawing on all different settings and characters. Instead of lots of novels set in the outback as in Australia, in NZ you get deep, dark bush and remote farms and old ghosts.
What’s next for you? Any new projects you’re excited about?
I’m working on a standalone novel at the moment that I started on a writing retreat. It was going to be a short story, funnily enough, but it kept growing and growing. It’s great to write something where I don’t have to keep track of everything for Book 2 – I can focus totally on this one woman and her search for her daughter.
But right now I have had to put that aside as I’m working on the editing of a new book, For All the Dead Girls, which is a sequel to my Melbourne PI novel, Woman, Missing. I’ve got the editor’s notes and comments back and it’s so helpful to have that objective eye pointing things out!
Do you have anything to add?
I’ve always felt very grateful for having been shortlisted in the CWA Debut Dagger back in 2018 with my very first novel, Trust Me, I’m Dead. It got me started with the series that was published by Verve Books in the UK, and since then I’ve just kept going.
Many thanks to Sherryl for taking the time to answer my questions. If you’re interested in learning more about her books, check out her website HERE.
