Is there an element of catharsis involved in writing novels?
Perhaps on an unconscious level, I was trying to impose a shape on a shapeless story, that never had a proper beginning, middle or end. The mystery of my grandmother’s death and my uncle’s disappearance in Switzerland in 1937 have never been solved, and never will be. Maybe I wrote the story of a family tragedy in the mountains because I needed to explore it on my mother’s behalf – and I wish I could tell you that there was some catharsis in it for her. But there wasn’t. My first novel, Egg Dancing, had autobiographical elements which were certainly cathartic for me – but I’ve never used my own life in a book since then. Mostly, I write to get away from myself and to go places I haven’t been, and meet people I haven’t met, or be people I haven’t been. That, for me, is one of the main joys of fiction. From a dramatic point of view it’s interesting that you split the story between two narrators. Is it easier to create doubt and tension when you have two perspectives, two voices to play w
