Exclusive interview with author Colette McBeth and a review of her psychological thriller Precious Things.
Rating: 3 Stars
By Gabrielle Pantera
“I worked as a TV news reporter covering a lot of big crime stories for ten years,” says Precious Things author Colette McBeth, about her time with the BBC. “That’s the job my main character has, so in that sense I knew what I was doing and was aware of how police investigations run and how they deal with the media. I first got the idea for one of characters in 1998. I had just finished university and was working in Ibiza for the summer, meeting lots of new people and generally having a great time partying. It’s a magical kind of place and the club scene was populated by larger than life characters.”
Precious Thing starts slowly, then builds into a compelling story that after a few chapters you must continue reading to find out what happens to Rachel and Clara. McBeth writes of two women who are more then friends. At times the story gets confusing because it’s all told by Rachel. We learn of the girls past and what is actually lies between the two. If you like psychological suspense this book is for you.
Rachel, a shy teen who grew into a strong independent woman, is a television reporter. Rachel goes to a reunion put on by Clara, but Clara is a no show. Rachel needs to find her. But, Clara isn’t missing. She’s trying to draw former best friend Rachel into a trap.
“My main character wouldn’t do what I had planned for her,” says McBeth. “She had a mind of her own, and once I started listening to her it all made sense. But we had a few battles early on. Even now that I’ve finished it, she’s still surprising me. I love the way one reader views her in an entirely different way to the next. I did have a bit of fun creating my fictitious newsroom, let’s just say I had plenty of material to work with.”
“In terms of research for my character’s personality, I did do a lot of work on this over the years,” says McBeth. “A good friend of mine is a forensic psychiatrist and we often chatted about how she would react in certain situations and what character traits she would have.”
McBeth also had her experiences from partying in Ibiza. “It got me thinking how I could ever really know all these people properly,” says McBeth. “Those thoughts were turning over in my mind one day as I drove through the mountains. That’s when the picture of a woman who had done something terrible in her past, yet had no remorse and no conscience appeared in my head. She was beautiful and charming and fun, and that was all anyone saw, right up until the very end.”
Precious Thing is McBeth’s first novel. McBeth says her next book has required much more research. Called The Life I Left Behind, it’s about two women who were attacked by the same man years apart. One survives, one is killed.
“I could have easily been one of those people who say they want to write a book but never get around it,” says McBeth. “In the end I asked myself what I’d be most likely to regret not having achieved by the time I reached seventy; writing a novel was at the top of my list. That’s when I decided to go for it.”
McBeth was born in Scotland and now lives in London.
Precious Thing by Colette McBeth. Hardcover, 304 pages, Publisher: Minotaur Books; First Edition edition (March 4, 2014). Language: English, ISBN-13: 978-1250041197 $24.99
