INTERVIEW
September 2009
CLAUDIA CARROLL
Claudia Carroll is the Dublin-based author of six novels, including her 2009 release If This Is Paradise, I Want My Money Back! She used to play the role of nasty businesswoman Nicola Prendergast on TV soap Fair City. Her book Remind Me Again Why I Need A Man was optioned for a TV series while I Never Fancied Him Anyway is to be a film. (Interview by Angela Smith)
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1. Why did you decide to turn to novel writing and what inspired your first novel, He Loves Me Not . . . He Loves Me.
Well, when I was very young and eejitty, I was cast in a rubbishy film, shot in a stately home in the Irish countryside, which was completely falling apart and barely held up by the wallpaper. The family, all Anglo-Irish gentry, were all deranged and I thought; here's an idea. How about a mad family down on their luck, who are forced to rent out their home to a film crew fresh from LA ... with hilarious consequences???
2. Besides your Portia Davenport books, have you ever considered writing another sequel?
No, but it's funny you ask, as I'm often asked if I'd write a sequel to my third book, Remind Me Again Why I Need a Man. The thing is, you get a fresh idea and a fresh set of characters who come to you with every new novel and that can be addictive, just seeing where these people take you! So for the moment at least, I'm working on fully stand-alone books.
3. Was Do You Want to Know a Secret inspired by the self-help book The Secret?
To a degree, yes. But the Law of Attraction, which the bestselling book The Secret is based on, has actually been around ever since Victorian times. So the answer is, The Secret was a touchstone, but my book is not based on it as such; it's more about the comedy which arises when three friends, who are self-help book addicts ( like myself!) try to project manage each other's lives for a year, with hilarious consequences.
4. Have you ever been tempted to write a book centred around a TV soap?
Not so far ... but neither is that such a bad idea either ... hmmmmmm ...
Why do you think Ireland has produced so many great chick lit authors?
Oh that's easy. It's because we never shut up talking. Try getting through to my landline and you'll see what I mean. Irish women NEVER STOP YAKKING.
5. If you were an angel, who would you like to be teamed up with back on Earth?
Ehh ... George Clooney's personal angel. There you go, I didn't even have to think about it. And I wouldn't be judgmental on him or anything. I promise. Once I got to watch over him all the time.
6. Your book I Never Fancied Him Anyway is being made into a movie. Which actors would you like to see play Cassandra, Charlene and Jack?
Funny you should ask, but a LOT of the actors on the soap opera I worked on keep calling me to demand auditions for any of those parts. My standard, 'get out of jail free' answer is, "I have no say in this whatsoever. Kindly stop calling me at four am. I need to SLEEP."
7. Did you ever think that one of your novels would become a movie?
Never in my wildest dreams. I'm constantly amazed and overwhelmed with deep gratitude when someone even comes up to me to say that they've even read something I've written.
8. How is the process of going from book to movie been so far?
So smooth that I'm now thinking ... ok, where's the iceberg??? Mind you, maybe I've just seen the movie Titanic once too often.
9. What is the most exciting part, for you personally, of seeing your book made into a movie?
Working with geniuses like Wendy Finerman (producer) and Robin Swicord (screenplay). How I'm even let into a room with them is beyond me.
10. What are you working on next?
Can you believe it ... book number 7? I will be finished at the end of September, which scarily, is only days away. Its provisional title is Princess. Had Enough of Prince. Seeks Frog. Do you like it?
11. Out of all of your characters, which one have you enjoyed writing their story the most?
Most definitely, the one I've just literally finished. She's a Cinderella character who loses everything and ends up having to move back in with her step mum and stepsisters who hate her. She has been hysterical to write and now I'm praying my editor says the same thing too.
12. Has picking a long title become one of your trademarks?
Yes, although I'm often afraid they might sound a bit like country and western songs!
13. Which books have had the most influence on you?
I read anything and everything, but am a huge fan of Marian Keyes, who walks on water as far as I'm concerned. But as for classical books, I re-read Jane Austen all the time; all commercial women's fiction plots are in there somewhere ... Jane got there first!
