Q&A: Jennifer Trevelyan, Author of ‘A Beautiful Family’

We chat with author Jennifer Trevelyan about A Beautiful Family, which is set over the course of one sunbaked summer vacation where a family is pulled into a web of mysteries that the younger daughter sets out to solve.

Hi, Jennifer! Can you tell our readers a bit about yourself?

I am a mum of two living in Wellington New Zealand where I was born and raised. I have been writing fiction in my spare time for more than a decade and have recently had my first book published, a novel called A Beautiful Family.

When did you first discover your love for writing and stories?

Pretty early on! My mum is an artist and would illustrate some of the books we used in school to learn to read. I would see her unfinished sketches in her studio, and then I would see them as published illustrations! This gave me an early fascination with books and publishing. Then, when I was about 12 years old, I wrote a story for school and when the teacher handed it back to me, he said, ‘You’ll be an author when you grow up.’ He was my favourite teacher, and I think his words sealed my fate.

Quick lightning round! Tell us:

• The first book you ever remember reading: It was a picture book my father bought for me, called Jennifer’s Walk. I still have it. It’s very special to me as my father died of cancer when I was in my twenties.
• The one that made you want to become an author: Gosh. So many books! But I think maybe The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett. It might also explain why I’m a very keen gardener.
• The one that you can’t stop thinking about: Again, so many! Right now I’m thinking a lot about Picnic at Hanging Rock by Joan Lindsay. It is rumoured to have been written in two weeks! How did she do that? And what really happened at Hanging Rock? We’ll never know.

Your debut novel, A Beautiful Family, is out now! If you could only describe it in five words, what would they be?

Atmospheric suspense loaded with nostalgia.

What can readers expect?

Expect to be glued to the page! The novel has a lot of twists and turns and the reader is kept guessing right to the end. 

Where did the inspiration for A Beautiful Family come from?

As a child I spent some of my summers with extended family on the Kāpiti coast of New Zealand. It’s a very wild and beautiful stretch of coast not far from where I live. I thought it was a great place to set a novel, and then I thought, while I’m at it, why not set the book in 1985 and make the narrator 10 years old, as I was in 1985?

Were there any moments or characters you really enjoyed writing or exploring?

It was great to spend a little bit of each day pretending to be ten years old again. It’s a wonderful age, when you are beginning to understand the complexities of adulthood but still have one foot planted firmly in the magic of childhood. My narrator tries so hard to get everything right, but she doesn’t have access to all the information.

Did you face any challenges whilst writing? How did you overcome them?

So many challenges! I think the hardest thing about being an unpublished writer is the loneliness, and I was pretty secretive about my lifelong dream of becoming a writer. Only a handful of people knew that I was writing (I wrote in the mornings before work). I would write a scene I was really happy with and then think, ‘I wonder if anyone will ever read it.’ I don’t think I really overcame it, but I learned to write for myself.

This is your debut novel! What was the road to becoming a published author like for you?

Looking back it seems like years of getting nowhere and then everything happening all at once! The book spent 3 years in a drawer while I tried writing other things and completed an MA in creative writing. Then I pulled it out and sent it to some agents – one of whom was Felicity Blunt. She loved the book and signed me up immediately. It was picked up by publishers in Australia, New Zealand, the UK, and the US, and film rights were sold! I am still getting my head around it all!

What’s next for you?

I am working on another book and I’m enjoying it so much. It’s a different process of course – I have more time to devote to my writing, and now when I write a scene I’m happy with, I know that someone will read it! There is additional pressure, but it’s a pressure I’m lucky to have.

Lastly, what books have you enjoyed reading this year? Are there any you’re looking forward to picking up?

When I’m writing a novel my reading becomes sporadic. I tend to dip in and out of things and I do a lot of re-reading too. But this year during breaks in my writing I have read You Are Here by David Nicholls, Tell Me Everything by Elizabeth Strout, and Three Days in June by Anne Tyler. All three books were wonderful. Right now, I’m looking forward to going back and reading all of Kate Atkinson’s Jackson Brodie books, because somehow I’ve missed them, and I think she’s a wonderful writer.

Will you be picking up A Beautiful Family? Tell us in the comments below!