Beginner’s Pluck
When Rebecca was fourteen she contracted ME, and was home from school.
“I couldn’t sleep at night, and all I could do was write. I wrote loads of stories, and when I was 16, and had a tutor, she suggested I send them in to a newspaper. The Spectator in Bangor gave me a page each week to write for teenagers. I did that until I was 18, then gave up because I was modelling.
She got the idea for the Coop at university, but it’s taken time to complete.
“I was married at college, and I had a child in my third year, so went back the following year to take my finals. I’ve been writing in any time I’ve had since.”
Who is Rebecca Reid?
Date/place of birth: Jul 27, 1983/Belfast.
Education: Glenlola Collegiate in Bangor. Queens University, English.
Home: Bangor.
Family: Husband and daughters aged five, two and a half, and seven months.
The Day Job: Mum, and writer.
Hobbies: The theatre and cinema.
Favourite Writers: I like James Patterson. I love American Classic Noir. My favourite book is Jim Thompson, The Killer Inside Me.
Second Novel: Thicket Wood. “It’s done, and will be released in six months.”
Top Writing Tip: “Go with what you feel. If you think of a scene, go and write it.”
Twitter: @thicketswood
THE DEBUT
The Coop. Part one of the ‘Thickets Wood Trilogy.’ Published on Kindle: €3.03
Howard and Lilly live in the remote community of Thatchbury, in an unspecified country. Howard witnesses the aftermath of a shooting. Matthew, an incestuous child from the coop, has injured teenage Jodie Tiding. She survives, but is traumatised. There’s much gossip about this, and the truth, as it unravels, is complicated, sometimes confusing, and ultimately tragic.
Each chapter starts with a girl in a room, apparently imprisoned there.
The Verdict: Original, and disturbing. This is a beautifully written debut.
