100 books like The Sunken Land Begins to Rise Again

I’m one of those writers who’d identify themselves as readers first, and as an oft-bullied queer kid growing up in Singapore, I often found refuge and salvation in writers whose works were able to refashion and reimagine our lives, however intimately or grandly. I grew up devouring fantasy of all kinds; I went from Enid Blyton to Charmed, for instance, before discovering in my later adolescence the manifold possibilities of magical realism and the other expanses contained within the realm(s) of speculative fiction. Many of the books in this particular list were especially useful in crafting my second novel, Lovelier, Lonelier. 

I grew up in an isolated rural pub in England. My love of folk horror was born of a strong nostalgia for that time and it has fed into both my writing and my reading. I understood isolation, small communities, the effect of strangers, as well as the sense of ‘otherness’ in the atmosphere of the countryside – the calm before the storm, the liminal twilight. It also meant that I could tell when a writer had captured the ‘essence’ of folk horror. When the author weaves a story between the landscape and man, blends traditions and mythology – they take me to that place I know.

An avid reader when young, I made the transition from reading to writing relatively late in life. It happened unexpectedly, but once I started writing I found it impossible to stop and have had twenty-eight novels published so far. Fortunately I found a publisher within weeks of completing my first novel, which was shortlisted for several major awards. Currently I am writing the 20th novel in my Geraldine Steel detective series, which has sold over a million copies in the UK alone. As well as writing detective novels, I also support up and coming crime writers as chair of judges for the Crime Writers Association’s Debut Dagger Award.

I enjoy stories that bring together diverse themes, such as family life, myths and legends, quests, and cutting-edge science, in an uncomplicated way. I love hidden communities, where accepted rules do not apply, allowing the development of original storylines. The suggestion that there is something on the edge of the supernatural, yet grounded in reality, the weirdest of events retaining a rational explanation. My writing has been inspired by the films of David Lynch. I admire his ability to evoke a sense of menace and a fear that things are not as they seem, leaving much to the reader’s imagination.

I’m the sort of writer who constantly asks “what kind of story could I set here?” A quiet copse, a busy mall, a shabby wedding venue, all locations have their own stories to tell in addition to those of the characters who inhabit them. Stories work best when the location is the pivot around which everything else happens. This is doubly true for secondary world fantasy because, when you’re creating a world, you don’t just tease the story out of its locations—you can weave it into the fabric of the place. Which is how I created the world of Queen Of Clouds, down to its very motes.

I’m the sort of writer who constantly asks “what kind of story could I set here?” A quiet copse, a busy mall, a shabby wedding venue, all locations have their own stories to tell in addition to those of the characters who inhabit them. Stories work best when the location is the pivot around which everything else happens. This is doubly true for secondary world fantasy because, when you’re creating a world, you don’t just tease the story out of its locations—you can weave it into the fabric of the place. Which is how I created the world of Queen Of Clouds, down to its very motes.

I’m the sort of writer who constantly asks “what kind of story could I set here?” A quiet copse, a busy mall, a shabby wedding venue, all locations have their own stories to tell in addition to those of the characters who inhabit them. Stories work best when the location is the pivot around which everything else happens. This is doubly true for secondary world fantasy because, when you’re creating a world, you don’t just tease the story out of its locations—you can weave it into the fabric of the place. Which is how I created the world of Queen Of Clouds, down to its very motes.

I’m the sort of writer who constantly asks “what kind of story could I set here?” A quiet copse, a busy mall, a shabby wedding venue, all locations have their own stories to tell in addition to those of the characters who inhabit them. Stories work best when the location is the pivot around which everything else happens. This is doubly true for secondary world fantasy because, when you’re creating a world, you don’t just tease the story out of its locations—you can weave it into the fabric of the place. Which is how I created the world of Queen Of Clouds, down to its very motes.

Although I’m from New Zealand, Europe has been home for a lot of my adult life, and that has included a lot of time in North Yorkshire. It always seems to me that there’s potential for magic around every corner, in the deep sinkholes and high fells of the Dales, or the cobbled charm of the York Shambles and the loom of the Abbey over Whitby harbour. So I do feel that the fact so many stories are set in London is a waste of so many delightfully different settings, and I make a point of hunting out as many alternatives as I can. I hope you enjoy this selection!

I didn’t know anything about Victorian history before I started writing the Arrowood books. The idea for the character of William Arrowood came as I was reading a Sherlock Holmes story. It occurred to me that if I was a private detective working in London at the same time, I’d probably be jealous, resentful, and perhaps a little bitter about his success and fame. That was the basis of Arrowood. I started to write a few pages and then realized I needed to learn a lot about the history. Since then, I’ve read hundreds of books on the topic, pored over newspapers in the British Library, and visited countless museums.