Author Dinah Jefferies talks to us about her latest novel The Hidden Palace and how her childhood growing up in Malaysia has influenced her books.
Dinah was born in Malaysia and moved to England at the age of nine. She studied Fashion Design and went to live in Tuscany where she worked as an au-pair for an Italian countess. At one point, Dinah lived with a rock band in a commune in Suffolk.
Dinah's writing career started in 2014 when The Separation was published. The book that followed, The Tea Planter's Wife established her as a bestselling writer. Titles like The Silk Merchant's Daughter and The Sapphire Widow will be familiar to many Suffolk readers. Dinah's latest title, The Hidden Palace, will be published by HarperCollins on 15 September. You can find The Hidden Palace and all of Dinah's books on our catalogue.
The characters of the classics were my heroes. I must have read Jane Eyre half a dozen times as a teenager, and I loved how all that anguish and torment was finally resolved. Same goes for Wuthering Heights, Tess of the D’Urbervilles, and Rebecca. They all feature women in difficult situations who face their greatest fears and do or don’t overcome them. I like to write resilient characters who face hardship or challenges but find their strength and their courage and I hope readers enjoy them too. Tess of the D’Urbervilles, Rebecca, and Wuthering Heights all take place in especially atmospheric and powerful settings, and I always aim to do the same. (By the way, talking of Wuthering Heights, I adored Kate Bush who was way ahead of her time).
The intense light, the brilliant colour, the tropical scents, the seductive nature of a searingly hot climate – all influenced my first six books, set in Malaysia, Sri Lanka (twice) Vietnam, India, and Burma. And especially The Separation which was set during the Malayan emergency when I was a child living there. I went to all those countries researching detail and atmosphere and part of my heart belongs in a far-flung exotic place, though I don’t respond well to heat in the way I once did.
My daughter was born in Suffolk and my son’s first primary school was there so it’s a special place for me. I’ve been back a few times as I still have friends there but as I live in the West now it’s quite a trek. My recollections are of long hot summers, of Barsham Faire, of cold windy winters, of looking after goats, and picking sprouts with frozen fingers.
In fact my second book, The Tea Planter's Wife set in Sri Lanka, really changed things for me. It became a Sunday Times number one, a kindle number one, and a Richard & Judy book club pick. Because of the success of that book, I was able to build a writing room at the bottom of the garden – we live in a small Victorian terrace - and it enabled me to go on all the foreign adventures I’ve had since then. It gave me visibility in what is a hugely crowded marketplace.
Many if not all families have secrets. In Daughters of War, I peel away the layers and uncover a life-changing family secret for Florence. This results in her having to leave her home in France where she lived with her sisters. The Hidden Palace is the second book in the trilogy and takes the story on from where Daughters of War ended. Florence arrives in war-weary England only to find that her mother Claudette is insisting she heads off to Malta to find her missing aunt. It’s dual narrative, partly set in Devon, briefly in the Cotswolds and 1925 Paris, but mostly in Malta between 1925 and 1947. I loved revisiting some of the characters from book one and taking them on this dramatic emotional adventure with rifts between sisters, danger, betrayal, and hopefully some reunions.
It’s called Night Train to Marrakech and is set in 1966. The three sisters from Daughters of War now have grown up daughters of their own. One of whom, twenty-two-year-old Victoria, sets off to discover a grandmother who has been in hiding and guarding a dark secret her entire life. Victoria hopes to learn more from her about her father Victor who was a hero of the French resistance executed by the Nazis (in Book One). She doesn’t realise she’s walking right into the heart of terrible danger and that Marrakech is not just full of hippies and the beautiful people.
The story is set mainly in that city but also at a stunning kasbah in the High Atlas Mountains where her 74-year-old grandmother Clemence lives in isolation. It’s dual narrative and her grandmother’s thread tells how she resolves a current and past threat and eventually divulges the secrets that have haunted her life. I loved writing her as she is the first character I’ve written who is exactly my own age.
I think I would always say the work of Thomas Hardy because it is so cinematic.
I’d love to go to India again. We went to Rajasthan and everything about it was awe inspiring. If I went again, it would be to the foothills of the Himalayas. But I have to admit that going to India is probably also the thing I wouldn’t want to do again. The heat, the noise, the exuberance is wonderful but exhausting. Business flights are phenomenally expensive now - my writer’s back will no longer cope with economy seats – and the cities are a bit too invasive when you’re accustomed to the peace and quiet of Gloucestershire. If I could be teleported to the serene tea plantations in the foothills of the Himalayas with views of the snow tipped mountains and sparkling fresh air, I’d go like a shot.
Not strange or funny exactly but I’ve had several people tell me the entire history of their family and the multiple generations before them, suggesting I could write their story as a novel. Fifty percent of the profits to them, fifty percent to me. I politely tell them that’s very kind, but no thank you, as I enjoy thinking up my own ideas and I have so many still to use. I don’t tell them that truly no idea is worth fifty percent when a book takes well over a year of my life.
Also, what people sometimes believe is a great idea for a novel rarely is. The thoughts I’m offered tend to be episodic histories without an actual core, or premise, around which a story is developed. In fact, one of the criticisms literary agents level at stories submitted to them is that they are too episodic. I need to be able to express what my core story is in elevator pitch and sadly life histories mostly don’t enable me to do that, although a section of a life can be an interesting topic to pursue.
I have never missed a deadline. The reason is that I don’t work well under external pressure. I know some people do and will write reams when a deadline looms. That would give me a migraine. I do however put myself under far too much pressure and although this means I get things done, it also means I don’t find it easy to relax.
