Tell me about your latest book and why we should read it?
FORGOTTEN revolves around a situation most of us can relate to-a stressed mother makes the mistake of leaving her baby in the car. I have to confess that I’ve done it, darting in to pay for petrol and looking frantically at my locked car every five seconds. And if I’ve done it-I’m sure other mothers have too. It’s a worst case scenario but perhaps one we should be aware of.
If someone was to write your life story what would the title be?
How to Avoid Friends and Influence No One
What’s the strangest fan question or request you’ve received?
No really strange requests or questions but rather some amazing comments. I will always remember the one from a mother of a special needs child who read BLAME and told me she saw herself and her struggles in the novel. I was also really touched by a message from a man who read THREE HOURS LATE and wrote to tell me he had seen some unsavoury parts of himself in the character of the abuser.
If you could co-write with anyone in the world (alive or dead) who would it be?
Terry Pratchett. Really I just want to spend the day with him.
Tell me something nobody else knows about you (yet!).
I have just finished the first draft of my seventh novel. I haven’t even told my agent or my beta reader yet.
Finally please recommend 3 books that you have recently read and tell me why you’ve chosen these.
How to Start a Fire by Lisa Lutz
I didn’t expect to love this book as much as I did because the plot is nothing new-it’s about a friendship between three women, but her language and style are very engaging.
The Drowned Boy by Karin Fossum
My first foray into Norwegian crime fiction. I love the almost detached storytelling and the characterisation of Inspector Sejer.
Cooee by Vivienne Kelly
I loved the main character Isabel. She is thoroughly unapologetic and not very nice about her family, and sometimes you need to read about a character like that.
Who is Nicole Trope? Nicole Trope went to university to study Law but realised the error of her ways when she did very badly on her first law essay because-as her professor pointed out- ‘It’s not meant to be a story.’ She studied teaching instead and used her holidays to work on her writing career and complete a Masters’ degree in Children’s Literature. After the birth of her first child she stayed home full time to write and raise children, renovate houses and build a business with her husband.
The idea for her first published novel, The Boy under the Table, was so scary that it took a year for her to find the courage to write the emotional story. Her second novel, Three Hours Late, was voted one of Fifty Books you can’t put down in 2013 and her third novel, The Secrets in Silence, was The Australian Woman’s Weekly Book of the month for June 2014. She lives in Sydney with her husband and three children
