The wild bunch: Kate Mosse on why we love out-of-control women

From The Girl on the Train to Gone Girl, badass women rule in today’s blockbusters. Author Kate Mosse picks her favourite justified sinnersThis year has been, in fiction at least, the year of the wild woman. Novels driven by vengeful, unreliable female narrators and psychopathically flawed protagonists have topped the bestseller charts – Paula Hawkins’ The Girl on the Train, Renée Knight’s Disclaimer, Lisbeth Salander in The Girl in the Spider’s Web, following in the footsteps of Gillian Flynn’s Gone Girl. Complicated, flawed, delusional, violent, transgressive and out of control, these are women seeking retribution and taking matters into their own hands. Mad, bad or misunderstood, they are satisfying to read about and satisfying to write. So where do such characters come from? One of the most commonly asked questions at any literary event is how a character comes to life. Is character the keystone, the first component of a novel? Or is it an idea that first whets the author’s appetite? A period or an object? Or imagination, pure and simple? We give different answers, of course, because we each have our own technique. Besides, the various inspirations for a new book often happen near-as-dammit simultaneously and unconsciously, with lots of conflicting ideas rushing forward at the same time. Continue reading... Continue reading at 'The Guardian'

[ The Guardian | 2015-10-20 00:00:00 UTC ]

Other news stories related to: "The wild bunch: Kate Mosse on why we love out-of-control women"


Loose Women to launch TV Book Club

ITV daytime chat show Loose Women is today (March 24th) launching a new book club, with Paula Hawkins’ The Girl on the Train (Doubleday) picked as the first title. The book club, called Loose Books, will see a different Loose Women panellist pick a book to read each month, which will be... Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2015-03-26 00:00:00 UTC ]
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iBooks Bestsellers: Runaway ‘Train’

Paula Hawkins’s 'The Girl on the Train' once again topped Apple’s iBooks bestseller list for the week ended March 9. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly

[ Publishers Weekly | 2015-03-10 00:00:00 UTC ]
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iBooks Bestsellers: Hawkins Back On Top

Paula Hawkins’s 'The Girl on the Train' pushed E.L. James out of the top spot on Apple's bestseller list. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly

[ Publishers Weekly | 2015-03-04 00:00:00 UTC ]
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iBooks Bestsellers: ‘Girl on the Train’ Climbs to the Top

Paula Hawkins’s debut thriller, rose from #2 to hit the top of Apple’s iBooks bestseller list for the week ended February 2. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly

[ Publishers Weekly | 2015-02-04 00:00:00 UTC ]
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'All the Light We Cannot See' won't be dislodged from bestseller lists

'Light' came out months ago but is holding its own on bestseller lists among newer releases such as 'The Girl on the Train' by Paula Hawkins. Continue reading at The Christian Science Monitor

[ The Christian Science Monitor | 2015-01-29 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Gone Girl crowned "2014 bestseller" for eBooks by Sainsbury's

Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn has been named the top-selling ebook of 2014 for ebooks by Sainsbury’s. The Orion-published book was released as a film in Autumn last year starring Rosamund Pike and Ben Afleck, which had a direct impact on digital sales of the thriller novel. Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2015-01-22 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Soumission tops charts post attacks

Michel Houellebecq’s controversial novel Soumission, which featured in satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo, tops France's bestseller charts in the wake of the Paris attacks. Continue reading at BBC News

[ BBC News | 2015-01-16 00:00:00 UTC ]
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iBooks Bestsellers: Grisham Pushes to the Top

Gillian Flynn’s 'Gone Girl' has been ousted from the top spot by John Grisham’s 'Gray Mountain.' Continue reading at Publishers Weekly

[ Publishers Weekly | 2014-11-05 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Gillian Flynn, Diana Gabaldon's books dominate sales lists following screen adaptations

Sales bumps after books are adapted as movies or TV shows are nothing new, but 'Gone Girl' author Flynn and 'Outlander' writer Gabaldon are seeing their older books reappear and hold steady on bestseller lists as well. Continue reading at The Christian Science Monitor

[ The Christian Science Monitor | 2014-10-30 00:00:00 UTC ]
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iBooks Bestsellers: Book to Film Titles Lead

Gillian Flynn's 'Gone Girl' hit #1 at both the weekend box office and on Apple's bestseller list. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly

[ Publishers Weekly | 2014-10-08 00:00:00 UTC ]
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iBooks Bestsellers: 'Gone Girl' Takes the Lead

As the first reviews for David Fincher’s much anticipated adaptation of 'Gone Girl' begin to trickle in, Gillian Flynn’s 2012 bestseller pushed to the top of Apple’s iBooks bestseller list for the week ended September 22. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly

[ Publishers Weekly | 2014-09-24 00:00:00 UTC ]
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U.S. Authors Star Overseas

American titles hit the top of the bestseller charts across European markets in July. Diana Gabaldon’s "Written in My Own Heart’s Blood" came in at #1 on Germany’s fiction list. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly

[ Publishers Weekly | 2014-08-15 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Flynn to reimagine Hamlet for Hogarth Shakespeare

Gillian Flynn is the latest writer to sign up to the Hogarth Shakespeare series. The initiative... Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2014-05-27 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Penguin's withdrawal of The Hindus causes international outcry

Major writers including Arundhati Roy and Neil Gaiman condemn 'egregious' suppression of Wendy Doniger's book under pressure from Hindu nationalistsMajor authors from Arundhati Roy to William Dalrymple and Neil Gaiman have condemned Penguin's controversial removal of Wendy Doniger's book The... Continue reading at The Guardian

[ The Guardian | 2014-02-13 00:00:00 UTC ]
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'Gone Girl' Finally Hits Paperback

With more than 6 million copies sold, and 71 weeks spent on the New York Times's hardcover bestseller list, Gillian Flynn's thriller, Gone Girl, is coming to paperback. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly

[ Publishers Weekly | 2013-12-02 00:00:00 UTC ]
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J K Rowling takes top two spots in bestseller charts

J K Rowling's The Casual Vacancy (Sphere) and her pseudonymous The Cuckoo's Calling (... Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2013-07-30 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Thatcher, Le Carré and TV stars help book sales rebound

Gillian Flynn's Gone Girl has returned to the summit of the Official UK Top 50 after a week... Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2013-04-30 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Erotica will save us all

Thanks to a certain middle-aged former TV producer called Erika James and a little publishing phenomenon called Fifty Shades of Grey, erotica seems to have not so much crept its way into the mainstream, as landed with noisy squawks and a puff of feathers on the bestseller charts. Continue reading at Stuff

[ Stuff | 2013-04-12 00:00:00 UTC ]
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'Gone Girl' Flynn stays at W&N

Weidenfeld & Nicolson has acquired two new novels by Gillian Flynn, author of bestselling... Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2013-01-03 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Amazon struggles to get its books onto the bestseller charts

Books published by Amazon like the Penny Marshall memoir 'My Mother Was Nuts' have not seen strong sales. Continue reading at The Christian Science Monitor

[ The Christian Science Monitor | 2012-10-19 00:00:00 UTC ]
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