Rebecca Hunt: Doggone it, a good writer

There's been a slew of great debut novels this year, but nothing sticks in your head more than a talking dog. Nothing gets your national pride tingling like a reimagining of Winston Churchill's time in parliament, and so, here we are, with Mr Chartwell, the first novel by Rebecca Hunt.

We caught up with her to talk fictionalising historical characters, talking dog-battles and what she's enjoyed this year...

> Please tell us about the main character in your book - Mr Chartwell...

Winston Churchill named his depression the ‘black dog’ and Mr Chartwell is the physical manifestation of this - a monstrous dog who, as Churchill expected, appears again to torment him as he approaches his retirement from parliament. And Mr Chartwell doesn’t just have designs on Churchill: at the same time he also works himself into the life of Esther Hammerhans, a young widow. Mr Chartwell is dangerously charming and seductive, and his intentions for both Churchill and Esther gradually unfold to reveal themselves as far darker than he would have them believe.

> Who would win a fight – Mr Chartwell or Manchee from the Chaos Walking trilogy?

I haven’t read the Chaos Walking books, but I’d put money on Mr Chartwell winning. He’s bigger and badder, and he can also use his paws like hands, which means he could fight with weapons. Unfair, perhaps, but a pretty devastating advantage in the average dogfight.

> Who is more likely to win Crufts – Mr Chartwell or Maf the dog?

This is tricky: Mr Chartwell is a huge, ugly dog – pedigree unknown – so he’s unlikely to win anything, but he’s also dark, devious and not averse to menacing behaviour in order get what he wants. As a judge threatened by Mr Chartwell, your Crufts-judging integrity might well be compromised, meaning Mr Chartwell gets the trophy, deserving or not.

> How did you set about writing the book?

I wrote every day and quickly fell into a sort of pattern. In terms of a set limit, I tried to write for at least four hours a day. Sometimes this would mean I wrote a lot, and sometimes it meant I would write only a frustratingly tiny amount, but the one constant factor was that I was there, staring at the screen. Another thing I quickly adopted was not to be precious about what I had written – it was a process of continual revision as I worked through the idea to reach the objective I had outlined for myself at the beginning. With writing it obviously helps to be disciplined, and what discipline I started out with was increased as I went on: the repetition of writing every day became a habit, and habits are – usefully in this case - hard to break.

> How much historical research did you have to do for the book?

As well as reading books about Churchill I also visited places which I thought would help give me a tangible understanding of the man, such as Westminster Palace, the War Rooms, Blenheim Palace, and Chartwell House. Chartwell House was especially important as it provided me with an intimate portrait of his life – his chair, his desk, the view from his study window, the ornaments he had around him, the table he ate at, the gardens he loved. Seeing these things preserved as they were when Churchill lived there, walking the paths through his home and garden as he would have done, meant the house acted like a portal for me, making the past present.

Mr Chartwell is a fictional book, and therefore Churchill is fictionalised in it, however I wanted to reflect his life and character, and represent him as realistically as I was able. His words may be fiction, but I hope the sentiment is based in reality.

> This is your debut novel – how did you go about getting it published?

Basically, I bought The Writers’ and Artists’ Yearbook and did exactly what they suggested – first reading their various articles about getting published, then writing a synopsis and researching the listed agents for someone who might be interested in my book. I would definitely recommend The Writers’ and Artists’ Yearbook to anyone who, like I did, finds the publishing business a complete mystery.

> What's the best piece of advice you've been given about writing?

The best advice I’ve ever received comes from multiple and non-specific sources over many years, probably my whole life, and doesn’t solely apply to writing: Get on with it. I tell myself this all the time, about everything. As advice goes it’s pretty harsh, yes, but it works for me.

> Who was your favourite author as a child and why?

Embarrassingly, I don’t recall a lot about what I read as a child - I remember Enid Blyton was a regular, and I also remember Adrian Mole, but the rest seems a bit vague. The Guinness Book of Records and Rupert the Bear are in there from whenever I visited my grandparents in Derbyshire. Books about unusual abnormalities and freakish occurrences float to the surface of my memory too: I can still vividly picture an image of a man with a small second head on top of his normal head. I can also remember reading Born Free and Living Free by Joy Adamson. And Der Struwwelpeter by Heinrich Hoffmann was a massive hit with me.

> What are you currently reading?

At the moment I am reading Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee by Dee Brown, The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay by Michael Chabon, and this morning I finished A Mile Down: the true story of a disastrous career at sea by David Vann.

> What is next for Rebecca Hunt?

I’ve just started my second book and am doing a lot of planning, researching, reading and note-writing. It’s exciting to be starting something new, and there’s a lot to think about.

> What is your favourite book / album / film of the year?

One book I really enjoyed is Room by Emma Donoghue, which I found absolutely compelling and scoffed down in one sitting. I don’t actually have a favourite album, because I seem to have spent all of this year either listening to the radio or to the music my boyfriend or friends happen to be listening to in the same room. And two films I’ve seen this year which I thought were strange and excellent were Dogtooth by Yorgos Lanthimos and Inception by Christopher Nolan.