Louise Hare Books In Order
Book links take you to Amazon. As an Amazon Associate I earn money from qualifying purchases.Publication Order of Canary Club Mystery Books
Miss Aldridge Regrets | (2022) | Description / Buy at Amazon |
Harlem After Midnight / These Foolish Things | (2023) | Description / Buy at Amazon |
Publication Order of Standalone Novels
This Lovely City | (2020) | Description / Buy at Amazon |
Louise Hare
Louise Hare, born in the United Kingdom, is a London based writer. She has an MA in Creative Writing from Birkbeck, University of London.
Originally, she is from Warrington, the capital city is the inspiration for a lot of her work, including “This Lovely City”, which started life after a trip into the deep level shelter under Clapham Common. She knew this was used as an air raid shelter during the second world war. She was surprised to find when she got down there was that they’d house Windrush passengers for a few weeks when they first arrived.
During this time, she was on a creative writing MA and had to pen a short story for the course. She just attempted to imagine what they had to feel like, to show up in a strange country and then find yourself being shoved underground, just how disorienting that had to have been. This is how she came up with Lawrie. An edited version of this short story is now the first 1948 chapter in the book.
Her classmates read the short story and they wanted to know what was going to happen next. At the time, she was a bit disappointed since she really wanted to pen a good short story, but now is very pleased that she was able to work out what happened next. She started writing it late in 2016 and got her publishing deal in September 2018.
Evie was a character that she had already been thinking about for a different story but when she attempted putting her together with Lawrie, things just seemed to work and eventually they ended up falling in love. This love story part was a happy accident. She had two separate characters, with Evie’s being one she had been sitting on for close to a year, then realized once she added in Lawrie things worked.
The fact that they are in love raises the stakes for both of them. They are fighting to stay with each other and to keep their freedom. She believes you keep on reading in order to discover if it works out alright for the both of them, because there is the real risk that it won’t. Even Louise herself didn’t know how things would turn out until she reached the end how it would turn out.
A lot of the racism that Evie’s experienced are Louise’s own. Some from her childhood during the eighties and nineties, while others are from very recently.
She never set out to write a Windrush novel. It was just an accident, mostly born from that original short story, and once she had the plot locked down, she knew that she had to write it. It’s important to her to explore Black British history and tell stories that are set amongst Black communities that are often ignored.
Agnes and Aston were her favorite characters to write, because they just start off serving a purpose before developing into quite complex people. Agnes is somebody that’s had a tough life. Once Louise began thinking about what her life had to have been like, bringing up a mixed race kid during the thirties and forties, never having been married, and she lost the love of her life. It really wasn’t too difficult to see just why she is how she is. At times, she treats Evie poorly, but she really does love her. She’s just bad at showing it.
Louise spent her whole childhood with her head in a book. Each Saturday, she would spend her pocket money in the bookstore. She would also take out as many library books as she was allowed. Once these were all read, she would go back through all of her bookshelves and reread her favorites.
She started writing seriously in about 2015. She loved writing stories when she was a kid, but fell out of the habit. In some ways she is glad that she came back to writing later on. She believes having lived a bit first made her a better writer than if she just tried writing a novel during her early twenties, since she wasn’t writing too much worth reading during this time.
Louise loves historical fiction and Sarah Waters is possibly her favorite author in the genre. One of her absolute favorite books is called “Fingersmith”, a page-turner with a shocking plot twist that still makes her gasp to this day despite knowing that it is coming.
“This Lovely City” is Louise’s debut novel, which was released in the year 2020, having been published by HQ (Harper Collins) and House of Anansi. Her work is from the crime and historical fiction genres.
“This Lovely City” is the first stand alone novel and was released in the year 2020. The music’s playing and the drinks are flowing. However, this party cannot last.
London in 1950. The Blitz has ended and London continues to rebuild after the war, and Lawrie Matthews (a jazz musician) has answered England’s call for help. Having arrived from Jamaica aboard the Empire Windrush, he has taken a small room in south London lodgings, and he’s fallen in love with the girl next door.
Touring Soho’s music halls at night, and pacing the streets as a postman during the day, Lawrie has poured his whole heart into his new home, and it is alive with possibility. Until one morning, as he crosses a misty common, he makes one horrible discovery.
While the local community starts to rally, fingers of blame are pointed at those that had recently been welcomed with open arms. Before too long, London’s recent arrivals become the primary suspects in this tragedy which is a threaten to rip the city apart. This novel examines the complexities of belonging and love, and teaches us that even in the face of fear and anger, there’s always hope.
Fans of the novel found this to be an utterly compelling and atmospheric debut. Louise does a great job of conjuring up post war austerity in Britain perfectly, rich in all its detail, with all the bombed out derelict houses, rationing clothing, food, and fuel.
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