94 CalmMoment.com
decide to come up and punch you in the face. This
happened to almost everyone I knew at the time,
and my friends were the indie kids and the readers- not brawlers. It felt commonplace, but it’s a
horrific thing to go through. But for some reason,
I keep writing about it, maybe trying to process it
and make sense of it.
Q Why did you choose to set The Offing in the
aftermath of World War Two?
A The setting came first. Before there was a plot,
there was a place and a mood I wanted to capture,
which is one that’s slightly nostalgic and pastoral,
bucolic and sunny. That time, just after the Second
World War, was fascinating because the war had
ended, but the damage to the psyche of the nation
was profound. And in the two lead characters,
you’ve the young man Robert, and then you’ve got
Dulcie – she represents the past, and she’s passing
on her knowledge to him. Like any 16 year old,
Robert’s excited about life and wants to get out
there, and maybe seeing the war that just happenedmakes him realise that he wants to live his life
exactly how he wants. It’s about the pursuit of
freedom, and it’s about goodness, and friendship.Q The book is about the landscape too...
A I stay in Robin Hood’s Bay a lot. I was really ill
when I was 12 – I was in hospital loads and had
a kidney removed. As part of my recuperation, my
parents took me away for a few days, and we ended
up in Robin Hood's Bay. And this is something else
I’ve just realised – it’s a place I went to when I was
quite vulnerable, and I had a nice time. It was
written during winter days in West Yorkshire,
where I live, which is pretty bleak. So, in my mind I
was escaping. I wasn’t going to the Caribbean.
I was going one county over, to North Yorkshire,
but I spent the summer in a meadow.Q The literary world can be very London-centric.
Does that ever cause you problems?
A I’ve definitely had conversations with people in
London publishing explaining that people do
actually live like that in the north. I lived in London
for 12 years, and I wasn’t even aware I was northern
really until I moved to London and people started
asking questions about the north. I mean, I couldn’t
get published for years, and I was told things like:
“We’ve done a couple of northern novels and they
haven’t sold, so we’ve decided not to do yours now.”
It just spurred me on further to write. There are so
many more stories to be told.The Offing by Benjamin Myers (Bloomsbury
Circus, £16.99) is out now. Read more about his
work at benmyers.comBenjamin has penned
nine novels, but The
Offing is his first in which
love takes centre stage.