Authors Interviewing Characters: Patricia Gibney
Patricia Gibney interviews detective Lottie Parker, of The Guilty Girl
About THE GUILTY GIRL
An Utterly Gripping and Unputdownable Serial Killer Thriller
Something whistling through the door behind her caused her to turn. A shadow spread across the opening. She clasped a hand to her mouth, stilling the fear that was rising. The menacing shadow was followed by a face that sent a cold shiver down her spine…
When the call comes in about Lucy, a seventeen-year-old girl murdered after the secret party she held in her parents’ home, Detective Lottie Parker is first on the scene. As she picks her way through the smashed glasses and the blood spatter on the perfect cream carpet, she is horrified to see Lucy’s angelic face, silvery-blue eyes forever closed.
As Lottie breaks the news to Lucy’s heartbroken parents and the devastated partygoers, she discovers that hours before her death Lucy had revealed a terrible secret about her friend Hannah. And when Lottie finds Lucy’s bloodstained clothing hidden in Hannah’s bedroom, she has no option but to bring the shy, frightened girl into custody.
But Hannah claims to have no memory of the night Lucy died and Lottie begins to question her guilt. Then a fifteen-year-old boy who also attended the party is pulled from the canal. And as Lottie investigates, she discovers something shocking. Her own son Sean was at the party. Why did he lie to her? Is her beloved child a witness or a suspect… or is he now in the killer’s sights?
—
I place my phone on the table between us and start the recording app as she arrives. Lottie Parker is tall and looks flustered. I believe she would rather be anywhere but here.
Me: Thank you for taking the time out to talk to me, Detective Inspector Parker. I’ve been trying to pin you down for a long time.
Lottie: If I had my way, I wouldn’t be here at all. Superintendent Farrell thinks it’s a good idea for the public to see me in a good light. I’m not sure that is your objective, is it?
Me: Let’s make this beneficial for both of us while keeping your Superintendent happy.
LP: Fire ahead. I haven’t got all day.
Me: I believe you and Detective Mark Boyd are in a relationship. Can you confirm that?”
LP: My personal life is not up for discussion.
Me: It’s your personal life that makes you who you are, do you agree?”
LP: Doesn’t matter if I agree or not, I won’t discuss it.
I try to hide my disappointment. The gist of my interview was to get to know the woman behind the detective. I’ll have to try a different approach.
Me: Okay. This happens to be personal also, but what you have to say may help others. You lost your husband to cancer a few years ago. My readers would be interested in learning your coping mechanisms.
I notice her face turn puce and I wonder if she is embarrassed.
LP: Are you deaf? My personal life is not up for discussion.
Not embarrassed then, angry. I need to appease her with a white lie.
Me: I lost my partner. I’m struggling to cope and that’s the basis for my question.
LP: I’m sorry for your loss.
She seems to be considering her next move.
LP: When Adam died I thought I could carry on as before. I had thought of myself as strong and was big-headed enough to believe it. But I wasn’t that strong and nothing was ever the same again. Death changes everything. It leaves this giant hole in your life and no matter how you try to fill it, you can’t. It’s like an egg timer. Just when you think you’ve filled this gap in your life, it gets turned on its head and you have to start all over again. And, it is a slow process. No quick fix, I’m afraid.
Me: I never thought of it like that. An egg timer. Are you managing okay now?
LP: I tried to block out the trauma, but I made it worse. A friend helped me to survive; picked me up when I was down; gave out to me; coaxed me; loved me. They did what any persistent friend does. They helped me.
Me: How have your children coped, losing their dad?
LP: They’ve been great, but I wonder if they are suffering from my inability to handle their dad’s death at the start.
Me: Would you say you are out the other side now?
LP: There’s not a day goes by when I don’t think of Adam. It used to be in minutes and then hours. Now I measure it in days. Without saying I’m out the other side, whatever that means, I am living with my loss.
Me: Do you think if you hooked up with another partner that would ease your pain?
LP: Hooked up? Ah, I see what you are doing. I won’t discuss my current status other than to say I’m working harder than ever to rid this town of criminals.
Me: Are you burying yourself in work to dim the loss of your husband?
LP: My job is a pain in the arse at times, but it keeps me going. I do my best.
Me: Some of your colleagues have told me you are a ‘ball breaker’. Do you agree with that description?
LP: What do you think?”
Me: I think it is offensive.
Her lips crease into a flat line. More anger? Then she stares at me with something like sympathy in her eyes.
LP: You are young and have grown up in a politically correct environment. I don’t take that term as offensive. I take it as a compliment. My work environment has been mainly a male dominated domain. Still is, to some extent. I have to take the comments and knocks. If I can get up and fight them at their own game, I am a winner.
Me: You think you are winning the fight against crime in Ragmullin?
LP: There is no winner in crime. There is always a victim. You can’t tell that person they are winning. They’ve been violated in some way. I can only do my best and hope that’s good enough to bring about justice for the victim and their families.
Me: Tell me about your relationship with Detective Sergeant Boyd.
Her green eyes blaze with fury and I almost duck from the glare. Then her phone vibrates on the table and skids across it.
LP: I have to take this.
She stands and moves to the window and talks animatedly before returning to me. She picks up her jacket and tattered old handbag.
LP: I hope you have enough there for your readers to digest. I’ve to leave.
I’m disappointed.
Me: Your superintendent said I could have an hour.
LP: I’m sorry, but people don’t wait around to become a victim at a time that suits magazine reporters. I have to go to a crime scene. Off the record? A teenage girl has been brutally stabbed to death. We think another girl is the perpetrator. You will be the first to know when I arrest and charge THE GUILTY GIRL.
—
Patricia is the million-copy bestselling author of the DI Lottie Parker series. She yearned to be a writer after reading Enid Blyton and Carolyn Keene and even wanted to be Nancy Drew when she grew up. She has now grown up (she thinks) but the closest she’s come to Nancy Drew is writing crime!
In 2009, after her husband died, she retired from her job and started writing seriously. Fascinated by people and their quirky characteristics, she always carries a notebook to scribble down observations.
Patricia also loves to paint in watercolour and lives in the Irish midlands with her children.
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Category: Interviews, On Writing
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