Alice Feeney is a New York Times million-copy bestselling author. Her books have been translated into over thirty-five languages, and have been optioned for major screen adaptations, including His & Hers which is coming to Netflix later this year. The secret of her success? It might be Scotland. She tells us about her love affair with Scotland and how it has inspired her books, including Beautiful Ugly, which is out this month.
All of my books have been partly written or edited in Scotland, and more than one of them is set there, including Beautiful Ugly.
Ten years ago I was still writing in my spare time, on the train to work and at weekends. Then I took a trip to the Scottish Highlands to finish a book called Sometimes I Lie. I rented a small property near Glencoe and I fell in love.
I walked a lot, I wrote a lot, and when I submitted the novel, I somehow got my dream agent after years of nothing but rejections. He sold the book for more money than I’d ever dared dream of. First in the UK, then in an auction in the US, soon followed by another auction in Germany. My dreams came true and my life changed very quickly. I quit my job, became a full time author, and I’ve been writing books ever since.
I’d written a few books before Sometimes I Lie which nobody wanted to publish. So I’ve often asked myself what was different with that book. Was it just a case of good timing? Or luck? Did I stumble upon the zeitgeist perhaps? Or was it something about Scotland, where I had written so much of the story?
I am a smidgen superstitious, so back to Scotland I went to write the next novel. And I’ve been returning to the Highlands every year since, sometimes for several weeks, because I genuinely think there is something magical about the place.
The Highlands haven’t just helped me to write, visiting has inspired a few of my stories too. I first had the idea for Rock paper Scissors during a trip to Scotland in March 2018. We drove to a remote property in a terrible snow storm. When we finally arrived, it was dark and cold, there was no power due to the storm, the pipes were frozen so no water, and no phone signal so our phones didn’t work.
The car was quickly snowed in so we couldn’t leave, and we soon realised we were trapped. We tried to make the best of it – lit a fire, opened some wine – then, just before bedtime, a ghostly face appeared in the window. Someone was outside, watching us, and I felt like I was in a horror film. In real life it was just a kind caretaker checking we were okay, but my imagination rewrote the story and it became the opening of Rock Paper Scissors.
The following year we stayed at an old converted chapel in the Scottish Highlands. My agent had just sent my latest book out to publishers, and I was scared nobody would want it and that my career might be over. I was surrounded by so much beauty. Glistening lochs, majestic mountains, a shimmering sea, so I decided to distract myself by climbing hills and walking for miles along the coast. When that didn’t calm my anxiety, my husband suggested a trip to a whisky factory.
After an afternoon spent tasting whisky at the local distillery we went home. My agent still hadn’t called. By then I was absolutely convinced that everyone hated the new book, so I opened some wine and started cooking my favourite Nigella recipe. When the bottle was empty, I opened another.
My favourite places to stay tend to be in the middle of nowhere. There was only one spot in the property where my mobile had a signal – a tiny upstairs windowsill – and I had given up checking it. But then my husband walked into the kitchen holding my phone and told me it was Jonny, my agent. Given how much I’d had to drink I didn’t think answering was a sensible idea, but it turned out my husband already had.
I told my agent that I was a bit drunk. He offered to call back, but I said no, and braced myself for bad news. Then he told me I had a huge new book deal, the biggest of my career, and my legs stopped working. I sunk to the floor, I laughed, I cried, I thanked him. And, despite being drunk, I remember every word of that call. Once again the Scottish Highlands had been a place of luck and magic for me. My career wasn’t over, it turned out I was just getting started.
Visiting the Highlands always feels like coming home. A few years ago I was island hopping in the Outer Hebrides and my ferry got cancelled leaving me stranded on a tiny island with nowhere to sleep but my car. That was the moment that sparked the idea for Beautiful Ugly, my new book. The Scottish Highlands have played such a huge role in my writing career, and inspired so many of my stories, I think I will always be in love with Scotland.
Beautiful Ugly
