08 April 2025
Full of unexpected twists and heartrending turns, The Midnight King is a dark thriller about family, trauma and the secrets we hide within.
Husband. Father. Serial Killer.
‘The best book I’ve read about a serial killer since Red Dragon‘ GARETH BROWN
‘Incredibly dark, atmospheric and utterly gripping’ WILL DEAN
‘A twisty and twisted thriller that will worm its way into your mind’ JO CALLAGHAN
Part of the joy of The Midnight King is that there is a novel within the novel – we have the present-day narrative with Nathan and Isaac, and embedded within is Lucas Cole’s fictional account of his crimes. What was it like to be writing two books in very different styles, but woven together?
It was a lot of fun! I loved being able to jump around between the two main characters of Nathan and Isaac, as well as Lucas’s fictional manuscript. Having three strands of plot meant that I could play about with voice and structure a lot – it was important to me that each story sounded distinct in some way, whether it was the sound of the characters or the style of the writing.
Having said that, I also found it pretty challenging at times. I had to make sure that each storyline had a reason to exist, that there was enough plot to propel readers forward. I didn’t want people to inwardly groan every time they reached an Isaac section, for instance, because they didn’t find him compelling or interesting enough. And tying each character’s story together at various points in ways that didn’t feel forced was tricky. You never want the reader to feel the author’s hand guiding the narrative; the characters should be pushing the plot forward themselves in an organic way. It’s just my job to keep lobbing grenades into their path!
All your novels take place in the United States. What is it that draws you to that setting, particularly for The Midnight King, and what did you have to be mindful of when writing to ensure it felt authentic?
I’ve always loved US-set stories, especially crime stories. There’s something about the variety on offer, I think, that draws me in. America is such a vast landscape, you can write almost any sort of crime story there. For me, I want to drop my characters in some far away setting, miles from any oversight or major city and put them through absolute hell. Small-town Americana just seems like the perfect fit for that!
There’s also a nice distinction between British and US crime stories. In the UK, we love a procedural. We love diving into the workings of a police station, the officers, the hierarchy of it all. US crime often feels less bothered with that. Stuff like Mare of Easttown or True Detective is what I draw on – these stories of characters having to unravel dark mysteries and catch killers without being driven mad themselves in the process.
That said, not being an American myself, it’s important to get the little details right. Readers will absolutely (and rightly) call you out if you get the basics wrong. I believe, however, that there is always room for leeway and so long as your work feels ‘authentic’ (as opposed to be rigidly ‘accurate’) then readers don’t mind so much. Again, I take my cue from US crime dramas here – I have no idea if the way they portray detectives or private investigators is 100% accurate, but it feels authentic, and that’s enough. And of course, I have a great editorial team who cast an eye over everything I write, too!
There are plenty of books that centre serial killers or the hunt for them, but The Midnight King is different. What was it like to focus on the son of a serial killer, rather than the serial killer himself?
I knew I wanted to write a serial killer story but I was also conscious that there are so many great serial killer books out there! Trying to differentiate yourself in some way, and offer something to readers that they perhaps haven’t seen before, is hard. I felt like shifting the focus away from the killer to that of his son helped. It gave me a different way in to tell the story, and it forced me to think of a new approach in depicting his hideous crimes (hence the use of Lucas’s manuscript).
I also wanted to explore society’s fascination with serial killers – often to the detriment of the victims and others in the killer’s life (such as their family). I don’t think the victims of a killer are restricted to just the murdered. The people who live with a killer – who are married to one, who are the parents of one, who are friends with one – they can be victims too. The impact of a serial killer can spread out in ways that are often ignored, and it felt like this was something new I could write about.
There’s no spoiler in saying that The Midnight King is incredibly dark. What is it about the grittier end of crime fiction that appeals to you?
Oh man, I love a dark story! I suspect it’s because I’m a sicko at heart. Someone once told me that the crime genre is great because it allows you to put a lens to society, and society is filled with so many horrible people and dreadful things that it almost feels like cheating not to acknowledge that. I also just really, really enjoy a good horror. Being scared when reading a book or watching a film is like a rollercoaster to me: that safe space where you can let yourself become terrified for a brief moment. There’s nothing quite like the moment in a cinema when everyone jumps in fright at the same bit, before nervously laughing together afterwards. Scary stuff bonds us, we all have to deal with so much dreadful crap on our own, it’s nice to share the burden sometimes.
Plus, I think as you get older the things that scare you change. For me, I’ve got two young kids now, and when I came to write The Midnight King I asked myself the question: what would I find scary? And the answer was something happening to my kids. From that point, I knew I had to write this story, because it was exploring a new part of me that hadn’t existed just a few years ago. The best books are the ones written with honesty and from the heart, and that was something I tried to keep in mind when writing it. Not leaving anything behind, not caring if people at work would look at me with narrowed eyes after reading it. It was important to write something that I would find scary.
Is there anything you can tell us about your next book?
A little! It’s another small-town Americana story, only perhaps not quite as dark as The Midnight King. Two young kids go missing and after ten months one of them returns. But is the child who he says he is, or has he been changed in some horrible, strange way?
I think you should be trying to push yourself with everything you write, which for me means testing new ideas or narrative structures. With my next book, it follows four characters, which is the most I’ve ever done so far. I also wanted to try and give (at least some) of my characters a happier ending, so it was fun trying to see how far I could bend them without breaking them entirely…
