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| Amanda Ireland | |
Amelia Ireland lives in London but travels extensively to far-flung places. She likes to rock climb, kite surf, and ride horses. She is also a mother to two very dramatic children. Her debut novel, The Seven O'Clock Club, about the journey through grief of four people, will be published by Berkley on April 15, 2025. Ireland recently spoke to Shelf Awareness about inspiration, authenticity, and the comfort of sharing emotions with trusted people.
What inspired you to set a novel in a grief support group?
I had four stories I wanted to tell but also a big plot twist that I had to make sure was as realistic as possible, especially when readers looked back and tried to unpick it. The only way I could think of to get both to work effectively was to set the book within a closed-shop environment which brought everyone together at the same place and time. The novel is about how sharing experiences is key to moving on, and having a support group setting seemed the best way of emphasizing that.
You have several twists over the course of the story. How did you pace these moments?
This may sound unlikely, but from the moment the first major plot twist happened, the rest of the book just flowed out of me without even pausing to think about it too much. Of course, it needed a lot of refining in the editing process, but on the whole I found that every time I hit a bit of a cliffhanger, I knew exactly what I wanted to do next.
Something I have come to realize during the process is that no writer is good at everything. I struggled sometimes, for example, with the everyday descriptive narrative you need in order to set the scene. For some reason I found it hard to imagine characters doing simple things, like picking up a drink, or scratching their nose. But when it came to knowing how best to drive the plot itself forward, that's the bit I found natural to write.
I knew before I even started writing the book that I wanted to take people on a journey where they never quite knew where they were going to end up. Even writing it was a journey for me in that sense because as soon as I'd written an ending to a particular event, I knew I didn't want it to be over, so would then take it off in a different direction. I'd like to hope that even if people don't like all of the twists and turns, at the very least they can say that they had no idea they were coming.
What research did you do into the grieving process and grief counseling? Did anything from your research directly inspire something in the novel?
In terms of research, I read a lot about the grief process from a psychological point of view, particularly online journal articles, although it became clear for the most part that there is no such thing as a standard scientific response when it comes to how people grieve. I can see why the five stages of grief are so well-known, but I can also see why they've been challenged.
As far as grief counseling was concerned, I didn't want it to be too authentic. The whole point of Genevieve's theory is that she's doing something unusual and slightly controversial, and I wanted readers to question her motives. So whilst I did research group therapy techniques, I then strayed away from them entirely.
In terms of inspiring the novel, the stories themselves (bar one) draw heavily on my own personal experience of grief, as well as that of two friends. To be honest, no amount of research can replace experiencing something yourself or watching loved ones go through it, and that made me feel much more confident about tackling the topic head-on. Ultimately no one can argue that your own personal experience isn't believable. That said, humans are all different in how they process emotions, so I wanted to ensure that all of the characters had different responses to what had happened to them.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, the one character I did research extensively was Callum. Fame and addiction are not things I had first-hand experience of, and I knew both would have a big influence on his character. I also didn't want to do either an injustice. I interviewed two very honest musicians over the course of six months whilst I was writing my first draft, and it was through talking to them that his character evolved into the person that he became in the book.
Was the process of writing such an emotional, intimate story more challenging or more cathartic?
It was definitely cathartic. I'm very open when it comes to talking about my own experience of grief, but putting words on a page to describe things which had happened to me brought back memories I had buried for a long time. It also made me realise how little of it I probably dealt with when it happened, so the book was a real chance for me to process my own feelings and give myself something back.
Each character in the support group has a distinct dynamic with the other three characters. How did you develop these connections?
Callum became a bit of a linchpin when it came to relationships between the four characters. Because of the way he is and behaves, it was easy to imagine how the others would react. The three women are different in terms of character and circumstances, but they share a lot of the same values so the potential for a deep connection was always there. I suppose their development also came naturally as the book went on because in my head these were real people with genuine emotions and stories to tell.
I cannot tell you how many rewrites I did where the focus was solely on character and the relationships between them. I knew that readers wouldn't identify with the book if they didn't love the characters, and it was important to me that they were likable and had authentic connections with each other. Each one had to have a realistic relationship with every other person in the group, including Genevieve. Otherwise the story wouldn't have been believable either.
What message do you hope your readers will take away from your story?
How important it is to share how you feel with other human beings when times are bad. I'm firmly of the belief that so many of the problems we experience nowadays stem from the fact that we've lost the ability to share without fear of being criticized or judged. That's not helped by the image we are expected to portray of ourselves where everything is seen to be perfect. As much as people think they can work through things themselves, nothing beats having like-minded people share your pain and want to help you.
I also hope that anyone who reads the book who is going through, or has gone through, something similar, takes comfort from the fact that there's always light at the end of the tunnel, even when things don't feel that way. --Jaclyn Fulwood