The Final Round by Bernard O'Keeffe

Recommended by Owen Toller

In today's post, we're delighted to feature a double-bill of writing from former members of the SPS teaching staff, as erstwhile Head of Maths Owen Toller reviews the new detective novel by Bernard O'Keeffe, ex-English Dept (and 8th form undermaster). Mr O'Keeffe has also generously taken the time to answer the book blog's questions, so read on to find out more about his detective hero, and how to write a crime novel ...

A well-known TV newsreader, living in Barnes, has been holding an annual charity quiz for twenty-five years, with a group of her university friends as the core of its supporters. This year, however, an unscheduled 'final round' of the quiz alleges unknown skeletons in the cupboards of each of the friends. Shortly afterwards a mutilated body is found at the Leg o’ Mutton Pond. Is there a connection?

 
The Barnes setting is very recognisable; the characters include several writers and two sixth-formers with personal difficulties (one the daughter of the newsreader, the other the son of the detective). One of the suspects is the headmistress of a high-profile girls’ school. A world in which Paulines will feel at home! And no wonder, because the author is our very own Bernard O’Keeffe, who retired from the English department a few years ago and who still lives nearby. (There is a passing gibe – perhaps now out of date? – about the ugliness of the St Paul’s buildings.) So it is all the more pleasing that the writing is not just good but increasingly strong and atmospheric as the story gathers pace, and that the characters come vividly alive. Indeed, the conclusion has something of genuine tragedy about it. The detective, DI Garibaldi, has a lot of interesting qualities. I think this is a very good detective novel by any standards, and not just for those who know SW13. The book is said to be the first of a series – hooray!

Thanks to Mr Toller for his excellent review: now over to the author ...

Q: After your first two novels, what made you want to write a crime novel?
Mr O'Keeffe: I never imagined that I would turn to crime when I left SPS, but that's what I did. My first novel was comic fiction and my second was YA but in writing both I realised that I was withholding certain things from the reader, planting clues about what those things might be, and then revealing them at the end. It’s what you do in crime novels but it's what happens in a lot of literary texts - we keep turning the pages because we want answers to those fundamental questions - who, what, why, where, when. The difference is that in crime fiction those questions are prioritised.  

When I was teaching, I used to reassure my students that reading was not a case of code-cracking, not a matter of looking for clues that would reveal a hidden meaning, but I realise now that was merely another in the long line of untruths I delivered to my charges. I also realise that all literature may well be a form of detective fiction in the same way that all readers of literature may well be detectives.

So maybe turning to crime was simply a matter of time...

Q: Was it easier or harder than writing your previous novels? did you have to change your style?
Mr O'Keeffe: In some respects it was easier, in that in the kind of crime novel I was writing there were certain conventions that needed to be observed, and things that needed to be included - a crime, an Investigator, a range of suspects, clues, red herrings etc. It's a bit like writing a sonnet. You know there have to be fourteen lines and this gives you something to start with, a kind of frame. Some might see these restrictions as limiting but they can actually be a help.

What was harder was making sure that you knew what you were doing at every turn, that it was all leading to a ‘solution’ but not in a way that could be easily predicted. Writers can be ‘planners’ or ‘pantsters'. A planner has it all worked out in advance and in great detail (these are likely to use diagrams, colour-coded wall charts, etc). A pantster operates more by the seat of their pants (hence the name) having a vague plan but happy to change it and make things up as they go along. I’m more of a pantster and in crime fiction that approach can bring problems.

I didn't try to change my 'style' at all. There was definitely no sense that I needed to dumb down because it was crime. Many crime novelists are better prose stylists than their 'literary' counterparts.

Q: If you had to pick three words to describe Inspector Garibaldi, what would they be?
Mr O'Keeffe: Charismatic. Intelligent. Funny.

Q: What makes Barnes a good setting for a detective story?

Mr O'Keeffe: Its main advantage is that I know it well. It's also quite village-like, a bit cut off from the world (and that's even with a functioning Hammersmith Bridge) and so a good location for a lighter, non-gritty London crime novel. It's also populated by people it's easy to satirise.

Map of Barnes by Camilla Charnock

Q: Were there any particular crime writers whose books you admired and who influenced your novel?

Mr O'Keeffe: It was Colin Dexter's Inspector Morse Oxford-set novels that really ignited my interest in crime fiction. 

More recently it's been Andrea Camilleri's Sicily-based Inspector Montalbano novels (I like to see Garibaldi as the bastard son of Morse and Montalbano). 

I've also admired/been influenced by Ian Rankin, Val McDermid, Peter Robinson, Michael Dibdin, Donna Leon. More recently there's been Elly Griffiths, William Shaw, Mark Billingham. Going back a bit, there's PD James and Ruth Rendell. And the first detective novels I ever read were Agatha Christie's.

Q: When you were writing the novel, were you trying to give the reader clues so they could solve the mystery themselves, or were you trying to keep them guessing right to the end?

Mr O'Keeffe: I was trying to make it possible to predict but not too easy. You have to be fair to the reader. It's easy to provide an unexpected solution or twist, but it won't be accepted unless it is seen as plausible and something that has been prepared for. Surprise is important but it's difficult to manage. I would ask myself the question - ‘what would surprise the reader here?’ But I would follow that with a better question - ‘what would surprise me, here?' I worked on the principle that if you don’t surprise yourself while you’re writing it you’re unlikely to surprise anyone reading it. This is OK for a 'pantster' like me, but it does mean you have to go back and make a lot of changes.

Q: If your story was adapted for film and TV, who would be your dream casting for Inspector Garibaldi?

Mr O'Keeffe: Anyone who looks like they could be Italian-Irish. On the Italian side maybe a young Al Pacino or Robert De Niro. Or even a young Tom Conti. On the Irish side how about Cillian Murphy (without the Peaky Blinders cap)? Or maybe Toby Jones. He doesn't look Irish or Italian but I could see him unearthing things just like he does in The Detectorists...

Q: What are you writing at the moment?

Mr O'Keeffe: Garibaldi No 2. It’s a series...

...which is great news. Thanks once again to Mr Toller for his review, and to Mr O'Keeffe for taking the time to answer our questions: much appreciated!