Matt Haig

Matt Haig is the author of The Last Family in England, a UK bestseller narrated by a Labrador; The Dead Fathers Club, a widely acclaimed update of Hamlet featuring an eleven-year-old boy; and The Possession of Mr. Cave, a horror story about an overprotective father. His work has been translated into twenty-four languages.

His latest novel is The Radleys.

From his Q & A with Melissa Mia Hall at Publishers Weekly:

Were you influenced by Boo Radley of Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird?

Yes, Boo, pale-faced, misunderstood suburban outsider, was definitely my inspiration, though I later discovered Radley means "of the red meadow," which can have vampire connotations.

What aroused your interest in vampires?

Vampires are, quite simply, the greatest symbol of forbidden desires and selfish will the human imagination has yet conjured. I find the vampire myth fascinating in all its guises, from Byron and Stoker through '80s guilty pleasures like The Lost Boys to the melodramatic magnificence of the current True Blood. I have always enjoyed vampire stuff without ever having been a full vampire geek. I suppose I love the idea of blood thirst because it can say so much about us, not simply about addiction but about all those desires that can tear a family apart.

Didn't this book originate as a script?

The screenplay and the novel were...[read on]

The Page 69 Test: The Radleys.

Writers Read: Matt Haig.

My Book, The Movie: The Radleys.

--Marshal Zeringue