THE STORY BEHIND THE BOOK
Rescuing Rose was, to my great relief, a huge success in 2002. One of the things that readers said was how much they had enjoyed the fact that the heroine, Rose, was an agony aunt, desperately trying (and often failing) to solve her readers problems and, ironically, with a huge, unresolved problem of her own. So when it came to planning book five, I decided that the heroine would be another agony aunt, but of a different kind an agony aunt for animals and pets. Id read articles about animal behaviourists and had become fairly fascinated by the subject, and so I began to do some research. Once Id done that I decided that Miranda Sweet would be an animal behaviourist whose own past behaviour leads much to be desired.
So behaviour is one of the main themes of the book. The others are courage different kinds of it both emotional and physical and also redemption and forgiveness as well. Miranda has done something terrible years before for which she will seek forgiveness during the course of the book. This, crucially, is where Shakespeares The Tempest comes in. Those of you whove read Out of the Blue will know that Othello is the template, in many ways, for that book (see the section on Out of the Blue if youd like to know more), and The Tempest is the point of reference for Behaving Badly. That is why I named the heroine Miranda, because that name (which Shakespeare invented specifically for The Tempest) means admirable, from the Latin, mirare meaning deserving of admiration. But in many ways Miranda has not been admirable at all. During the course of the book she must try and find the courage to do the honourable, admirable thing.
I decided that Miranda would be presented with a very difficult I hope gripping moral dilemma. She has hurt someone in her past a young man called David. She decides to look for him, and seek reparation for what she did. But to her horror she finds shes falling in love
How can she tell him the truth about herself and who she really is now?
Against this theme of the struggle to find the emotional courage to do the right thing, I decided to counterpoint Mirandas best friend Daisys huge physical courage. She happily parachute-jumps and hang-glides and abseils, and yet hasnt the courage to confront her long term boyfriend, Nigel, about his failure to commit.
I loved writing the animal scenes the pet problems and animal agony letters the puppy parties and the dog show too. Llamas also feature in a big way. Nearly all my novels feature animals, and I love putting them in because animals are such a touchstone for human feeling. But the important thing about being an animal behaviourist is that you have to understand the human behaviour, before you can begin to sort out the pet.
My books involve a search for redemption they are ultimately uplifting and hopeful. And I hope that youll feel that the journey to Mirandas redemption despite her difficult moral and emotional struggle - was well worth your time.
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