A CONVERSATION WITH
Eve Chase
The Daughters of Foxcote Manor is your third novel. What inspired you to write this story?
I was longing to write about a forest—somewhere lush, dark, and ancient, where things can be easily hidden, but also a place of growth and hope. A setting with its own soulful character. I’d also been circling around the idea of an abandoned baby for a while. How would the discovery of this baby affect those who found her? How would she change the course of their lives? So it started with a forest and a baby, and the rest grew from there.
What was your writing process while creating these dynamic female characters? Did you draw on personal experience to craft them? It’s pretty impossible to write without drawing on some personal experience—it all gets stuffed in the cluttered cupboard of the mind somewhere! But I consciously avoid writing about people I know. My characters tend to develop as I’m writing rather than emerge fully formed in the first draft. That said, I do know their backstory from the outset. I’m always asking myself, would she really say that, think that? And I have to want to hang out with them on the page. So they’re allowed to be bad but not boring!
Was there one character in particular that you related to or enjoyed writing the most? Big Rita, the family’s nanny, was a joy to write. Physically, she’s imposing, which makes her interesting to me. I’m five foot four: What does the world look like viewed from over six foot? More important, she’s got such a good heart, I really rooted for her. She’s a young woman with no family or money of her own, in a low-paid job, devoted to a grand family who take her for granted. Over the course of the novel, she proves herself, finds her voice, and grows up. There’s a lot of Big Rita to love.
How was writing The Daughters of Foxcote Manor different from writing your previous novels, Black Rabbit Hall and The Wildling Sisters? I deliberately kept the chapters shorter and caffeinated the pace of this novel. The story demanded it—so much happens that I didn’t have time to linger. As ever, this involved a lot of painful manuscript cutting. But I hope that the forest setting is so rich, the story never feels spare.
Foxcote Manor feels like an influential character in the novel even though it is a setting. Does Foxcote Manor or a similar place exist? If so, how is that place significant to you? It’d be lovely if it did exist. Even lovelier if it were mine! Foxcote Manor is a figment of my imagination but it’s based on an old English hunting lodge. The Forest of Dean, where Foxcote Manor is set, used to be a favorite hunting ground of the royals. And the style of the house—wood-paneled rooms; mounted antlers; large fireplaces; a boxy, wide wooden staircase—is fairly typical of one of those old rural houses.
The Daughters of Foxcote Manor alternates between the present and 1971. Was one timeline easier to write, and if so, why? In many ways the past is easier to write about because there’s no Internet or cell phones to get in the way of the plot. It’s a relief to lose our contemporary super-connectivity. People can actually get lost. Or vanish. Or not know who called when the phone goes dead! And the police don’t have the sophisticated technology and testing that helps them snag criminals today. As an author, I appreciate those cracks!
What is your favorite scene in the novel, and why? I’m fond of the pivotal scene when the baby is found. It took many rewrites because I didn’t want it to be sentimental—an abandoned baby is a terrible thing; we fear for her safety—or flippant. I knew how much the family inside Foxcote Manor was yearning for a child, and that she’d shine a light into that darkness.
Without giving anything away, did you always know how the story would end? Yes, always. I have to know before I start writing or I’d feel very wobbly every time I sat down at my desk. My finished manuscript is always very different to the original outline, though. My biggest flashes of inspiration come while I’m actually writing, so I have learned to trust in that process, and not panic (too much) when things don’t seem to be jelling.
What do you hope readers will take away from The Daughters of Foxcote Manor? I hope the takeaway is that families come in all different forms, that we can create them as they create us. A mother’s love, whether that mother is a birth mother or an adoptive one, is a transformative force on the course of generations. Love shapes history, too.
What’s next for you? I’m back in Cornwall for my next novel, on the wild wind-lashed north coast. It’s a story about inheritance, half-siblings, and a family trying in vain to block out a terrible event that happened years before.
DISCUSSION QUESTIONS 1. How does where you come from influence or limit where your life can go? Does that have the power to reverberate through generations?
Have you ever discovered secrets from your own family’s past? Do you think the truth is sometimes best untouched?
6. If given the opportunity, would you vaca2. From the beginning of the novel, we are aware of a terrible tragedy that has befallen the Harrington family. How do you think this event changed each of the characters involved? Do you think the story would have taken a different turn had this tragedy not happened?
3. The Daughters of Foxcote Manor portrays the subtle nuances of the relationships between mothers and daughters. Were there any scenes or instances that mirrored your own relationship with your mother or daughter?
4. Why do you think the author chose to set a timeline in the novel in the 1970s? Did it change the way you read the story? If so, how?
tion at Foxcote Manor for the summer?
7. Hera finding a baby abandoned in the woods is a big turning point in the novel. Do you think Rita and the Harringtons made the right decision in that situation? If you were in their shoes, how would you have reacted?
8. Discuss the novel’s treatment of motherhood. Was Jeannie a good mother to her children? Did Rita do what was right when faced with a crossroad in her life? Do you like how Sylvie reacted to Annie’s shocking news?
9. What does being a “good mother” mean to you? Are there gray areas to that term? Have you faced a situation that drew you into a “gray area” as a mother?
5. How did the family secrets in the novel affect Rita, Hera, and Sylvie?
10. Were you surprised by the ending?