The heatwave may have lifted for now, but it burns on in this week’s post – the soundtrack behind a story about a scandal on the Isle of Wight in 1976. Its author says her novels grow from ideas that take root and become obsessions – a process I recognise very well, as my own novels start that way. Alongside the ideas were key pieces of music – David Bowie for optimistic yearning, Nick Drake for wistfulness and Brian Eno for the unexpected and threatening. She is Isabel Ashdown and she’ll be here on Wednesday with her Undercover Soundtrack.
‘Heat-baked lawns… the slap of flip-flops on asphalt’ – Isabel Ashdown
My Memories of a Future Life 