Monster Love

About the Author ~ Carol Topolski
Carol Topolski is a practicing psychoanalytic psychotherapist. Her many previous roles include music festival organiser, advertising executive, teacher, nursery school director, director of a rape crisis centre and refuge for battered women, probation officer and film censor. She lives in London and has two grown up daughters and one granddaughter.

Exclusive Amazon.co.uk Interview with Carol Topolski

What is Monster Love about?

Monster Love is about Brendan and Sherilyn Gutteridge, who live an affluent life in a Manchester suburb accessorised by all the objects success can buy - cars, houses, clothes - but who neglect their child and leave her to die. The story is told in mostly first person accounts by the couple themselves and by those who have been around them in the past and over the course of the child's brief life and death. The evil coiling beneath their surface gloss slowly slides into view and a complicated, three-dimensional picture of two damaged individuals emerges. My ambition was not to exonerate them, but I needed to know why they'd done what they did; why it had seemed so essential to them to rid themselves of their daughter; why they considered her annihilation an act of self-defence.

What inspired you to write it?

I wanted to explore what lies behind the kind of tabloid headlines that scream `PERVERT! BEAST! MONSTER! when someone is accused of a heinous crime. It's the kind of shorthand that shuts down thinking and persuades the reader that the remedy is simply to lock the accused away, lose the key and watch society magically return to a state of grace. Killing a child - especially your own - ranks high in the hierarchy of unconscionable acts, so I embarked on an archaeological dig in the Gutteridges' history, hoping to disinter whatever had caused them to kill their child. In my professional life, in different guises, I have struggled to discover what froths behind masks and make sense of things that often appear senseless.

Who are your literary influences?

Whilst my own writing is very character driven, I admire writers who not only situate me in the skin of their characters, but can tell a story. I want to be able to give myself over to a book, so Philip Roth's magnificent biography of 20th century America, "American Pastoral', "I Married a Communist" and "The Human Stain" picked me up, held me entranced whilst I read it and put me down, changed. 19th century English writers, too, evoke the emotional theatre of their characters' lives in the course of epic, thrilling stories - Charles Dickens, of course, George Eliot, Arnold Bennett - as do the Russia greats: Dostoyevsky and Tolstoy in particular. I find, however when in the throes of writing that I can barely read - not from any fear that I might imitate another author, more that I need to inhabit my own unfettered mind.

If you could recommend just one "must-read book" to anyone, what would it be and why?

Blindness by Jose Saramago, a Nobel prize winning Portuguese writer. In the course of writing of a people struck by a plague in his inimitable, difficult, eccentric style, he explores the notion of community, the nature of exclusion, of identity, the tentacular hold of implacable governments and how friable civilisation's veneer really is.

What top tips do you have for anyone looking to write their first book?

Take your time, both in the preparation and the writing of your book. Sit with your characters as though you've invited them in for a leisurely meal. Know how they'd feel if they cut their finger, what fruit they like, what holiday they took when they were seven, what smell disgusts them, what weather inspires them. Even if you use nothing of that on the page, that knowledge of their emotional geography brings them to life. Prepare to be surprised, to be shocked, when writing; when a story's going well it will write itself in mysterious ways. A character who seemed essential when the day's writing began may well be dead by nightfall. Let that happen. Your first draft is your raw material which will need shaping, polishing, diminishing, aggrandising. Be bold in what you cast out. Take Quiller Couch's advice to "murder all your darlings": if you rock back on your heels in admiration of a phrase or a paragraph, it's probably indulgent and needs to go. Know that what seemed remarkable two weeks - two months - ago may have become pedestrian when you look at it again. Enjoy yourself.

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Dark and unpleasant - Rated
I admired this book and the way that it is written, but I also disliked it intensely because the subject matter is so unpleasant. I read it because friends had liked it and I can see why they did, but at the same time I am sorry that I read it because I feel like it's the kind of book that will haunt me.

I found it difficult to find reviews that explain what the book is about, but it emerges very early in the novel so I don't feel it is a spoiler to say that it's about a young married couple who have an intensely close bond, who find themselves pregnant despite all their plans to avoid having children, and who then abuse, neglect and eventually kill their little girl. I just hated to read parts of the book, didn't want to know these people and felt quite unsatisfied with their inability to process any understanding of what they had done.

Every chapter of the book has a different narrator. Some parts of the story are told by Brendan and Sherilyn (the central couple) while others are written by people who had something to do with them: their family, case officer, neighbours, co-workers etc. Most contribute just their one chapter although the lead characters have more than one. It's an effective technique (although sometimes I wanted to stay with some of the narrators or visit them again) and Topolski brings each different voice to life very well. In an author's note at the end of the book, Topolski explains how she actually started the novel writing a chapter in the voice of the little girl, locked up and confused and I am very grateful that this was omitted. The book is more about the central relationship between Brendan and Sherilyn which is intriguing - they share some psychic connection but also withhold secrets from one another. Ultimately however I think Topolski fails to make that relationship credible.

Why 3 stars? It's a clever book and well written, but it's just such horrible material that I can't recommend it. Having said that, if you are the kind of reader who is drawn to dark novels about very unpleasant crimes and you like spending time inside the heads of monsters, then this is a well written and clever novel (not a thriller, nor a mystery) that you will probably enjoy.

evil reviewed - Rated
Be warned do not attempt to read this novel if you are easily hurt or offended or upset. This novel tackles the tricky subject of child abuse, throught the eyes of the people directly and indirectly involved with the eventual death of Samantha. It it incredibly dark and disturbing, yet I feel it is tackled with great strength and judgement. Topolski, is a counciller, and this does come through in how the book comes through to the reader. It also sheds light on how people can be the way they are through the actions of friends, and, more importantly family. A fantastic book, great first time author who quite clearly has a natural talent for writing great novels, before I read this I thought all child abusers and paedophiles should be sent away for life. After reading this I do still think they are evil, but theyre is a reason why and we cant judge before we know everything.

Those of a nervous disposition should go for it all the same. - Rated
Extraordinary! Very disturbing -- how could it not be, trying to get inside the minds of people who do something unthinkable? But the author shows how the monsters came to be the monsters that they are in a way that produces, not exactly sympathy, but certainly compassion. Psychologically completely fascinating and sometimes even very funny. It's also interesting as a piece of writing, with the narrative given by different voices in different chapters. You won't come away unscathed, but your horizons will definitely be larger.

Looking at the dark! - Rated
First novels don't come any bolder than this! Ms Topolski has done an extraordinary thing. She focuses on one of the darkest of human feelings - hatred of babies - and takes us with her on a journey of discovery. Why does such hatred happen? Where does it come from? What can it lead to? How do we cope with it? You might think this would be the kiss of death as a subject for launching into print, but Penguin are no fools. The book is highly intelligent and compassionate, and extremely well written. It's a page turner too! Highly recommended.

Gripping - Rated
I was hooked from the first page.
A brilliant story, well written.
With each character painting their own picture of the events this book reeled me in and kept me up reading til 3am.
I sympathised with the neighbours and colleagues AND I felt as if I could understand the reasons behind the couples total devotion to each other.
It is a truly amazing writer who can make you empathise with monsters.