Kitt Townsend
Hello Kitt. So, where are you from and how did your interest in story-telling begin?
I was born in an isolated rural village in the West Country during the mid 1970’s and developed a love of stories from an early age. My mum had to go back to work after she had kids, but couldn’t afford a childminder. Sitting on my own on the back stairs of the care home where mum was a cleaner, I would dream up my own adventures to pass the time as I waited for her shift to finish. If I wasn’t there with her, I’d be looked after by my nan. She was a widow, and kind of lost it a bit after my granddad died. She’d just stand in the kitchen, leaning on her stove and staring into space for hours on end. Looking back, I guess she was probably deeply depressed. So again, I made up my own stories to pass the time and make that mundane world seem much more exciting than it really was.
When did you begin to suspect you were any good at writing?
I had a few school teachers who were enormously encouraging. One gave me my own book to write stories in and would let me do creative writing while the rest of the class had to work on their grammar. That felt like a huge privilege. Another loved my stories so much he would often read them to the class as an example of best practice. But I got my first proper writing break, aged 16, when BBC Radio broadcast my half-hour ghost story, ‘The South Norton School Nightmare’.
A Quick Word with:
Wow. That’s quite a break!
I saw a playwriting competition advertised in the newspaper, with a chance for the winners to have their plays produced and broadcast on the radio. What struck me instantly was that there was an Under-18’s category. I’d never seen anything like that before. The idea that I could write something at my age and have it professionally produced for an audience just blew me away. From that moment I was determined to win the competition. I shut myself in my bedroom one Christmas holiday, only coming out for Christmas Day, and by the end of the holiday I had a completed 30-minute script. I timed it doing all the voices and sound effects so I knew the duration was spot on. I got my dad to type it up on this clunky old typewriter belonging to my sister, then posted it off with my fingers crossed. Two months later I got a phone-call one evening to say I’d won. I was ecstatic. The BBC invited me in to the recording and a day of editing, which was brilliant. From then on, I knew that telling stories and broadcasting was the world I wanted to be a part of.
That’s quite something for a sixteen-year-old. You must have been shouting it from the rooftops?
You’d think. I was actually really reluctant to tell people about the whole experience and kept it all to myself until the week before my play was broadcast. I thought my mates would just take the p***, and feared people in the working class community I lived in would think I was getting fancy ideas above my station writing plays for the radio. Sadly, I was proved right on both counts.
It was all plain-sailing from there, then?
Ha ha. I wish. I was the first kid from my family to go into any form of higher education. I studied both Television Production and Screenwriting to MA level, first in Surrey, then at the Elephant and Castle in London. I’m now a trained drama script-editor, and fortunate enough to be an award-winning (all two of them!) writer. But before I got here, there was a parade of dead-end jobs: labouring on building sites, factory work, stacking supermarket shelves and cleaning the toilets in the local shopping centre. There’s nothing quite like the experience of pulling on a pair of marigolds and plucking cigarette butts out of the urinals to focus your mind on trying to fulfil your ambitions. Today, I’m actually an experienced film editor, with numerous credits on television. When not writing, I’m working my day job as a film editor for BBC News, where I’ve worked on a huge range of stories, from the usual wars and politics, to brilliant good news stories like Marcus Rashford’s school meals campaign and Captain Tom’s NHS covid fundraising walk. My favourite stories to work on as a film editor are real-life human interest stories. A few years ago I edited an amazing story about a lady called Gena Turgel, who survived the Nazi death camps as a girl. She even got to meet Anne Frank and washed Anne’s hair when she was poorly. To have been a young person and lived through the horrors of World War II... I was full of admiration for her courage.
Reading ‘A Thief To Catch A Killer’, I was struck by what great characters Solomon Klyne and Holly Malone are, and how invested I became in their journey. When the story ended, I knew I wanted to spend more time with them and see where they went next. How did you come to create them?
The character of Sol really took form in my head over a period of a couple of months. My own children are dual-nationals, and were bullied at school for using their second language and for aspects of their ethnic appearance inherited from their mother. I wanted to create a hero for teen readers whose identity, like theirs, was split between two cultures. That’s a tough journey in itself. They’re children of both somewhere and also nowhere at the same time. They don’t always fit in with the conventional world that rejects people who don’t slot into simple categories. Teenagers shouldn’t be afraid to be different if that’s what they feel they are. Sure, other people, especially your peers, will try to knock you back. But I’m a firm believer that what makes you different from other people is the very thing that makes you stronger - if you embrace it, own it and find a way to be proud of it.
With Holly, she’s based on a few different girls I knew growing up. Girls I really admired. She’s gutsy and talented, and isn’t afraid to challenge any boy at their own game. Sure, she knows how to be glamorous and feminine, but won’t fret if she slips in the mud or sweats like an ox to get the job done. I’m lucky enough to have married a woman who shares many of Holly’s finer qualities! Beware though - beneath Holly’s tough exterior run deep waters. She’s had more than her fair share of pain and tragedy, and we’ve barely scratched the surface. I’m really looking forward to exploring Holly’s depths in future stories. I know she’s going to be full of surprises.
Of the two lead characters, I feel Sol’s journey is very much the focus in this first adventure.
Yes. Holly is very self-assured for much of the time. She's seen inside that wealthy elite world and it doesn’t phase her. She’s done this secret agent thing before and knows the ropes. Whereas Sol’s unsure of himself and his place in the world. His dilemma is at the very core of the narrative. There’s a lot of my own story in Sol, though we’re very different people. My mum spent a long time in hospital with cancer when I was in my early teens. It was a difficult time and a difficult age for me. Some of my mates were falling in with a rough crowd who were on the wrong side of the law. I had tough choices to make and knew I’d likely lose them as friends if I chose not to follow their lead. It’s so easy to wind up getting involved in crime at that age. No one wants to chose to be left out. Crime can seem fun at first. Sticking two fingers up to the rules - it gives you a sense of power - until you come face-to-face with the consequences. ‘A Thief To Catch A Killer’ is really about those kinds of choices, and having to live with the consequences.
Why did you chose to write for a teen readership?
I tend to find adults have very fixed ideas about the forms and conventions they want their reading and their novels to take. Teenagers are way more open-minded. They’re hungry for you to take them to new worlds, new places - not just in terms of settings and locations, but also mentally and emotionally. Of course, they can be a tough crowd if you don’t meet their expectations. They don’t hold back when you disappoint. But they’re also the most engaging and enthusiastic, and totally open to new concepts and characters. Why wouldn’t a writer want to write for an audience like that?
So what’s next for Sol and Holly?
I’m busy on the next book right now. So we’ll have to stop chatting because I need to get on with it. But if you can’t wait for that, I’ve written a little novelette adventure following on directly from ‘A Thief To Catch A Killer’. It’s called ‘An Afternoon To Kill’, and all readers can download it for free by following the link to join my Mission Xtra Club on this site.