Natasha Cooper, who was born in London, worked in publishing for ten years before leaving to write full time in 1986. Her first crime novel, Festering Lilies, was published in 1990, the year she joined the Crime Writers' Association. This year sees her taking the chair of the CWA and publishing Prey to All, her tenth crime novel. Her first six crime novels form the tongue-in-cheek series that stars Willow King, a severe civil servant with a secret double life as glamorous romantic novelist, Cressida Woodruffe. They allowed Cooper to take a frivolously irreverent look at various institutions that affect life in Britain, and to challenge the lazy habits of those who make judgements about people on the basis of their appearance.
Creeping Ivy was something of a turning point, with Willow/Cressida taking only a walk-on role. That novel belongs to Trish Maguire, Cooper's new heroine, who features in novels that are grittier and more realistic than the earlier series. Trish is a thirty-something barrister, specialising in family law. Reviews of Prey to All include: "Trish is an engaging character, warm and human, and well drawn" (Donna Leon, The Sunday Times); "Natasha Cooper possesses the ability to write some of the most dark and realistic crime novels around" (Birmingham Post); "Cooper's novels are a welcome alternative [to the violence of much recent crime fiction]: convincing and hard-hitting, they explore how ordinary people get caught up in appalling events" (The Times); "Natasha Cooper is another writer who deals with real life. Trish Maguire, a lawyer, is a flesh and blood character with a likeable personality. The ending of this accomplished novel is both bitter and believable" (Susanna Yager, Sunday Telegraph).
In the late 1990s, Cooper decided to add an extra dimension to her writing life, looking not so much at current crime and investigation as at the longterm effects of violence on perpetrators, sufferers, and their friends and family. In order to distinguish these novels from her others, she writes them as Clare Layton. The first, Clutch of Phantoms, is a two-hander. One of the principal characters is seventy-four year old Livia Claughton, just out of prison after an extended life sentence for the murder of her husband and his mistress. The other, Cass, is her granddaughter, a twenty-seven year old hotshot City trader, who believes her grandparents died in a car crash. Their developing relationship, as well as the friendship Livia makes with an eleven year old arsonist, and Cass's dealings with Christopher Bromyard, make this novel warm as well as hard-hitting. Cooper/Layton is now at work on the second, which is about rape and the crisis in masculinity. It is due to be published in 2001.
In addition to her two novel-writing personae, Cooper also reviews for a variety of newspapers and journals, including Crime Time, The Times Literary Supplement, and the Express. She regularly speaks at crime-writing conferences and on the radio. Her main interests outside work lie, as readers of her Willow King novels may guess, in food and wine. She is a good cook and an even better eater, and she believes that one of the greatest pleasures in life is to sit over a leisurely meal with friends, talking... a lot.
the books
As Natasha Cooper:
Festering Lilies (1990)
Poison Flowers (1991)
Bloody Roses (1992)
Bitter Herbs (1993)
Rotten Apples (1994)
Fruiting Bodies (1995)
Sour Grapes (1996)
Creeping Ivy (1997)
Fault Lines (1998)
Prey to All (1999)
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
As Clare Layton:
Clutch of Phantoms (2000)
