For this month’s Author Spotlight, Robyn Walton spoke to best-selling Sydney author, Dinuka McKenzie, about her new novel, She Lied First, just out with HarperCollins Publishers Australia.
She Lied First is a standalone psychological suspense novel following your three-part policing series. Is there a target audience and is it younger and different than that for the Kate Miles books? Do you see yourself giving us more standalones? Does writing a series offer different satisfactions?
Having written three books in the Detective Kate Miles series, which explore the juggle of marriage, young kids and a career, I needed a change from that world. A series allowed me to go deep into my characters, discovering more layers to their personalities, relationships and histories with each novel. I loved writing that series, and Kate will always be a favourite character as she allowed me to find an audience and enter the world of crime writing. However, as a writer, I wanted to push myself to write something I hadn’t tried before.
She Lied First centres around Devi and Kal, two sisters of South Asian heritage, in their twenties, single and still finding their way in the world, at a very different stage in life to Detective Kate Miles. And yet, as with the Kate Miles series, family is at the centre of this novel – its pressures, expectations, damage, and secrets. More than anything, Devi and Kal are desperately seeking connection. They are complex, messy, vulnerable and damaged, and I loved writing them. I hope that fans of the Kate Miles series will find space on their shelves for Devi and Kal, and that this novel introduces my writing to new audiences who are fans of psychological suspense. I definitely want to keep challenging myself, so expect to see more standalones in the future. My target audience will always be readers who enjoy character driven crime narratives in whatever form that takes.
Your main character Devi is 20, in her final undergraduate year studying in central Sydney, and has recently moved away from her dominating mother to the beachside southern suburb of Cronulla, sharing a flat with her sister Kal, a nurse who’s four years older. Weird for me to read. Guess where I went to live when I was 20 and in my final year? I’m sure I stayed in the same “crappy rental … two bedroom, ground-floor, yellow-brick seventies special” and worried my parents by prioritising new friends and community over my studies. Although Devi’s venture could go happily, delivering meet-cute opportunities, things aren’t going well for her when you introduce her. What’s been happening?
I love that Devi and Kal’s living situation struck a chord with you, and that you have that connection to Cronulla, the setting of this novel. We all probably have a story or two from our twenties about the first flat or crappy share house we lived in! After setting three novels in the far north coast of New South Wales, I had a lot of fun situating this novel within the suburbs of Sydney, the city I’ve spent the majority of my life in.
She Lied First centres around the two big secrets that Kal and Devi are keeping from each other. When the novel opens, we meet Devi at the flat in the middle of a Zoom counselling session with a psychologist. It is clear that Devi is not in a good place mentally, and that the relationship between the two sisters is on shaky ground. Devi feels compelled to allow Kal into the room to listen in on what she’s revealing to the counsellor, and is very wary of Kal’s reactions to what she says aloud. The novel begins with the deep fracture of the sisters’ lies having blown up in their faces, and then takes the reader back in time with flashbacks to reveal everything that happened, lie by lie and secret by secret.
As readers we’re inclined to side with Devi as we move with her through her messy but endearing situations. When we’re given Kal’s point of view, we learn Devi is “exhausting”, needing perpetual reassurance. Police detective Hanna isn’t convinced by Devi’s claims that local player Nate has done wrong by a series of young women and ought to be held responsible for a road fatality, and Devi isn’t helping her cause by erratically stalking Nate. When you give us Nate’s point of view, we may agree when he describes Devi as obsessive and vindictive. A lot of half-truths and perhaps lies to navigate within this small group of people?
With a cast of characters in their twenties, the novel deals with that period in young people’s lives where emotions run big, risk taking and mistakes go hand in hand, confidence and deep insecurity sit side by side, and you both love and hate passionately. None of the characters in She Lied First is wholly likeable. Each one engages in some questionable and in some cases downright toxic behaviour. That was a deliberate choice on my part, as I wanted to explore how individuals justify their decisions and convince themselves of their own rightness, even when aware of the hurt and damage they might inflict.
In She Lied First, I wanted each character to provide a new perspective that pushes back on the last, making the reader question the version of reality they’ve been presented as they move between the various point of view characters. The book explores the idea that truth is malleable and never entirely objective, merely the version of reality we tell ourself, and utterly a matter of the person telling the story.
About 160 pages in you surprise us with a backstory. Had you planned this all along or did ideas come to you as you wrote?
In Part II of the novel, the reader gets Kal’s version of the sisters’ relationship. Up until that point the reader has only had access to Devi’s version of their relationship and how things between them have fallen apart. When I was crafting the novel, I always knew that the sisters would have completely different takes on their relationship. The fun part about writing this novel was when particular truths would be revealed to the reader, to create that moment of surprise and change the interpretation of what they had been reading. While that timing changed across various revisions, I always knew that there would be a moment in the novel where Kal’s version of events would turn everything on its head.
Devi’s diet is a story in itself. When she’s out: a vodka lime soda and a bowl of chips with aioli, three negronis and a bowl of potato fries. When she’s home: double chocolate brownies, croissants. No thanks to the traditional Sri Lankan meals her mother delivers to the sisters’ flat or sends via her network of conservative friends. A way of signalling cultural shifts across generations, or more to do with characterisation?
With a cast of South Asian characters, I definitely wanted Sri Lankan food to feature in the novel as a reflection of the sisters’ cultural heritage. I also wanted the story to feel true to the eclectic diets of young people in their twenties: snacks, food deliveries, cocktails, and junk food. As a massive foodie, I spend an inordinate amount of my days thinking about my next meal, so it felt only natural to incorporate food into the narrative as an extra layer of the characterisation. I have already received feedback from early readers about how this novel made them very hungry and suddenly craving Tim Tams. My apologies in advance!
Please also tell us about the audiobook version of the novel which you refer to in your acknowledgements.
The wonderful team at Harper Audio and Bolinda produced a full cast narration of the audio book for She Lied First. So all of the point of view characters, Devi, Kal, Nate and Rupa, were narrated by separate voice actors. Hearing a sample of their narration, particularly with Devi, Kal and Rupa being voiced by South Asian actors, was actually more emotional than I expected. I think for readers who love audio books, you’re in for a treat with the cast of She Lied First.
Thanks for your responses, Dinuka.
Thank you for reading and for your thoughtful questions, Robyn! And massive thanks as always to Sisters in Crime for your unwavering support.
More info here.