Sue Moorcroft

In a letter to the Times, Tom A Restall takes the cue from an article by Lino Spiteri to recommend a new novel by Sue Moorcroft. According to her website, Moorcroft was born near Moenchengladbach in Germany but was brought up in Cyprus and Malta. She says that Malta is her "favourite place in the world." Her new novel Uphill all the Way was published earlier this year by Transita and is mostly set in Malta. From the letter by Restall:

It was interesting to read Lino Spiteri's Wide Angle (The Sunday Times, August 7) in which he mentioned renowned authors who visited or lived in Malta and then wrote about our motherland. Mr Spiteri, whom I admire as a person and author, stated: "Today's mix seems to have lost much of the allure of authors." This perhaps is fair comment insofar as foreigners who have made Malta their home. However, there are several authors who have mentioned Malta in their work or who have written books with a Maltese background. One such author is Sue Moorcroft, who may still be relatively unknown in Malta.

Transita published Sue's first novel Uphill all the way earlier this year. Ms Moorcroft was born in Germany and spent much of her childhood in Cyprus and Malta. A good part of her first novel is set in Malta - Sue believes that the next best thing to being in Malta is writing about it. I met Sue through the Malta Global Friends Website and know how much she loves Malta. To give an authentic account of the Maltese environment, Sue came to Malta on several occasions visiting sites and meeting people. During her last visit, I was surprised that she wanted to visit the Addolorata Cemetery, of all places. Having now read her book, I understand why. She showed her love for Malta and the Maltese enthusiastically in her novel.

In this interview with Mike Atherton for the Great Writing website, SueMoorcroft explains:

I had to focus hard after that because I had about ten working weeks to write what was missing - about 40,000 words, I think. I had a week in Malta booked, and about 40% of Uphill All the Way happens in Malta, my childhood home. It was terribly useful for research, but as I was leaving I discovered that some fool had made a big alteration to Malta International Airport, which meant my final scene would no longer work! I had a meeting with my agent the next morning to discuss final edits, but now I had to rewrite the ending as well. I had twelve days left. But I did it. And if you had a publishing contract depending upon it, you would, too!

Malta locations for Uphill all the Way