Chatting with author Julie Wassmer about Whitstable, writing, and her new book Disappearance at Oare

18th June 2018

Disappearance at Oare by Julie Wassmer, set in and around Whitstable.

Julie Wassmer sets her Pearl Nolan crime mysteries in and around Whitstable and her new novel takes the reader around the Kent countryside from Whitstable to Oare, Faversham, Herne Bay (with its remarkable clock tower) and more. This is a delightful series of mysteries featuring Pearl Nolan, her family and her wonderful restaurant The Whitstable Pearl. There are consequently lots of food mentions that had me craving local delicacies – oysters are the highlight of any menu in the town.

Pearl is approached by Christine Scott, whose husband went missing 7 years ago, leaving his car abandoned at Oare, 13 miles from Whitstable. Although a search was carried out by the police, his disappearance was not thought to be suspicious. It is considered death in absentia. But Christina needs closure. Apparently 200,000 people go missing in the UK every year and don’t get followed up unless there is reasonable evidence of foul play.

Pearl has a great support network from both her Mother (who is caught up designing a float for the upcoming Oyster Festival which is typically held every July) and her son, who often holds the fort at the restaurant when Pearl is out sleuthing.

As the story progresses there are various red herrings. Why would her husband Steven have just disappeared when he was about to have a major art show at The Oyster House, a large warehouse owned by Jonathan Elliott, a rather rich and charming man. Steven’s grief at the loss of his twin brother, when they were both much younger, was something with which he never really came to terms. His mother and stepfather have been processing their grief under the guiding hands of a local, self appointed minister who perhaps isn’t all he seems…. And it is up to Pearl to see if she can get to the bottom of Steven’s disappearance.

The author is a writer whose words flow, and whose storylines really do entertain. The settings make for perfect #literarywanderlust to this part of the world!

Tina for the TripFiction Team

I recently caught up with Julie over a coffee at The Sportsman, on the Faversham Road in Seasalter, just a little way out of Whitstable. If you head down to Kent then it is really worth making a detour to this amazing gastro-pub with a daily tasting menu both lunchtimes and evenings (booking is essential). The owners are also busy constructing wonderful small residential cabins, painted in primary colours and situated in a bucolic meadow, on the sea side of the pub – each cabin is individually designed by a local artist, a perfect place to escape for peace, quiet and luxury.

There are regular exhibitions at The Sportsman and the artist featured at the time of my visit was the work of Kimmy McHarrie. She has trained in Venice and creates intense and beautiful wall mosaics using traditional methods and materials of glass and stone.

Spring Migration – Mosaic by Kimmy McHarrie (photo Faye Gallen)

Julie has worked many years as a scriptwriter for East Enders and her ease and experience of writing is reflected in her novels, which have incidentally been optioned for TV. She has already been commissioned for the next two books in the series, one of which will be a storyline featuring visitors from Borken, Whitstable’s twin town in North Rhein Westphalia.

She is clear that Whitstable is not a cute whimsy like, for example, a Cornish fishing town. The town has its own real charms, so much so that “everyone falls in love with Whitstable“. It’s true! A delightful centre with individual shops (including the rarity of a sewing machine shop!), plenty of individual cafés and brightly decorated outlets catering for the many tourists. The smuggling history makes it quite an anti-authoritarian kind of place today, having become the “adopted home of many artists, attracted as much to its laissez-faire attitude as to its stunning sunsets and the clear northern lights of its coastline“; it is just managing to keep its identify despite the influx of people from London. It is popular with people escaping the city, either to visit or to live, as it is only just over an hour on the fast train from the city. The locals refer to incomers as DFLs, Down From London.

TF’s Tina on the left, Julie on the right

Whitstable is very much a town in flux, says Julie, a mirror of Pearl’s own life situation, as restaurateur and part time private investigator, mother to a son who is starting to make his own way in life and her sporadic relationship with McGuire (who is in the police force).

She acknowledges that she really does enjoy bringing the area she knows so well to life in her books. Jonathan Elliott’s warehouse and the way Pearl encounters him is fashioned around a real encounter in Julie’s life and the actual warehouse is based on one she saw at Chamber’s Wharf. In her next books her readers will explore a local lighthouse, and there may even be a visit to the “Old Neptune Pub” – the pub ON the beach!

She herself writes in her own beach hut when the weather is sufficiently clement during the Summer months, where she can be totally without distractions. She is also a keen environmentalist and has actively participated in “East Kent Against Fracking“.

Thank you to Julie for such wonderful insights into her life as a writer!!!

If you enjoy gentle mysteries that twist and turn, with likeable protagonists, then take yourself off to Kent in the Pearl Nolan mystery series.

You can follow Julie on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and via her website and you can buy her latest book (which can be read as a stand alone) through TripFiction.

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