Chris Whitaker talks about his gripping new novel All colors of darknesswild experiences in the London financial sector and the adaptation of his works for television.
Chris Whitaker is relaxed now that he is back on this side of the Atlantic. Hot press On a pleasant Friday afternoon at HQ, the Londoner has just recovered from his jet lag after doing a torrent of promotion for his new novel in the US. All colors of darkness. Everyone – including Oprah – reads it. He got the call that it was number 2 on the New York Times bestseller list at dinner the night before we meet. It’s all, in his words, “slightly surreal.”
“I was nervous about this book because it feels like it’s the best I can do,” he says. “I couldn’t change a single word, and I’ve never had to before. I thought if people don’t like this book, I have nothing else to offer them, so I’m mostly relieved.”
The work in question – his third novel – is a complex story of friendship, obsession and self-discovery. Transport yourself to 1970s Missouri, where the fictional town of Monta Clare is thrown into shock when teenager Joseph “Patch” Macauley is kidnapped. During this time, he lies alone in a dark room before he literally feels a touch from Grace – another girl trapped there with him.
Amidst the darkness, they fall in love, but after Patch’s escape, there is no evidence that Grace ever existed, so he embarks on an epic journey across the United States to desperately find her. A harrowing atmosphere of neglect, violence and isolation permeates the entire film, so intense that you suspect it could only have been created by someone who has experienced these feelings first hand.
“I don’t think I could have known what it would feel like without guessing, and that wouldn’t have felt quite right to me,” admits Chris.
The author was a victim of domestic violence as a child and was stabbed at the age of 19. The one, he says openly, may have contributed to the other.
“When I was 10, my mother’s boyfriend broke my arm,” he recalls. “I realized that you can’t always ask for help, and when you do, no one comes. I think if I had been robbed and hadn’t been attacked when I was younger, I probably would have given the robber my phone without fighting back. As a child, I never wanted to feel like a victim, so if someone wanted to take something from me, I would rather let them stab me than give it to them.”
Chris Whitaker. Copyright: Miguel Ruiz.Religious views
In All colors of darkness Patch uses painting to try to conjure up an image of his fugitive friend. The use of art as a means of coping with trauma is one of the many parallels between the protagonist and his creator.
“It was PTSD that made me write,” Chris explains. “When I was stressed or going through a difficult time, I would return to writing. The library was a big part of my life. My mom worked two jobs and wasn’t there when I got home from school. I would often hang out in the library because I didn’t like going home to an empty house. After I was stabbed, it became a safe place. I borrowed a book about PTSD that talked about therapeutic exercises.
“Writing things down, keeping it to yourself and not having to talk to anyone on the outside – that really appealed to me. It suited my personality and I still do it today. When something goes wrong, I’m the last person to tell anyone, often to my detriment. I’m definitely teaching my kids that it’s OK to ask for help. They’re very different from me back then.”
In addition to Chris’ childhood trauma, sociopolitical themes also play a role. All colors of the dayReligion and especially (without giving too much away) abortion play a prominent role in the shadow of the landmark Roe vs. Wade ruling.
“The stars of the show are thirteen when the book starts, so they’re not really concerned with anything other than their immediate problems, school, a date to prom, that sort of thing. But then these outside forces creep in as they get older. My mother was Catholic, my father is an atheist, and they divorced when I was quite young.
“She wanted my brother and I to be baptized and he wanted us to decide for ourselves. It was a fierce battle – there were these opposing views, which I found quite interesting. One Instagram review said, ‘I had to stop reading because your religious views obviously don’t align with mine,’ but it’s a dialogue. I don’t give it any bias. In the narrative, each character has their own view, even if it’s something I personally have strong opinions about.
“This is a hot topic in America. These poor women who have to drive across seven states to get an abortion, it’s such chaos.”
TV ADAPTATION
Upon arrival at the world-famous Hot press In the office, Chris, like many other wide-eyed visitors, admired the gallery of signed covers on the wall. A 2005 photo of Pete Doherty playing guitar caught his eye and the author remarked that he was a huge fan.
He is also no stranger to the libertine lifestyle. After the knife attack, Chris became a day trader in London’s financial hub of Moorgate and worked his way up the corporate ladder. He then broke trading rules and ended up owing his bosses half a million pounds. Although he was only in his early 20s, this was an extraordinary time in what had been an eventful young life.
“I was there in the last days of wild drug use and customer entertainment, before the crash,” says Chris. “There was a strip club called Stringfellows. I went there so often that the dancers came to my wedding. The back row of the church was just strippers. They were really my friends – they’re nice, interesting people. Some of them had business degrees, but they kept stripping because it paid so well.”
Unusual friendships aside, life in London’s financial straits became exhausting – and Chris had to deal with the stress and demons the only way he knew how.
“Customers would come to us and they wanted to go to brothels and stuff,” he says. “I was sitting in a bar in Mayfair and they were out with sex workers. I felt like a pimp or something. Then you have to be back at your desk by five or six, so I slept in the office. I was just fed up with it. I still trade with my own money because it gives structure to my day.
“I like to sit at a desk at a certain time, so I spend an hour a day doing that. But when I turned 30, I was at a crossroads. I had to pay off all my debt money and I had to decide what I wanted to do with the rest of my life. I was really unhappy, really deeply unhappy. I looked back at my life and thought, ‘What is the constant? What is the thing that I always turn to?’ And it was writing.”
Nowadays, the author has a lot to look forward to, with All colors of darkness bought by Universal for a TV adaptation.
“I’m an executive producer, which means I’m a little bit involved, but I’m not picky at all,” says the author. “I know it has to exist in a different format. There’s a writer called Sarah Gubbins who Pam and Tommy – she’s great and she’s really got it. There’s talk of making the book into three seasons and a pilot has already been written so I’m looking forward to reading that.”
• All colors of darkness is out now.
