Nelle Davy

Nelle Davy is MIRA’s youngest author and an exciting up-and-coming UK talent. She was born in Grenada in 1984 to an Anglo-Caribbean family before moving to London where she experienced a challenging childhood living in poverty.The drive and determination that Nelle gained as a result of her disadvantaged and unhappy childhood shines through in this stunning debut novel. Nelle currently lives in London with her husband and is working on her second novel.

1. “The Legacy of Eden” tells the story of Meredith who has been the last seventeen years trying to forget but receives shattering news one day, when she gets a letter informing her that she must confront her family history and her part in the rise and fall of the Hathaway dynasty. What inspired you to write this type of story?
   At the time I had finally severed the last contact I would have with my family and I had had enough distance that I could look back and start to examine what happened in my past and I suppose subconsciously when I chose to write my first book, I settled on a story that was very similar, about a woman who was forced to confront her family history and her own part in it. But at the time I had no idea how obvious and immediate the connection was to my then present…it is only now I can look back and think ‘oh, that’s where that came from’.
2. As you are new to writing scene (Welcome!). Can you tell us a bit about yourself and how you got into writing?
   I always always wanted to be a writer. I never really wanted anything else. It felt like this was who I was and the worst thing is, that you cannot declare yourself as a writer until you are published. So for years it was a bit like keeping this incredibly vital part of myself slightly under wraps. When I got the publishing deal I really felt a huge sigh of relief because it meant finally I could be open about who I was and what I wanted to be without cynicism.
3. What authors do you admire?
   So so many – Jeffrey Eugenides, Jeanette Winterson, Tolstoy, Flaubert, Tennessee Williams, John Steinbeck, Nathaniel Hawthorne, the Bronte Sisters…now that was amazing to me. A whole family of writers? Come on.
4. When sitting down to write, what is the one item you need beside you?
   A thesaurus.
5. And finally Nelle do you have any new projects or releases on the horizon which you would like to share with the readers of the website?
   I am in the middle of a second edit for my next novel called “The Last Magnolia”. It is set in Louisiana in 1963 at the height of the civil rights movement and the critical breakdown in race relations across America.

Read more about Nelle Davy online