Below Deck: Why Jack Heath Set Choppy Water on a Cruise Ship
Read an article from the King of Twists himself, Jack Heath, about his new book Choppy Water.
What makes a cruise ship the perfect setting for a murder mystery? For Jack Heath, author of Choppy Water, it’s the deadly combination of endless ways to kill and almost nowhere to escape. But while many cruise ship mysteries focus on the passengers, Jack takes readers below deck, into the hidden world of the crew, where secrets, sinister possibilities and danger lurk around every corner. Here, Jack shares why he chose this unique setting for his latest thriller – and why you might never look at a cruise holiday the same way again.
Whenever I tell someone I've written a murder mystery set on a cruise ship, something terrifying happens.
They say, 'Hey, I've read one of those!'
I immediately quiz them. What's the title? Who's the author? What are the twists? And always the unspoken question: is it too similar to Choppy Water?
I shouldn't be surprised that there are other crime novels on cruise ships. It's a great setting, because there are so many ways to die and so few ways to escape. You could drown. You could be eaten by a shark. You could be sucked into a propellor (or more likely an azipod, as I learned writing Choppy Water.) And those are just the water-based deaths! You could be roasted in one of the incinerators below decks, or boiled in one of the giant washing machines, or sliced and diced in the kitchen. Heck, you might just get shot by a pirate. (I used every single one of these, by the way.)
I've been reading all the nautical mysteries I can get my hands on, hoping they're not too similar to mine. So far it's been smooth sailing (though The Woman in Cabin 10 had me worried for a bit). These books are a lot of fun, but they tend to focus on the passengers. When writing Choppy Water, I was more interested in the crew: the hundreds of people breathing the recycled air below decks, surrounded by watertight doors that could cut them in half with the touch of a button. They know every secret code on the radio. Every hidden corridor. Every blind spot in the CCTV. All the places a body could disappear.
So if you've enjoyed a cruise ship mystery, great! Now try one from below the waterline.
And if that sounds like something you've read already, please don't tell me.
Choppy Water by Jack Heath releases November 3.
Choppy Water
by Jack Heath
Death on the Nile meets Die Hard in this new 'locked room' mystery by the King of Twists, Jack Heath.
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