Author Caimh McDonnell told David Hennessy about Ring the Bells, the latest in his series of Stranger Times series under his pen name, CK McDonnell.
Manchester-based Dublin author and former stand-up comedian Caimh McDonnell has just released the fifth novel in his critically acclaimed Stranger Times series, written under the name C.K. McDonnell.
Ring the Bells is a Christmas- themed story and the latest in the supernatural comedy series following the staff of a struggling Manchester-based weekly newspaper dedicated to investigating the weird, the unexplained and the inexplicable.
Caimh is also known for his Dublin Trilogy books of crime fiction with a dark comic edge which feature his anti-hero, Bunny McGarry.
Ring the Bells, the fifth book in the series, sees a well-meaning book group turned witches coven attempt to perform a ritual of peace when they get a whole load of anything but.
Caimh chatted to The Irish World about his latest in the series.
How did it feel writing a Christmas- themed Stranger Times story?
“It’s been great.
“It’s been quite a big gap since the last one.
“The other books all sort of happened within six weeks of each other so we start in summer and it moves up and the last one was Halloween.
“Then I had the idea of Christmas.
“Then I went back to the publishers and my agent.
“They both went, ‘We can’t bring your book out as normal in January or February if it’s a Christmas book because people will kill us’.
“So because of that, we had to put it back.
“It’s great to see the reaction, people very excited about it and without giving too much away, I’ve received several emails from people this week telling me I made them cry which is always a good thing when you’re a writer as long as it’s for that reason.”
The book follows previous books such as This Charming Man and Love Will Tear Us Apart so there is a Manchester music theme to the titles. Does Ring the Bells refer to the song by the band, James?
“Yes, bang on.
“You’re the first person to get that. Well done.
“The first book the publisher said, ‘It has to be called The Stranger Times’.
“But everything else is all Manchester band names and to be honest, we spent a lot of time looking for a Christmas themed one and there isn’t one.
“I think Frank Sidebottom had some kind of Christmas song but it didn’t really work as a title.
“I am a big fan of James and they have a lot of song titles that would work well as things.
“I decided that would work and then bells ended up being a quite significant thing in the book which is just a weird example of how my brain works.
“But originally we went with it because it was the most Christmassy of the limited choices we had of Christmas songs based around Manchester.”
The story line involves such things as a demonic Santa, did you like the idea of taking a dark lens to Christmas?
“Yeah, it was fun doing that.
“I’ve been Father Christmas quite a few times so it’s a little bit therapeutic if I’m honest.
“It’s a fun time of year to write about.
“I think I’ve done it a few times now and I think it was just a nice odd take to take.
“We call it an anti-Christmas book but, as somebody said, in a weird way it does put you into the Christmas spirit despite the fact it’s got a demonically possessed Santa Claus in it.”
You have written about Christmas before with your character Bunny of course..
“Yeah, Christmas is one of those where people are having a great time or if they’re on their own, could be having a rubbish time.
“It is a time where I think people naturally reflect on the year they had and where they are so, as a writer, there is a sort of weird appeal to it.
“And Christmas, for all the commercialisation stuff, does have a kind of magic to it in different ways.
“I must admit I didn’t realise I was as big on Christmas until I look back at all my books and go, ‘I do seem to be a little bit obsessed with Christmas’.”
It’s also a time when people’s guards are down, they are feeling ‘merry’ and that just heightens the drama, doesn’t it?
“Exactly, yeah.
“There’s definitely something about it.
“It’s just ripe with story which is, I guess, why I keep being drawn back to it.”
You have dealt with things such as vampires in the Stranger Times series, what are you keen to tackle now? What is next?
“There’s a lot I want to do.
“There’s a lot more I want to do with the characters.
“When you’re starting off, maybe you’re driven by the monsters. It’s fun to do those things and they’re always going to be there because it’s a big part of the genre but there’s different ways I want to take it.
“There’s a few different bits and pieces of folklore and stuff.
“I’m always reading up on that stuff and looking for interesting little ideas but I think now after five books really the big momentum of the series is the characters and they drive it forward.
“Everything else kind of comes out of that really.”
Do you continue to keep an eye on those publications that do really look at the weird and wonderful stories that are out there?
“I’m always fascinated by that stuff so I love digging through those things.
“In the book I obviously make up news stories that are supposed to have appeared in The Stranger Times and that is uniquely difficult to do because it’s very hard to come up with something weirder than what actually exists in real life.
“Back in COVID times, remember when all these people were going mad about the towers and the 5G and all that sort of stuff and saying 5G causes COVID?
“I wanted to find a technological advance and then people making weird ideas about it.
“I came up with the idea of trains.
“I wanted to come up with some idea that people thought the railway would cause stuff to happen.
“And then, incredibly, I found out that in real life, people thought women’s wombs would explode if they were on a train going too fast which is weirder than the thing I actually came up with.
“We all know the news is pretty grim.
“I must admit some of the weird and wonderful stuff does kind of weirdly restore my faith in mankind in a weird way sometimes.
“You think everything’s just people fighting with each other and it turns out there’s some guy farming crocodiles in Ethiopia.
“Stuff like that sort of cheers me up in a weird way.”
You had a gathering recently. I understand the jury’s out whether it’s to be called Caimhstock or Caimhfest but you gathered some of your readers in Manchester for a Stranger Times walking tour and more things, that must have been a similar kind of thing..
“It reminds you that there’s a lot of good people in the world.
“When you do book events, you do meet all these people and it kind of restores your faith in mankind a little bit.
“Especially if all you see is social media and the news, I think you’d probably think we’re two minutes away from destruction and then when you meet people like that, especially the kind of people who spend their time getting excited about books, you realise there’s a lot of good people in the world and it’s worth remembering.”
The Irish World was speaking to Caimh after the Manchester synagogue attack in October.
Caimh took to his social media to offer his sympathies to the Jewish community while also referencing that the perpetrator’s actions did not represent the community he came from.
“What I love about Manchester is it is genuinely very diverse and in the best way possible.
“The Jewish community has always been an enormous part of Manchester.
“They are a big part in the city’s history.
“One of the many, many reasons I’ve heard why Liverpool and Manchester don’t get on is that Liverpool back in the day was charging Manchester businesses huge money to use the dock.
“The story goes the Jewish community got together and they built a lot of the canals and they went around Liverpool and that’s why the Jewish community was always sort of beloved.
“But they’ve always been a massive part of the Manchester I know, as have the Muslim community.
“I always think it’s dangerous where if some white guy goes off and does something mad it’s just, ‘Oh he’s mad’, basically some mental health thing whereas if it’s a Muslim or a Jewish guy or another ethnic minority it’s always, ‘Oh, well, that’s because they’re part of that community’, and in the same way as you and I were never represented by the IRA when they did anything over here.
“That’s exactly the same for the Muslim community so I feel massively for the Jewish community because I have a lot of friends there but also you feel bad for the Muslim community because this is just putting pressure on them when the vast majority of them have had nothing to do with this and condemn it.
“I can remember the Manchester bombing and the mood after that in the city where it did come together so incredibly.
“It was very moving and it really has stayed with me.
“It (Manchester) has that great resilience about it that it’ll take a lot more than these kind of things to make Manchester change how it sees the world.”
What has the Oasis reunion done for the city?
“God, it’s been massive for them.
“They are a big deal in this city.
“It’s kind of like U2 in Dublin really.
“It’s the only thing you can compare it to where if you ask someone from Dublin their opinion about U2, they have one. They are either a big fan or they don’t like them but nobody’s in between.
“And similarly here.
“I think Oasis, weirdly, are probably less divisive than U2 which is odd to think about so it was a big deal.
“Seeing loads of my friends get really excited and almost feeling like teenagers again, it’s great to see that.
“It’s been a lot of fun and genuinely seems to have been an outrageous success as well which is great.”
Earlier this year BBC and RTE announced a series based on McDonnell’s Dublin Trilogy books. The show will be written by Stuart Carolan who created Love/Hate and the cast will boast actors like Aidan Gillen, Chris Addison and Philippa Dunne.
“It’s going to be quite different to the books.
“A Man with One of those Faces is basically the jumping off point for the series.
“The impression I’m getting from reading stuff is it’s going to be quite different.
“But Stuart Carolan’s record speaks for itself.
“The cast, everything I’ve seen has been really impressive (but) it’s going to be odd to see it.
“It’s hard to explain really because the books are so personal to you and then it goes off and it basically becomes something entirely different and it’s completely out of your control.
“It’s going to be weird to sit down to watch a version of the people who live in my head on a screen, but it’s very exciting.
“It’s great that they’re filming in Ireland and it’s pretty much an entirely Irish cast.
“I’m excited to see how it turns out.
“I didn’t have much to do with it beyond the initial discussions whereas The Stranger Times I’ve just signed a deal for that with a northern production company.
“We had other production companies involved before and they did scripts and stuff but my concern was it was written by people who are writing scripts based in Manchester and I don’t know if anyone there had been to Manchester.
“I just felt like with The Stranger Times, in particular, getting the vibe right.
“With the Dublin books, obviously Stuart Carolan there’s no worries there.
“He knows Dublin as well as I do if not better so this time around with The Stranger Times. I’m going to be working with a writer up here.
“But TV is always an odd beast to be honest.
“I think the thing that best sums up the experience of doing TV and film is James Patterson.
“There’s nobody bigger than James Patterson. He’s got so many books and he’s enormous.
“But Along Came a Spider, which is one of the big Hollywood versions of his stuff, he was at the premiere with his wife and a character walked on screen and he turned to his wife and went, ‘Who’s that?’
And she went, ‘I think that’s the main character’s sister’.
“And James Patterson went, ‘He has a sister?’
“My point is if James Patterson has that level of control, good luck to the rest of us.
“I’m very excited to see it and it’s got a great cast and we’ll see what happens.”
If The Stranger Times was to come to the screen, who would you like to see in it?
“People always say, ‘Is Banecroft based on Jackson Lamb (Slow Horses).
“He isn’t and what he actually is is basically a rip off of Dylan Moran from Black Books.
“To be honest back when I started writing Stranger Times, Dylan Moran was the original idea I had in my head for the character of Banecroft so at the very least, I feel like we should offer it to him.
“If I get a say, I’d like to see Dylan Moran do it because he’d be brilliant.
“I think he’s an incredible comic but he’s also a very underrated actor but outside of that, you have a sort of few images in your head but it kind of pays not to get too tied down to these things, I think.”
If he is Banecroft, who is Hannah?
“Amy Huberman.
“Because of who she is I think people have a tendency to view her as a celebrity rather than an actress but when I saw her in stuff, she was brilliant.
“So that’s one of the actresses that sprung to mind that I sort of had in my head.
“But we’re a long way from making any of those decisions and to be clear, I don’t get to make them normally.”
Speaking of rugby, or at least Brian O’Driscoll’s other half, I’m sure you were sad to see London Irish collapse after you yourself were involved for a long time there..
“Yeah the professional side of it folding is absolutely tragic.
“People go, ‘Well, there’s other clubs you can go and watch rugby and stuff..’
“But it was never about the rugby for a lot of people.
“That was a part of it but London Irish was a family.
“I was there for 13 years as the announcer and we were relegated twice.
“We had a couple of great years when Bob Casey was captain and they were really electrifying years but there was a lot of lean times more than there was good times and the people who stayed with the club in that were an incredible bunch of people and for them to lose the club really feels sad to me.
“The amateurs are still there.
“They’re incredible, pretty much the best amateur setup in the country.
“Thankfully Sunbury is still there and there’s been rumours about London Irish coming back and it would be great to see if they did.”
What’s next? It certainly seems like there will be more Stranger Times books as the world of it continues to expand..
“Frankly I was always worried as an author going, ‘What happens if you’re writing one character and you get bored of that character or you’re writing one series and you get bored of that series?’
“And honestly I’m very lucky in the sense that I’m so excited to write Bunny still, I’m more excited now to write Bunny than ever in a weird way and I know him so well.
“It’s like putting on an old suit but every time, it feels like I just have so much fun with him and the hard thing now with The Stranger Times, in particular, is deciding what to write next because there feels like there’s so many options, so many directions I could go in which is great and it obviously means hopefully there will a lot more books and I’m very excited to write them.”
Ring the Bells is out now.
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