M.K. Oliver: 'Success in writing ultimately comes from keeping going'
BY Maya Fernandes
12th Feb 2026
In this interview M.K. Oliver, author of the debut crime thriller A Sociopath's Guide to a Successful Marriage, shares his advice for writing dark humour.
'I think it’s the glorious clashing of the banal and domestic with the macabre and criminal that gives the book its energy and humour.'
We caught up with M.K. Oliver to discuss his time studying with us, the inspiration behind his debut novel and his tips for querying agents.
Your debut novel, A Sociopath’s Guide to a Successful Marriage, introduces readers to Lalla Rook, a reformed sociopath whose ruthlessness is as compelling as her humour. What inspired you to tell this story, and why through this particular voice?
Part of the inspiration comes from the many powerful female role models I've met and been inspired by in life and fiction. None are sociopaths, I think it’s important to say, but I’ve always been impressed by those people who speak their minds in the face of opposition, hold their focus, and get what they wanted out of life, regardless of the many obstacles they faced. Lalla needs sociopathy to be able to do that, but all those other role-models just took guts.
It’s also inspired by the growth of wonderful and anarchic stories in books and on TV about women going way beyond social norms and conventions, which are not only thrilling and often violent. Think Killing Eve, Bad Sisters, My Sister, The Serial Killer, How to Kill Your Family, the Kitty Collins series, Sweetpea, and many others. But these stories also manage to be about a search for meaning, about justice, and about resetting the nature of their relationship to the world and to the patriarchy – something sometimes lacking in stories centred on violent male characters.
I have to also say that my school experience has also given me a very rich background to draw on, and I've enjoyed hugely exaggerating the panic and fear which comes from people keen to get their children into the best schools. People can sometimes feel intimidated by Heads, so it was fun to create a Head who was intimidated by a parent!
So, it’s the opportunity to write a truly transgressive female voice that really appealed.
Satire, crime and domestic life sit side-by-side in the novel. How did you approach balancing dark humour with emotional depth, especially when exploring themes like ambition and motherhood?
I think it’s the glorious clashing of the banal and domestic with the macabre and criminal that gives the book its energy and humour. And if the book works as a satire, it’s because we need to have our obsessions with houses, schools, appearances and status mocked and pulled apart. They’re superficial and unimportant, but are often used in a way that isn’t superficial at all, because they become tools to display superiority, subjugate and exclude other people.
I think coming from a large family and also from Liverpool has meant that humour and seriousness always sit closely side-by-side. You can be irreverent in a family, and share humour that would be inappropriate to say in many places, but underneath the gallows humour and constant ribbing, you’re all bonded by the strongest of emotions. I think it’s the emotional depth and lack of questioning about the nature of those bonds that allows grit and humour into the fold.
Many readers describe Lalla as an anti-heroine they can’t help but root for, even while being shocked by her choices. How did you develop Lalla as a character, and what advice would you give writers looking to make readers root for a complex, sometimes flawed, protagonist?
I once remember trying to answer an essay question similar to this, but that was about the character of Macbeth. I remember one critic saying something along the lines of how amazing Shakespeare is to write a play about this unambiguously evil and murderous man and make us like him. I’m not sure we do like him, but in my answer to that essay, I remember talking about how we stay with him because we’re given insights into his thoughts, fears, doubts and even his vulnerability.
So, learning from the very best, I’d say that if your character is flawed and potentially unlikeable, it helps to allow the reader/audience an insight into what it feels like to be them, even if they have muted feelings. We can provide the feelings they don’t have themselves.
As I was writing the story, I was very aware that Lalla was going to kill, but I wanted people to stay on her side. I wanted people to enjoy her actions, to a degree, even if only admiring her front and audacity. But to achieve that, it was important that she didn’t go around killing good people or for no reason.
So, it’s about balancing the enjoyment of someone unbound by normal morals and guilt with actions that can also be read as having some good or purpose in them, even if that’s not the initial intention.
I also feel that we don’t just judge actions, we judge the intent and motive. Lalla is pragmatic and efficient but she’s not gratuitously violent, mean-minded and she doesn’t delight in violence at all. She’s actually quite matter-of-fact about some things we would find terrifying. When she murders an intruder, for instance, she’s much more interested and engaged in the cleaning and tidying up than the murder itself.
One reviewer said Lalla reminded her of a line from Pink’s song, ‘Raise Your Glass’ in which she says, ‘Raise your glass if you are wrong/In all the right ways’. There’s a lot of Lalla in that line. We can see she’s doing wrong, but we also see she’s doing it somehow in the right way, at least for her needs.
You’re represented by Curtis Brown literary agent Felicity Blunt – how did you know that Felicity was the right agent for you? Do you have any tips for new writers approaching agents for the first time?
Of course, most people have their dream agent, and Felicity Blunt was mine, but you never expect that agent to offer representation. Even before I met her, I really admired the quality and variety of the books she represented, liked the fact that she was within a larger organisation, and thought she spoke with real clarity and insight about the publishing industry. And she represented Jilly Cooper, which is all you really need to know to understand her values and sense of fun.
But when you meet an agent, it’s also about different things like chemistry and vision. Do you have a similar view of the book and what needs doing to it? Are you compatible in terms of how you like to operate?
I’ve had many rejections from agents over the years and they’re often very generic. I was therefore a little shocked when I was doing my weekly shop in the supermarket and Felicity phoned me and told me how much she loved the book, and how she’d like to represent me. That was an amazing moment, and she was the only agent to actually call in person, which I thought was a lovely touch and did make a difference.
In terms of advice, I’d say that there are many, many agents out there, and some of these are more high-profile than others, but that does not mean better. You should therefore not only submit to those who have struck major deals, but look more widely, and in more detail at what each agent likes and who they represent. You’re not looking for ‘the best’ agent as there’s no such thing, you’re looking for the ‘best fit’ for you and your book.
I’d also say that you have to write a good book first, and that’s harder than it sounds, as you often think you’ve written a good book long before you actually have, at least I did. You may have a good story, a great voice, brilliant characters, but bringing all of these together, honing and editing until they’re as tight as can be, makes all the difference. So make it your very best, before you send it out to anyone.
Quite often, if everyone else is like me, your urgent desire to get your book out there, means that you can send something out without the right level of polish, and you only get the one chance for an agent to read the opening to your novel.
I do think it’s hard to comprehend the fact that there are thousands of books out on submission at any one time, several of them are very like your own, and therefore, yours has to be not just a good book, but the best of its type.
What novel do you most frequently find yourself recommending to others?
I have always loved strong and idiosyncratic female voices, such as Nora Ephron’s Heartburn, Maria Semple’s Where’d You Go, Bernadette, and in a different way (as it’s non-fiction) Love, Nina by Nina Stibbe, and, of course, Bridget Jones’s Diary by Helen Fielding.
But I often find myself recommending Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine by Gail Honeyman as it has a remarkable female main character and is an astonishingly funny and moving book. It’s even better when you re-read it and catch all the wonderful idiosyncrasies of Eleanor’s voice.
In terms of the more sociopathic books, I really do recommend My Sister, the Serial Killer by Oyinkan Braithewaite for its skill in balancing a love story with several murders. What a feat that is.
You studied with us on our Writing a Psychological Thriller and Writing Crime & Thrillers – Advanced courses. How did your time with us shape your approach to writing?
Without the advice, support and insights of other writers, (published and unpublished) it’s very difficult to find the distance you need to really ‘see’ your work and make improvements in it.
I really think it helps to read other people’s work and to get a variety of views on your own writing, especially from people who don’t know you, and don’t need to say the right thing. You learn so much from this, and it’s not all critical. I gain as much from hearing which passages resonate, as from those parts that slow down the reading or feel out of place.
I was also fortunate to be on the same course as Sarah Harman, whose book All the Other Mothers Hate Me was published last year, and being able to speak to someone a little further along the publishing journey really inspired me and helped me to see the difference between speculatively sending something out to agents, and doing so more professionally.
The course tutors themselves were generous with their time and wise in their support. They were able to offer incisive advice, helpful ways to hone your skills, and to provide a more worldly perspective on your work.
It’s also true that success in writing ultimately comes from keeping going. It can sometimes be tough doing that by yourself, so I found the courses gave me the much-needed buzz, energy and motivation to keep honing my craft and improving my work.
Many of our students find lifelong writing friends on our courses. Are you still in touch with anyone you met on the course?
Yes, I’m still in touch with people I met on the course, and some are even coming to my book launch, which is a lovely feeling, as you share quite a lot with each other as you go through these courses.
We continued to discuss work and share advice and ideas long after the course ended, and these conversations really helped to keep everyone focused on making their best submission.
The other thing worth pointing out, is that everyone on the course is very supportive partly because we all know what it is to have faced rejections and more challenging critical appraisals of our work. So, there’s a huge amount of respect for each writer, wherever they are on the long journey towards getting an agent and a publishing deal.
And finally, what’s next for your writing journey?
Well, I’m delighted to say that I’ve just completed the first draft of the next book featuring Lalla Rook. I have a two-book deal with my publishers, which means that there’s a certain amount of time pressure to get the next one done.
It’s also notoriously difficult to nail your second book. I think that’s because half of your head is awaiting publication of your first book, with anxiety, excitement and anticipation, while the other half is either listening to early reviews or wondering if you can write at all!
It’s important to recognise that you will never write the same book twice, so you have to allow each journey to feel different, without thinking it’s therefore not going to plan.
Get your hands on a copy of A Sociopath's Guide to a Successful Marriage, out now from Hemlock Press.
M.K. Oliver was a student on our Writing a Psychological Thriller course in 2022 and our Writing Crime & Thrillers – Advanced course in 2023.
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