Tammy Cohen: 'There’s nothing more exciting than helping a new writer identify their voice'
BY Maya Fernandes
13th Nov 2025
In this interview Tammy Cohen, bestselling crime and psychological thriller writer, shares her advice for aspiring authors.
'Other people’s lives and motivations and often mystifying choices are endlessly fascinating. Character is everything. It’s what differentiates a synopsis from a story. Even plot-driven genre books would fall apart without character.'
We spoke to Tammy about her approach to writing character-driven stories, her reading recommendations and what she loves most about working with budding writers.
You write under three names – Tamar Cohen, Tammy Cohen and Rachel Rhys – covering everything from contemporary dramas to psychological thrillers and historical mysteries. How do you navigate the different voices and genres across your writing identities?
I’d like to claim the name thing was part of a clever career strategy but the truth is far less impressive. When I got my first deal, my publisher suggested my given name ‘Tamar’ had more gravitas than Tammy, which is the name I’m usually known by. Frankly I’d have written as Miss Piggy if it meant I’d be published, but after four books, Sales and Marketing reported booksellers were questioning how to pronounce Tamar. As I’d anyway begun to tiptoe over the line from dark psychological suspense to psychological crime, I went back to Tammy, which somehow seemed to fit with the faster-paced, less introspective books I’d started writing.
Rachel Rhys (the name was a nod to my Welsh mum) was born out of financial necessity. Teenaged kids are expensive and I had three of them. I knew I could comfortably write a book every nine months, but my contract was for a book a year. My agent, Felicity, suggested writing under a new name in a radically different genre that wouldn’t compete with my existing contract and I decided on historical when a story randomly fell into my lap. I read a journal my mum’s friend had written about a six-week crossing she took on an ocean liner from Telford Docks to Sydney to go into domestic service in Australia in 1938. The background details were so vivid: what they ate, what they wore, the various glamorous locations they visited en route, the different classes of people on board and how they interacted (or mostly didn’t). I knew if I moved the action ahead a year to 1939, it would be the perfect setting for a crime novel: the looming shadow of war, the claustrophobia of the ship itself. And when I started writing, the voice was naturally completely different from my contemporary novels as the story called for more description and colour, more focus on the sights and smells in order to bring to life that particular point in time and place.
After that, I alternated between contemporary and historical and never had a problem switching between the voices. In fact whenever I was mired in the slough of despond with whatever book I was writing, I could cheer myself up with the knowledge that the next book would be a complete change.
I actually have a fourth pseudonym as well. A couple of years ago, together with the brilliant Terry Hayes, I co-wrote a one-off spy thriller as a companion novel to the movie Argylle under the pseudonym of Elly Conway, the film’s protagonist. When Felicity first called me to tell me about the project, my immediate reaction was a resounding no. I thought there was no way I could write that kind of book. But I did it, and learned so much during the process.
Publishers tend to be focused on brand-building and consistency so I’m not sure they always love having an author who switches between names and styles, but just as we wouldn’t expect an actor to play one role for the rest of their lives, I don’t see why we should be restricted in how we write.
You’ve lived in various parts of the world from a very young age, and your novels take readers all over the world – from Italy in Murder Under the Tuscan Sun to Cuba in Island of Secrets. Do your novels usually begin with a sense of place, or does it emerge alongside your characters?
My first few books had very little sense of place. They were all set in London which is where I live, partly because I was more interested in focusing on the characters and the complex dynamics between them, and partly because I’m naturally extremely lazy.
It was when I started writing as Rachel Rhys that I really started to explore the idea of place. Those books are about women, trapped by the constraints of their time, who escape to exotic destinations and become embroiled in murky goings-on but in the process discover who they really are. Through writing them I discovered the richness that evoking a place can bring to a novel, the smells, colours, sounds that create layers of intensity and can become such a valuable dramatic tool in reflecting and enhancing the mood of the action.
Obviously, there are books that don’t need to rely on a sense of place. Spare, lean narratives set in nuclear bunkers or on boats or in prison cells, so that the lack of place in itself becomes a dramatic tool, creating a feeling of claustrophobia and forcing the readers to engage only with the characters and the story. Occasionally I’m tempted to write that kind of book, but then I think of those two magic words – research trip – and I change my mind.
Your books explore many kinds of relationships – romantic, familial and otherwise. What interests you about writing these kinds of character-driven stories, and how do you make them feel so real?
Like most writers I’m incredibly nosy. I love eavesdropping on other people’s conversations and waste hours scrolling through social media posts of random strangers. Other people’s lives and motivations and often mystifying choices are endlessly fascinating. Character is everything. It’s what differentiates a synopsis from a story. Even plot-driven genre books would fall apart without character. Silence of the Lambs might have been another run-of-the-mill serial killer narrative if we weren’t so fascinated by Hannibal and Clarice and the electric dynamic between them. Harry Potter only works so well because of the way the three personalities at its centre play off one another. We all spend our lives second-guessing other people – how they’re feeling, why they’re acting as they are. My books are all about the gaps between who a person really is, who they believe themselves to be, and who they present themselves as to the outside world. Relationships really are about how well – or how badly – we recognise and negotiate those gaps in the people around us.
You were also a freelance journalist for twenty-five years, writing for national magazines and newspapers. Has that background influenced how you write novels? And what does a typical writing day look like for you?
Being a journalist all those years meant that when I got my first book deal, I already knew how to write to a deadline. Also, years of sub-editors cutting out all my jokes meant I wasn’t precious about my work. As for a typical day, really there isn’t one. When my kids were still at school, there was more of a structure to my writing day but now I have all the time in the world, I’m far less disciplined. It doesn’t help that I have no deadlines at the moment as I’ve just delivered an edit. Yesterday I took most of the day off to visit an art exhibition with a friend. Today I’m trying to inch forward with my word count on the new book I’m writing, but as I have no deadline and I’ve reached a really knotty stage, I’ll look for any excuse not to do it. Like writing this Q&A.
These days I don’t beat myself up about not sitting at my desk. It’s taken me fifteen years to understand how much of writing happens when you’re walking around, observing, absorbing. It’s a funny thing about lockdown, so many writer friends complained that though they now had time to write, something was blocking them, and I think it’s because we all lacked the mental stimulation and creative inspiration that comes from engaging with the world; sitting on a tube, or a park bench, surrounded by strangers all of them at the centre of their own universes.
What novel do you most frequently find yourself recommending to others?
If I’m recommending a psychological thriller, it’s usually Apple Tree Yard by Louise Doughty, a page-turner which digs deep into the stories we tell ourselves to make ourselves more palatable. For a gasp-out-loud twist, it’s got to be Fingersmith by Sarah Waters.
To be honest, though I read a lot, once I’ve moved on to a new book, I instantly forget the previous one so I often recommend my most recent reads (currently Percival Everett’s James and The Ministry of Time by Kaliane Bradley – both excellent). My own reading taste skews towards dark books with dysfunctional, often very unlikeable characters, but if I’m giving novels as presents, I’ll usually choose something by Elizabeth Strout or Anne Tyler or Ann Patchett because they’re such beautiful, generous, empathetic writers and their books leave the reader feeling a little better about the world.
We're so excited to have you on board as an editor and mentor. What do you find most rewarding about supporting budding writers?
There’s nothing more exciting than helping a new writer identify and then develop his or her unique writing voice. Writing a novel is an act of insanity courage. Ninety thousand words is a huge undertaking and it’s easy to lose your nerve and think ‘this isn’t working, I’m going to try this other completely different thing instead’, and having someone in your corner cheerleading and saying ‘no, you have something. Dig into it. I believe in you’ can make such a powerful difference in producing a sustained piece of work.
Could you share your top tips for writers who are at the start of their writing journey?
- Remember your process is not going to be the same as someone else’s, much though you might wish it was. I’m not a natural plotter but I’ve wasted weeks in the past trying to plan an entire novel in advance because I know it’ll make the hellish first draft easier, only to find I either don’t start at all or abandon the project part way through. Now I’ve learned that if I can plan three scenes ahead, that works for me.
- If you’re bored with a scene and find you’re putting off sitting at your desk because you don’t want to write it, chances are it will be boring to read. Move on. You can always add it in at the end if it turns out to be necessary, but nine times out of ten it won’t.
- Seek out other people who are at the same stage of the writing journey as you. Writing is such a weird (and wonderful) business, only other writers truly understand the highs and lows of it. Plus, writing pals are the very best pals.
- Someone very wise said: ‘writing a book is 1 percent inspiration and 99 percent powering through the doubt’. Grit your teeth and keep going.
Tammy Cohen is a bestselling author of contemporary psychological thrillers. She has also written dark women’s fiction novels under the name Tamar Cohen and critically acclaimed historical mysteries under the pseudonym Rachel Rhys, the first of which was a Richard & Judy pick. She has been shortlisted for the HWA Gold Crown, and the Dead Good Awards, and longlisted for the CWA daggers. She has mentored writers who went on to get traditional publishing deals and was a member of the Killer Women crime writing collective.
We're delighted to welcome Tammy as the latest addition to our expert teaching team. She’s now available to provide one-to-one mentoring and full manuscript reports through our editorial services.
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