Bella Mackie on rich people, royal rivals and rogues ... and on going viral with Prince Harry

She went viral pitted against Prince Harry and released a bestseller that is getting the Anya Taylor-Joy treatment – now Bella Mackie is back for more.

I suppose if you write a book with a title like How To Kill Your Family, you should expect a viral moment.

Since my first novel came out in 2021, there have been several, but none blew up like the day a little book shop in the UK decided to create a new window display.

Alex, who owns Bert’s Books in Swindon, has a genuine knack for marketing, and that morning he used his talents to full force.

In the window he lined up copies of my book, alongside a hotly anticipated new memoir – that of the artist formerly known as Prince Harry. He took a photo of his work and tweeted it out with the caption, “Anyway, we do have some spare copies of Spare if you want one.”

‘Perfect fit’ ... Anya Taylor-Joy will play Grace in the Netflix adaptation of Bella Mackie’s How to Kill your Family.

The post passed me by at first, I’d deleted my account some months before, but it wasn’t long before people started texting me a link and DMing me on Instagram. My husband called me breathless with laughter, desperate to make sure I’d seen it.

The tweet went viral, and Alex got phone calls from several global newsrooms keen to get his comment on the state of the royal family, which he wisely declined.

The tweet followed me around for weeks, and I was besieged by messages from people who either hated or adored the departed royal, as if I had played some part in his public family fracture.

How To Kill Your Family is a novel about a girl hell bent on killing her immensely wealthy father and every single one of his relations after they wrong her. And soon you’ll see it on Netflix, with Anya Taylor-Joy as lead character Grace – she’s the perfect fit.

How To Kill your Family, right by Prince Harry ... the bookseller’s photo that went viral in 2023.

All families have their dysfunctional elements, but money and power really ramp up the normal problems we all face. How on earth are you going to have stable happy relations with your family when everyone is vying for status and primacy? Which of course gets me thinking about our royals again – and the fact that they sometimes seem more like a family from a soap opera than a dignified and united ‘firm’.

The modern relationship between the public and the Royal Family in the UK – and, I would suspect, in Australia – is mainly based on interest in their personal lives: Diana and Charles, William and Kate, and of course, Harry and Meghan.

They are modern-day celebrities, whether they like it or not, and not immune from public discourse, despite their status.

‘Modern-day celebrities’ ... the royals in happier days, watching the RAF Centenary Flypast from the balcony of Buckingham Palace in July, 2018.

The UK is still a class-based society, however absurd and poisonous the system may be. There is a constant appetite for pop culture which looks at the lives of the upper classes and reveals the mess behind the supposed glamour – the success of movie Saltburn, the new TV adaptation of Jilly Cooper’s Rivals, or the long-running reality show Made in Chelsea backs that up. I rely on this interest in rich people to inspire my writing – I’ve long been fascinated by what money and status does to a person (spoiler, nothing good), and have drawn on the lives of several real people to create my characters.

‘I’ve picked a rich seam to mine’ ... British author Bella Mackie is well-known in her homeland, where How To Kill Your Family has sold more than a million copies. Photo: Alex Cameron.

Having said that, I’ve never looked to the house of Windsor for inspiration. Perhaps it’s because I’m a firm republican, or maybe it’s because I don’t feel like there’s anyone to root for in that particular family (in fiction, you always need someone to root for, however unappealing you find them).

‘I’ve picked a rich seam to mine’ ... British author Bella Mackie is well-known in her homeland, where How To Kill Your Family has sold more than a million copies. Photo: Alex Cameron.

Instead I’ve always been more interested in those who’ve forged their own dubious path towards success before crashing down to earth: crooked press baron Robert Maxwell, Ponzi fraudster Allen Stanford, criminal financier Bernie Madoff. What is it that drives men like that to shoot for the moon and destroy their own lives (and those of others) in the process? By contrast, the lives of the royals feel almost dull. There’s no chance of them losing their positions, no matter how heinously some of them behave.

My new novel, What A Way To Go, focuses on the death of a man very similar to those I’ve mentioned, and looks at what happens to his family when their reputations and their finances are destroyed in the aftermath. I don’t expect another viral moment, but I wouldn’t put anything past Bert’s books.

And as long as people stay fascinated by the lives of the uber wealthy, anything could happen. I’ve picked a rich seam to mine.

‘Lethally witty’ ... that’s what Nigella Lawson said about What A Way To Go.

What A Way To Go by Bella Mackie is out now, published by HarperCollins. The critics are calling it “super-sharp”, “delicious” and “lethally witty” – let us know what you think at the Sunday Book Club on Facebook. And tell us if you’ve read How To Kill your Family – or if you’ll watch it.

Originally published as Bella Mackie on rich people, royal rivals and rogues ... and on going viral with Prince Harry