The Wonder: Emma goes back in time for the follow-up to critically acclaimed, and controversial, Room
ROOM author Emma Donoghue, who saw her novel made into an Oscar-winning movie, has a new book out which couldn’t be more different. The Wonder inhabits a totally different world.
Books & Magazines
Don't miss out on the headlines from Books & Magazines. Followed categories will be added to My News.
DESPITE the dark secrets that inhabit her writing, Emma Donoghue is sunny and cheerful on the phone from London, Ontario, in Canada.
She’s fresh from reading a bedtime story to her daughter, the 1905 tale A Little Princess by Frances Hodgson Burnett. “I like to supplement her 21st century books with some old ones,” she says.
Donoghue’s writing often straddles the same divide, using historical points of reference, as is the case with her latest novel, The Wonder, a fictional story inspired by the phenomenon of “fasting girls” in Europe and the US in the 19th century.
But it was her bestseller Room, which was subsequently made into a multiple award-winning film, that drew controversy for its ripped-from-the-headlines story about a woman who is abducted, raped and then held captive with the son that results from the sexual assault.
Detractors felt it was sensationalist; that it too closely resembled the tragic real-life story of Austrian criminal Josef Fritzl, who held his daughter prisoner in a secret basement. Donoghue says that after the backlash, she’ll think twice about using another current-day reference.
“Certainly I was surprised about how much people fixated on the inspiration from a contemporary case,” Donoghue says.
She has previously defended the novel on the grounds that only certain aspects of the Fritzl case “triggered” her story.
“Never say never, but I probably wouldn’t do that again,” she says. “I’ll write contemporary stories again, but I think it was the association with one real crime case that I found to be a bit of an anchor around the book.”
Nevertheless, Room was short-listed for the Man Booker Prize, won a host of other accolades, and brought Donoghue’s writing to the big screen with the film of the same name, which was released in Australia earlier this year.
The author, who was born and raised in Ireland before emigrating to Canada in 1998, was delighted the story had another iteration beyond the book.
“In cinema, an audience can pick up what’s sinister about a situation very quickly, so I think rather than labouring that, the film emphasised the magic between mother and child.”
Her adapted screenplay was nominated for an Academy Award, one of four for the film.
Being part of the glitz and glamour of Hollywood came as a surprise to Donoghue, especially attending the Oscars award ceremony.
“It was very strange, because in the book world there’s very little emphasis on glamour. To find that a film company was sending someone to my room to doll me up for the red carpet just made me laugh,” she says.
The film’s star, up-and-coming actor Brie Larson, took home the Oscar for Best Actress and Donoghue says it was a well-deserved accolade.
“The central performances were so wonderful. I was so happy with the film,” she says.
With The Wonder, which is published this week, Donoghue is open to another big screen adaptation.
Set in Ireland in the aftermath of the Great Famine, the compelling thriller about a nurse sent to investigate a young girl who seems to be thriving, despite not eating, unfolds in a measured but gripping way.
“When I was on the train going up to the Room set, I was writing The Wonder,” she says. “It was such a great contrast, because I was in this totally different world of mid 19th century Ireland. It was an escape from the modern and glamorous world of the film industry, but it could probably work as a film, and I would love to write it myself.”
The Wonder, Picador, $29.99
Originally published as The Wonder: Emma goes back in time for the follow-up to critically acclaimed, and controversial, Room