SUZANNE DO ON THE GOLDEN SISTER: TWINS, MYSTERY AND UNEXPECTED FRIENDSHIPS
By Nicole Fuge
Family ties, identity, and the friendships we least expect sit at the heart of Suzanne Do’s debut novel The Golden Sister. In this conversation, she opens up about the moments, memories and mysteries that inspired her story.
Could you tell us the plot of The Golden Sister in one sentence?
A homeless man is the only person who can help Lili Berry solve the mystery of her twin sister’s death, and Lili is the only person willing to help that man find his long-lost son.
Your main character, Lili, is an identical twin. Was there a specific thinking behind making Lily and Honey twins, rather than just sisters?
Twins are probably the closest and most intense form of sibling relationship, so I think that heightens the drama of the story. I don’t have a twin myself so I don’t have that lived experience to draw from, but my family does have some history of twins.
When my mum was in her 30s she had an operation for abdominal pain. The cyst, which was removed from her ovary, turned out to have a bit of tooth and some hair on it! The doctor suspected it was actually my mum’s twin. The embryo hadn’t developed, but had become attached to the other embryo, which grew into my mum. It was an alternative reality moment for me (I’m sure it must have been for Mum too!) What if my mum had been a twin? Would it be like having 2 mothers? Would it mean I had a back-up mother if something happened to my own? These were questions that pre-occupied me at the age of 11! In more recent years, my brother and his wife had fraternal twins, a girl and a boy. I’m not sure if it’s linked, but it seems like we have twins in our genes.
How did the initial inspiration for The Golden Sister come about? Was there a specific moment that sparked the ideas in the story?
I started writing The Golden Sister about three years ago, but the seed of the idea was planted a long time ago when I used to walk through the tunnel at Sydney’s Central Station on my way to uni. I’d pass by many people – buskers, homeless people, artists – and I remember one particular old guy, who had a sign that read, ‘George (X) searching for Michael (X)’. I noticed George and his sign a few times and I always wondered who he was searching for: His son? His father? His brother? I never stopped to ask the question, so I don’t know the answer, but the sign lodged in my memory. A mystery. It re-emerged years later and became the foundation of Pete’s story in The Golden Sister. So, Pete came first. Along with his missing son. Then I asked myself: Who would help Pete find his missing son? Someone with a vested interest, who was equally desperate. Lili.
The relationship between Lili and a local unhoused man, Pete, is a very special element of the book. Do you have your own personal experience with an ‘unexpected friendship’ like Lili and Pete’s?
I’ve had lots of ‘unexpected friendships’ in my imagination, but they mostly haven’t come to fruition in real life! Like George in the Central Station tunnel.. I still wonder what might have happened if I’d stopped and asked George who he was searching for. We may not have become friends, but he might have shared his story with me. I’m quite an introverted person so I find it hard to initiate connections with people in unexpected situations, but I do spend a lot of time observing people, wondering about their lives and imagining what it might be like to know them.
Lili’s mum Maz is quite a character. As a mum of four yourself, where did you draw inspiration for her – particularly her non-maternal, somewhat difficult-to-understand version of motherhood?
Maz is completely different from my own mother, but I recognise some elements of Maz’s personality in other people I know. She is not based on anyone in particular, but a writer of fiction is always borrowing from life. Characters need to feel real in order for readers to relax and trust them. Maz is not a particularly sympathetic character – she’s self-centred and irresponsible – but she can also be lots of fun. Don’t we all know someone like that in our lives? Someone who doesn’t have many redeeming virtues, but we put up with them because they’re fun! Maz is like a little kid in a middle-aged woman’s body.
Like so many Australians, Lili and Honey are biracial, with an Aussie mum and Vietnamese dad. Was this element of their characters intentional, or more of a secondary / background aspect?
Well, I’m a white woman, but my husband is Vietnamese and my children are mixed race, so cultural identity is something I’ve thought about a lot. My children have a very present, involved father and extended Vietnamese family, so their being Vietnamese is part of their daily lives.
With The Golden Sister, I was interested in exploring a different version of cultural identity, that is, where it’s an aside rather than the central focus. Being half-Vietnamese, Lili obviously looks different to her mother and her racial difference is always present, but it’s not front and centre for her. It’s kind of foggy. Lili has so much else going on, for example - the big gaping hole of her absent father. The fact that her father is Vietnamese is just another layer of confusion for her. It’s adjacent to the central fact of his absence.
People have compared The Golden Sister to the work of Marian Keyes and Craig Silvey. Is there an author you admire that you’d love to read The Golden Sister?
I adore Donna Tartt. I adore her books and I adore her. I kind of secretly want to be her. She is the exact opposite of me in every respect: a petite, chic, suit-wearing, unmarried, childless, reclusive literary genius with a perfect black bob (I love her hair). When I started writing The Golden Sister, I was hoping I was going to write the next The Secret History, Donna’s extraordinarily erudite literary crime novel. Fortunately, I completely failed at this aim (otherwise, if Donna Tartt did one day read The Golden Sister, she would think I was a hopeless copycat!)
Where’s your favourite place to snuggle down with a good book? And, what’s on your TBR pile at the moment?
There are six members of my family, all of us readers, so there are thousands of books in my house, on shelves, on tables, on the floor... Wherever you can sit down, there is a pile of books nearby. We have a very comfy blue lounge which I love snuggling on with a book and a dog or two. Often a child or two is squished on there as well. And I love reading in bed before going to sleep.
Currently on my TBR pile is The Name of the Sister by Gail Jones, Always Home Always Homesick by Hannah Kent, The Emperor of Gladness by Ocean Vuong… so many other books too! I’ve just finished Rapture by Emily Maguire and Hunger by Choi Jin-Young, both of which were absolutely brilliant.
What’s your favourite reading memory?
This is more of a family myth than a memory, but my Mum assures me it’s true. When I was two my parents had another baby, so Mum was very busy with my newborn brother. Mum would plonk me in my cot with a big pile of children’s books and, apparently, I would sit there for over an hour, reading the books. My parents couldn’t believe it! How many 2 year olds read quietly by themselves for hours on end? Mum and Dad thought maybe they had a child genius on their hands, but then one day Dad noticed I was holding the book upside-down! No genius (sadly), but definitely a book enthusiast from an early age.
What's up next for Suzanne Do?
I’m currently getting started on my second novel, which is exciting but terrifying. I’m trying to remember my process from the first book. It currently involves lots of praying to the writing gods and lots of cups of tea!
The Golden Sister by Suzanne Do (RRP $34.99) is out now, published by Pan Macmillan Australia.
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