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Were any of the central characters based on real-life historical figures?

The events surrounding real life serial killer Andrei Chikatilo were the springboard for the novel. But the bungled criminal process, the injustices, the system itself — these were more important than any real life characters in terms of inspiration. Soviet Russia is itself a character in the book — a peculiar blend of horror and absurdity. I’ve tried to be as close as I can to that.

However, I didn’t model the character of my fictional serial killer on the real killer. I took his crimes but not his character. Andrei Chikatilo discovered that other people’s pain gave him intense pleasure. That is a very interior, private motivation: one that is essentially unfathomable, indescribable. It belongs to him and no one else. It makes sense to him and no one else. It doesn’t give a reader, or me for that matter, any way in. Therefore, there’s a risk they’d seem flat, a device, a mere monster, rather than a “real” person. It’s ironic since in some ways making the killer dull and flat might have been a more accurate description of the man. Would it have made good reading? I didn’t think it would so I’ve totally rethought his reasoning and, insane though it still is, my killer offers up a warped logic to his crimes, that allows us to get a little closer to him.

What first attracted you to a narrative set in Stalinist Russia?

The story attracted me — the idea of a criminal investigation being hampered by a social theory, the theory that this crime simply could not exist. The story and setting, in that regard, are inextricable. But I didn’t suddenly think Stalinist Russia would be a great place to set a novel and go fishing for a story. Having said that, the more research I did, the more I realised what an amazing stretch of history it was and that definitely powered me forward.

Out of all the research, what was the most illuminating or unforgettable piece of information you discovered?

Some facts do stick in your mind, not always because they’re the most shocking or the most extreme. I remember reading that Stalin ordered a census of his population, I think in 1937. When the results of census came back, stating that the population was much lower than Stalin desired it to be (because he’d murdered so many people) he had the census takers shot. It was jaw dropping: executing people because he was annoyed the population wasn’t higher which was his fault anyway. Stalin then released his own inflated figures, figures he could’ve just made up in the first place.

What works similar to your own would you recommend to the reader who wanted to find out more?

There’s a selected bibliography at the back of the novel. I haven’t come across a bad book on the period, the histories, the memoirs, diaries — they’re all incredible.

What are you working on now?

The follow up to CHILD 44!

What was your favourite childhood book?

I loved Roald Dahl — I must have read everything he wrote. And then there was Tolkein, any adventure stories really, other worlds. I also remember being addicted to a kind of fantasy fiction where you’d read a page and then be forced to make a choice: do you want to go down this tunnel, or climb the ladder. You’d be given different page numbers to turn to and different adventures would unfold depending on the choices you made. I had about forty of those books. You were supposed to follow rules: using a dice to determine if you defeated a monster or not. I’d ignore those rules and cheat my way through. I could never imagine killing myself halfway through a book and starting again. I’d be interested to know if anyone ever did. Anyway, those books must seem quaint now — usurped by computer games where you make those kinds of interactive decisions every single second.

44 Stalinist Statistics

1. In 1919 there were 21 registered concentration camps in Russia.

2. In 1920 there were 107.

3. In 1930 there were 179,000 prisoners in the GULAG system.

4. In 1953, the year of Stalin’s death, there were 2,468,524.

5. Number of those prisoners who were pregnant–6,286.

6. Total number of forced labourers in the USSR–28.7 million.

7. On 12th November 1938 number of execution warrants signed by Stalin–3,167.

8. Number of political executions between 1930 1953–786,098.

9. Number of prisoners carried by the transit GULAG ship Indigirka–1500.

10. Number of life rafts on the ship Indigirka–0.

11. Number of prisoners who died when the ship sunk–1000.

12. Number of distress messages sent by the crew–0.

13. Amount of bread given to a GULAG worker in 1940–550 grams per day.

14. Amount of coal expected to be dug per day to earn that bread ration–5.5 tonnes.

15. Amount of bread stolen in the last two quarters of 1946 from 34 camps–70,000 kilograms.

16. Specified height of a toilet bucket — a parasha—in a male prison holding cell–55 centimetres.

17. Specified height of a toilet bucket in a female prison cell–30 centimetres.

18. Number of children in a Stalinist orphanage in 1940–212.

19. Number of spoons in that same orphanage–12.

20. Number of plates in that same orphanage–20.

21. Number of homeless children 1943–45–842,144.

22. Number of those children assigned to labour colonies–52,830.

23. Number of churches in Moscow before the revolution–460.

24. Number of churches in Moscow by 1st January 1933–100.

25. Total number of writers in the Ukraine in 1935–240.

26. Number of writers who “disappeared” from the Ukraine—200.

27. Number of peasants who died during the terror-famine and dekulakization 1930–1933–14.5 million.

28. During the deportation of the kulaks in 1933 total death toll in one district in the Poltava Province–7,113.

29. Of those 7,113 that died, number of children under the age of 18–3,549.

30. Number of Soviet children estimated to have died 1932–34 due to famine and execution–3 to 4 million.

31. Number of minutes a worker needed to be late in order to suffer criminal proceedings–20.

32. Number of people queuing outside one shop in Leningrad for groceries–6000.

33. Average living space in Moscow in 1940 per capita head–4 square metres.

34. In 1938 total distance in kilometres of sewage pipes in Stalingrad–0.

35. Population of Novosibirsk in 1929–150,000.

36. Number of bathhouses for entire population of Novosibirsk–3.

37. In 1937 percentage of all men aged 30–39 married–91.

38. In 1937 percentage of all women aged 30–39 married–82.

39. Amount paid to mothers with seven or more children–2000 rubles a year.

40. Price of a pair of shoes–12 rubles.

41. In Moscow oblast number of families registered with 8 children–2,730.

42. In Moscow oblast number of families registered with 9 or 10 children–1,032.

43. In Shakhovskoi district number of children in one family–15.

44. Age at which a child could be executed–12.

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