Q&A with Robert Rutherford: author of The Missing Hour
What sparked the idea for The Missing Hour?
My earlier books are all police procedural and that’s a tough market to stand out in so I wanted to pivot and do something a bit different. The Missing Hour is more of a high concept thriller with a big central theme at its core, and I wanted to explore how those big ideas can impact regular people, like my main character Maggie.
Was it tricky to write a story where one missing hour changes everything?
It was a lot of fun actually playing with the readers perception of what might have happened in that one hour. It plays off the water tight case the police say they have including DNA evidence, against Maggie‘s unshakeable belief that her husband isn’t capable of what they say, he’s done, let alone the fact that he was in bed beside her all night apart from a 60 minute window. It gave me the opportunity to tease the reader with the fact that every character, Maggie included, has secrets, and different motives for keeping them that way.
Without spoiling anything — were there any plot twists or endings you almost went with but ended up scrapping?
As far as the ending is concerned, no actually, not this time. That has happened before with other books, but with The Missing Hour, the ending is exactly what I’d planned out when I first came up with the idea. I had originally planned to kill off one of the main supporting cast though, but they were resurrected before I finished the first draft when I came up with a few other uses for them.
Can you give us a sneak peek into what you’re working on next? Another thriller in the works?
My next one is another standalone thriller. Trying to not give too much away it’s set in a world where trials are not only televised, but where we’ve switched out a jury of twelve for a public vote!
What titles are your most anticipated reads for the coming months?
I’ve just got an early copy of The Inside Man by Trevor Wood that I can’t wait to start. I’ve got King Of Ashes by SA Cosby on pre-order too - he’s that good, I’d read his shopping lists never mind his books.
The Missing Hour by Robert Rutherford: Chapter Sampler
Chapter One
They come for him in the stillness of the early hours, rubber-soled boots muted as they sink into the thick pile carpet of the hallway. No splintering door frame to announce their arrival. One swipe of key card against touch-plate grants access with a soft click. They move inside the darkened hotel room, four-strong, tasers drawn. Red dots dart across the sleeping figures like mosquitoes. Shadows retreat as their eyes adjust, helped by the shaft of light that follows them through the door.
Two peel off, moving towards the man who’s snoring up a storm. A third stays in the short corridor, blocking the exit, while the fourth pads around to the woman’s side of the bed. The other three look to him, tensing as he holds up three fingers. Two. One.
Silence explodes into noise. Hands rip back covers, grabbing wrists, wrenching them together. Snores transition into grunts. Grunts become shouts. More noises than words, trying to make sense of the half-formed shapes trussing him, dragging him up from his dreams and into a waking nightmare. He bellows like a wounded animal as the cuffs bite into his wrists. He’s huge. A bear of a man, but his size is no help as the two men by his side heave him over the edge of the mattress.
He struggles, twisting away from their grasp. One of them bears down on Grant with his full weight, forcing Grant’s head down at a rate of knots until his head catches the bedside table corner. The sound is somewhere between a thud and a crunch, cutting off his protests like he’s landed on a mute button.
The woman had woken a split second after her husband, and she twists now, struggling to sit up, but she’s pushed back against the mattress by a gloved hand. She opens her mouth to scream, a dark black oval amongst half-lit shades of grey, but the same hand clamps over her mouth.
‘Police. Stay put. Do. Not. Move. Understand?’
Her eyes dart like flies looking for a place to land, head wrenching to the side, looking for her husband. A second attempt to rise meets more resistance. Her mouth is suddenly uncovered, but only for the time it takes the arm to slide six inches lower, pinning her neck to the pillow. Her eyes widen, panic clearly visible even in the gloom.
‘Understand?’
She tries to nod, but that just makes the forearm across her windpipe roll in deeper. His spare hand goes back to her mouth now, releasing just enough pressure with his arm that she can suck hungry breaths, air whistling through his fingers on the way in. Her eyes roll so far right as to practically disappear, as she seeks out her husband. A single silent tear makes a break down her cheek as he is dragged to his knees.
The motion rouses him, and the noise he makes as he comes to is primal as his brain reboots. On instinct he slides one leg forward, pushing up. It takes the man either side of him by surprise, and for a split second she pictures Grant rising to his feet, the smaller men scattering in retreat.
But it’s a parallel universe that never snaps into existence. Instead she hears the metallic snick of a baton extending, and can only watch as one of the men swings it in a deadly arc. It connects on the side of Grant’s knee. Sounds like a jockey whipping a horse, and his leg crumples beneath him. Grant falls towards the bed, towards her, his face a mask of pain.
But the angle is all wrong. Instead of falling onto the mattress, his head whistles past the edge, continuing down to the floor. She hears rather than sees the impact. Even on the carpeted floor, the solid thunk sends a sickening shockwave to her core. This time when they lift him up, it’s as if someone has hit his off switch, head lolling forward like a puppet with strings cut.
It takes three of them to hoist the barely conscious man to his feet, and they part-walk, part-stagger under his weight back towards the door, one of them reciting his rights as they move. The fourth man waits until they’ve cleared the entrance, and have disappeared into the hallway before he removes his hands from the woman.
She stares at him as he backs away, and something in her eyes makes him wonder if she’s about to leap out of bed, go for him against all odds. Instead, she pushes up to a sitting position, hugging knees to her chest.
‘My husband,’ she says in a voice that sounds almost childlike. Soft, vulnerable. ‘Where are you taking him?’
‘Your husband is under arrest Mrs Brewer.’
‘Arrest? That’s ridiculous. Arrest for what?’
‘Murder.’
He sees the word strike home, stunning her like a sucker punch. Watches her try and process the blow he’s just dealt to her perfectly ordered world.
‘That’s ... murder? That’s ridiculous. I’m coming with you. Where are you taking him?’
‘He’ll be interviewed at Patchway, but you need to stay here Mrs Brewer,’ he tells her. ‘We’ll be in touch when you can speak to him.’
‘But—’ she starts, and he holds up a hand to cut her off.
‘Stay here,’ he repeats, edge to his words like a teacher scolding a naughty child. ‘You can speak to him when we’re done with him.’
‘Well how long will that be?’ she asks, but his back has turned before she’s finished her sentence. Her voice is heavy with hope, but he heads out, following his team without even acknowledging the question.
