Rotorua woman awarded residency to write first novel

Claire Baylis who will spend five nights in residency at a hotel working on her first novel.

Claire Baylis' background in law and research will soon culminate in her first novel about a fictional trial in Rotorua.

Baylis is halfway through a PhD in creative writing at the International Institute of Modern Letters at Victoria University. She lives and works in Rotorua but travels to Wellington every six weeks.

As part of the PhD she must write a piece of creative writing, and complete a critical component.

A former law academic, Baylis worked on a jury research project which saw her interview jurors in Rotorua about the cases they had sat in on. That will form part of her critical component.

"That gave me a unique insight into how jurors think and make decisions."

That helped form the idea behind Baylis' first novel which she will work on as part of a five-day writers residency in Auckland.

The Lake Ōkareka resident was named second runner-up in the Surrey Hotel Writers Residency Award.

Her novel is about a fictional rape trial in Rotorua and each chapter will be written from the perspective of a different juror sitting in on the case.

"I want to represent the Rotorua community and how a jury is drawn from a whole variety of backgrounds," Baylis said.

"I've drawn on personal traits and the way people think and tackle problems."

Baylis first started thinking about writing the book when she sat in on parts of the trial relating to the abuse of Nia Glassie.

"I still think about it and find it traumatic. I have a masters in law and I still found it hard to sit through.

"That started me thinking about the jury and I realised I was really interested in how they came to a decision."

While Baylis has experienced and heard about criminal trials in her law work and through interviewing jurors, the trial she is writing about is entirely fictional, as are the characters.

Baylis' PhD should be complete by the start of 2020 but she is hoping to have a first draft of her novel complete by the end of the year.

"This residency will help with that. I will be trying to get a lot of work done in a short amount of time," she said.

"I've got 12 characters ... I feel like I'm juggling a lot of balls in the air at the same time and when I'm here [at home] it's easy to get distracted."

Baylis said being on a jury could be difficult and traumatic and the life experiences of jurors affected the way they made decisions. She hoped to portray that in her novel.

"On a jury, you've got 12 complete strangers with different backgrounds, education, life experience; they are expected to come together to make a decision."

The residency award is in its fourth year and Baylis will take up her residency between now and September.