It’s Lucretia’s birthday today. Although she’s one of the four protagonists and one of my favourite characters, she did not exist in the original draft. Ok, originally there was no novel, there was just one story, Tiredness, that I assumed would also be my last but life had other plans for me…
I created Lucretia when I decided to include a character based on me in the stories, a supporting character living in the vampire house. However, once her character was created and started to grow, Lucretia pretty much took over the novel and she’s the reason why the book is the way it is.
Because of the reason mentioned above, she’s the only one that is described in the novel in such great detail – down to the freckles. She’s got my face, we’re the same height, she’s got my qualities, both good and bad, and my restlessness. There is one major difference, however: I’m left handed but I decided to leave Lucretia right handed. And, of course, she is frozen in time and will always look like I did in my early 20s whereas I have aged.
She got her name from a song. I created my heroine first and then (unsuccessfully) tried to name her. One night, when I was working on the stories, I put music on shuffle and the first song that was played was Lucretia, My Reflection by the Sisters of Mercy. I looked no further.
As for Lucretia’s surname, Lockwood, I was inspired by Charles Dickens. He had Lady Dedlock in Bleak House, one of my favourite books, and I liked the sound of it. I wanted my heroine to also have the word ‘lock’ in her name. After some brainstorming, I picked ‘Lockwood’ because, figuratively speaking, Lucretia is trapped: locked in a world she cannot leave.
Journals of the Undead 