I based psycho on Jimmy Savile, says writer Val McDermid
I based psycho on Jimmy Savile, says writer Val McDermid
VAL was deeply uneasy when she met Savile in 1977 and he inspired her character Jacko Vance who was memorably played on TV by actor John Michie.
BEST-SELLING crime writer Val McDermid has told how one of her most sinister characters was based on Savile.
The ex-journalist was deeply uneasy when she met Savile in 1977 and he later inspired her character Jacko Vance.
The TV celebrity with a secret lust for torture, murder and under-age girls first featured in the 1997 bestseller The Wire in the Blood and returned in two later books.
Vance, a former athlete, hung about hospitals and toured towns in a show called Vance’s Visits – similar to the Savile’s Travels radio show.
Val, 57, said: “People often asked me where I had got the inspiration for the character.
“They never guessed it was Savile. For a start, Jacko is handsome and charming. I assume Savile didn’t recognise himself in that description.”
Oct 29, 2012 @ 19:51:02
thought so! i’ve been wondering about this ever since the savile story came out – spooky parallels with the vance character…
Oct 30, 2012 @ 11:14:39
Amazing insight Val. I did wonder when I was reading Wire in the Blood who you had in mind. Now I know. Keep up the good work!
Nov 05, 2012 @ 16:21:04
Just read The Vanishing point – brilliant, now I’m sure I know who this is based on – a wonderful novel – but just where is the blood and gore from page 20? I had to wait till well on – chapter 50? Well done, its slightly NOT the Val I’m used to but hey! could’nt put it down – thank God for being retired!! Dorothy Kennedy Going to try the Jakko stories now, extra frisson , now knowing its the creepy Saville
Nov 23, 2020 @ 08:08:09
Absolutely loving all of the Tony Hill novels by Val Macdermid, once you start the books you can’t put them down, made lockdown a little easier with these great reads.
2023 in Books: Commendations and Disappointments | Laura Tisdall
Dec 30, 2023 @ 07:05:54
[…] A new category this year to highlight the books that were most satisfying upon rereading! The highlight here has to be Daphne du Maurier’s My Cousin Rachel, which I last read in my late teens. Picking apart both Philip and Rachel was absorbing, and the novel is so technically brilliant. I also loved rereading Tracy Chevalier’s lightning-doesn’t-strike-twice gem, Girl With A Pearl Earring, and Kate Murray-Browne’s domestic chiller The Upstairs Room. A special shout-out, too, to Val McDermid’s Tony Hill novels, which I’ve been reading in sequence for the first time over Christmas. I’ve been amazed at just how good the character development is when you actually read the books in order; novels that I thought were ‘weaker’ entries in the series, like Cross and Burn, have really come into their own, although my favourite remains the utterly terrifying The Wire In The Blood, which prefigured the unmasking of Jimmy Savile. […]