Author Bella Mackie says Americans romanticize the British upper class

As the age-old saying goes, if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. And that’s something author Bella Mackie has certainly stuck to.

Following the success of her debut novel How To Kill Your Family, she’s back with a new, in-depth dive into the lives of the super-rich.

What A Way To Go is a dark and humorous look at wealth, class and society’s fascination with human death.

Mackie, 41, says she drew her inspiration for the novel from the way “the British are obsessed with class”, rather than money.

Two of the book’s main narrators – millionaire Anthony Wistern and his wife Olivia – are in constant conflict, with Anthony’s working-class upbringing often clashing with Olivia’s upper-class roots.

“The mechanics of British society never seem to change and don’t allow people to move forward or backward,” Mackie told the BBC.

“We understand it in a strange, unspoken way that other countries don’t.”

You can easily imagine these two characters as real people.

Anthony seems like someone who could be one of the millionaire investors in Dragon’s Den, while Olivia is mentioned in the book itself as someone who regularly appears in the glossy high society magazine Tatler.

Mackie herself has spoken about her obsession with these publications growing up, and how they shaped her interest in the lives of the upper classes – or as she calls them, “ghost citizens.”

“We can never see them completely, it’s kind of a new phenomenon. There have always been super rich people who could do whatever they wanted. But there’s a new kind of 1%,” she says.

“They can get away with whatever they want because they’re not really held to the same rules or standards as everyone else.”

Mackie says, “Because we can’t see (them), I’ve tried to imagine it.”

Another central theme in the book is the true crime element, in which a local citizen journalist (detective) investigates whether the death of Anthony Wistern should be considered murder.

Mackie, who is a journalist himself and has worked for The Guardian and Vice, says this storyline was inspired through the case of Nicola Bulley.

Bulley disappeared in 2023 in a small Lancashire village, prompting social media users to turn up, suspecting she had been murdered.

A coroner later ruled that her death was an accident.

The TikTok app was one of the biggest drivers of interest in case.

“I was just stunned by what happened, the misinformation about her was just ridiculous,” Mackie said.

“People seem to have crossed boundaries that they might not have crossed before.

“Contacting someone’s family or accusing a victim of involvement – ​​without the internet you would think that this would not be acceptable,” she adds.

Mackie’s debut novel, How to Kill Your Familyis currently being adapted into an eight-part series by Netflix.

The book, which has sold more than a million copies, centers on protagonist Grace who takes revenge on her billionaire father and the wealthy relatives who rejected her.

Following the success of the film Saltburn, which portrays the British upper class in a playful, if slightly absurd, way, Mackie is curious to see how her 2021 bestseller was written for the small screen.

“The conversation (around Saltburn) was more about the class structure in the film than the plot,” she says.

“I think Americans saw that in their love of Downton Abbey. They probably thought, ‘Wow, that house is beautiful, what a great life.’

“I wonder if they fully understood the darkness of it.”

She adds that there is definitely “a romanticization of posh Brits from Americans.”

Mackie says it would be a “shame” if the film adaptation of her book were made specifically for an American audience, because “a lot of the humor is quite British.”

The writer was not involved in writing the screenplay, but says she will be “watching it for the first time with the rest of them.”

She points to Netflix series like Sex Education, which “felt British, but not completely – it felt like it could have been set anywhere.”

Although she was not involved in the screenwriting, she says she has confidence in the abilities of production company Sid Gentle Films, which was also behind the hugely successful Killing Eve.

“The writers are British and Irish, so they’ll probably try to keep it as authentic as possible.

“And I think that also works for other audiences who look at us and think what a ridiculous country we are,” she adds.