Twenty-seventeen kicked off with a tense four-part thriller on BBC1 in the UK, based on Louise Doughty’s best-selling psychological thriller, Apple Tree Yard. The BBC’s adaptation – co-written by Doughty and Amanda Coe – told the story of a scientist, Dr Yvonne Carmichael (Emily Watson), who seemed to have it all. When she started a torrid, illicit affair with the mysterious Mark Costley (Ben Chaplin), things went pear-shaped very quickly. The ambiguous ending seemed to be the end of the tale, but Doughty has now said that she’s working on a sequel.
Yesterday, The Sun reported that quoted Doughty, who was appearing at least year’s London Book Fair, saying that she is indeed working on a new Apple Tree Yard story.
There’s a lot more exploration to be done. What happens to a fantasist when his fantasies are revealed to be dust? This is a man who has lived by this image of himself all his life, as a lothario and someone heroic.
I reckon Costley emerges from prison a broken man, so how does he put himself back together? That would be the angle. What everyone would want to know is, does he get back with Yvonne?
The end of that first book – and the BBC adaptation – ended with flashbacks, revealing Yvonne jokingly saying to Costley that she’d like him to do some serious damage to her attacker. Costley, of course, took that to the ultimate degree and played up to the heroic personality he had built up for himself.
It was an interesting, thought-provoking ending, to an interesting, thought-provoking series. So to have a potential sequel focus on Costley is a bold, intriguing move. We wonder if that will be ripe for TV adaptation, too.
For all our reviews on Apple Tree Yard, go here
The Killing Times 
It is always a treat to have Emily Watson on our TV screens because her appearances are few and far between, so this is good news.
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