Rebecca Reid's "The Truth Hurts"

Rebecca Reid is a freelance journalist and author of the novel Perfect Liars.

 Here she dreamcasts an adaptation of her new novel, The Truth Hurts:

The Truth Hurts is the story of Poppy - a lost young woman who gets fired while working as a nanny in Ibiza, and Drew - an attractive and wealthy older man who falls for her on the spot. They get married in a whirlwind romance and move back to Drew's English mansion. But of course, if something seems too good to be true, it almost certainly is. Once they get back to the UK, secrets start to surface.

Excitingly enough, The Truth Hurts has actually been optioned. So when I play the dream casting game (which I have been doing on repeat since I first started writing it!) it's not entirely a fantasy. Of course, if it does make it to the screen in real life, then I'll defer to the wisdom of the producers and just be beyond blown-away that something I wrote in my tiny one-bed flat in London could become something so huge. But in the meantime, I love indulging in a game of fantasy casting.

Usually when I start writing, I 'shop' for my characters on the graduation headshot section of the websites for various drama schools. But when I was writing The Truth Hurts I had a picture of Florence Pugh on my desk. This was before she was so famous. I saw her in a little indie film about a fainting epidemic, and thought she was the most astonishing actor I'd ever seen. So she's still who I picture for Poppy. That said, my husband is absolutely insistent that it should be Sophie Turner. All of my picks so far have been British, but I'm very relaxed about the fact that if it does get made, it will probably be set in the US.

My Drew was always Tom Hiddleston. He's got this incredible charm and kindness to him, which I think you need in order to portray an older man who marries a younger woman that quickly. I would hate for Drew to read as creepy.

Gina, Poppy's best friend, was always written to be Nathalie Emmanuel, who played Missandei in Game of Thrones.

My fantasy casting hasn't ever extended into directing before, but I think in a dream world I would love it to be Jane Campion, because every frame she shoots is a painting, or Paul Feig, because I thought that A Simple Favour was the best (and most underrated movie) I've seen in years. Or if we're in the real realms of fantasy, me!

Follow Rebecca Reid on Twitter.

Q&A with Rebecca Reid.

The Page 69 Test: The Truth Hurts.

--Marshal Zeringue