I want my books to explore motives which make people think, 'Wow!

“I want my books to explore motives which make people think, ‘Wow! Imagine the psychological state you’d have to be in for that to be your motive!’ Whereas things like blackmail, jealousy—they’re rational reasons for committing murder.” Thus speaks Sophie Hannah, the novelist whose pen seeks not only to entertain, but to pierce the veils of the human heart. In these words she reveals a truth: that the greatest mysteries are not the crimes themselves, but the motives that drive men and women to them. For while blackmail and jealousy may be dark, they are familiar, easy to understand. But the most haunting stories are born from motives so strange, so twisted, that they force us to ask: what storm of the mind could bring a person to this place?

The meaning of this quote is the distinction between the ordinary darkness and the extraordinary abyss. Blackmail, revenge, and jealousy are common sins, rooted in desires we all know: power, possession, pride. They are terrible, but they are logical; they make sense to us because they mirror weaknesses we ourselves harbor. Yet Hannah seeks something deeper: motives that shock us, that break the bounds of rationality, that make us tremble at the fragility of the human psyche. These motives are not familiar—they are alien, unsettling, and force us to confront the mysteries of the mind.

The ancients, too, pondered this distinction. In the tragedies of Euripides, we find Medea, who kills her own children—not from ordinary jealousy alone, but from a consuming, almost supernatural fury against betrayal. Her act horrified the Greeks not merely because it was violent, but because the motive seemed to come from a place beyond reason. So too with Orestes, who slays his mother under the weight of divine command and inner torment. These were not crimes of logic, but of a psychological state so extreme that the audience shuddered, asking: what could bring a human being here?

History also testifies to this truth. Consider Lizzie Borden, accused of murdering her father and stepmother with an axe. While the world speculated about inheritance and resentment, the horror lay in imagining what state of mind could lead a daughter to such violence. Or think of the political assassins who killed not for gain or jealousy, but for causes so abstract that they seemed incomprehensible to ordinary men and women. The fascination of such cases lies not in the act, but in the motive—a window into the deepest, darkest chambers of the soul.

Hannah’s insight, then, is not merely about writing novels. It is about the human hunger to understand ourselves. Rational motives show us the sins of everyday life; irrational ones force us to confront the limits of empathy. To explore such motives is to ask: how far can the human mind be stretched before it breaks? Where does ordinary desire end, and madness begin? In this, Hannah’s work carries the ancient purpose of tragedy and myth: to explore not only what people do, but what hidden forces drive them into ruin.

The lesson for us is profound. We must not dismiss motives as simple, nor assume that all deeds spring from the familiar soil of greed and jealousy. Instead, we must learn to look deeper, to see that beneath the surface of every action lies a complex landscape of thought, emotion, and fracture. To understand others, we must look beyond the obvious, asking not only what they did, but why. And when the motive seems incomprehensible, we must resist the temptation to turn away; for it is often in the strangest corners of the human heart that the greatest truths about our fragility are revealed.

So let Sophie Hannah’s words guide us as both readers and human beings: “Explore motives which make people think.” Let us dare to peer into the shadowed places, not to excuse evil, but to understand the depths of the mind. For in doing so, we not only sharpen our vision of crime and story, but of humanity itself. To know the rational is wisdom; to grapple with the irrational is enlightenment. And only by facing both can we hope to truly understand the soul.