Apple Tree Yard starts on Sunday! [MNHQ message: No spoilers please, including what happens in the book!]

[Destinysdaughter]

I really enjoyed the book so looking forward to this. It's in 4 parts with Emily Watson playing the main character and Ben Chaplin as her lover. BBC1 9pm

Good article about it here.

www.theguardian.com/film/2017/jan/14/emily-watson-apple-tree-yard-middle-aged-women-infidelity-sexuality#comments

I think Mark told his lawyer about Apple Tree after when he banged on the glass to get her attention

He seemed to do that after seeing her make eyes at her husband, his now known jealous streak showing through.

I think actual perjury has to be a bit more than a sin of omission though surely?

Maybe Noel. I did wonder about that too. She didn't actually lie. Although perhaps she lied to the police about it when she was initially questioned. Would that count as perjury though or I should perjury specifically lying in court?

All the way through we see her vulnerability but actually Mark was the vulnerable one

*is perjury

I thought she did lie - when asked if they were lovers she said no,

Dave Coaches! That's who it was! Thank you Noel!

That's what I was wondering Wading, I thought perjury was just a court thing. Although maybe we're expected to accept that she had been asked at some point unshown

Yes juju.
Also his face when her husband did the baby hand gesture.
MC looked possibly hurt? As in you never told me?
Yvonne also withheld truths.

Ahhh lottie that's the bit I missed then!

'Alright sugar tits'

Look away now if you don't want to know the book differences:

She gets a six month sentace for perjury - arrested in corridor outside court. She pleds guilty - serves three months and gets out on licence.

The file she created was deleted, she doesn't know if Guy read it before he deleted it (computer was seized).

The flat is Mark's wife's dead uncle's. We discover near the end that she whisperer to Mark in this flat (while he was semi asleep) that she wants him to kill George and smash his face in - earlier in the book we'd be told the same scene but slightly earlier (before he sleeps) he'd said 'you know what we're going to have to do' 'we're going to have to warn Craddock off', she asks how and he tells her to leave it with him.

I like Ben Chaplin but I think he was a bit miscast in this for me- he looked slightly vulnerable throughout. In a kind of suit a bit big, stacked heel, hair too long, too black kind of way. I expected him to look suave-er.

Unless that's the impression they were going for, in which case- brilliantly cast

That's what I was wondering Wading, I thought perjury was just a court thing. Although maybe we're expected to accept that she had been asked at some point unshown

Perjury is specifically lying in Court. They'd have to have had a separate trial for that charge though, as she wasn't originally charged with it at the murder trial. Pretty unlikely they'd actually mount a trial just for her lying about whether or not she'd had an affair - it tends to be reserved for deliberate lying in a 'pervert the course of justice' kind of way.

So I was thinking "not much of a thriller" until the end.

I took it that the "twist" was she did want him to kill George - but is it?

But did she ask him because he was a spook or because she knew by then he had issues/delusions?

Surely at the point in the "safe house" she was still thinking he was a spook?

How/when did she gaslight him?

The perjury was very clear cut.

She lied in the courtroom about the nature of her relationship with Mark.

Said they were just friends, denied they had a sexual relationship.

Forgive my crappy spelling please!!

I enjoyed it & don't think she really wanted George killed.

perjury is different from perverting the course of justice.

perjury is simply lying about a material piece of evidence - it's illegal because it undermines the whole premise of the legal system, that when you are under oath you tell the truth.

Perverting the course of justice can be a range of things e.g. withholding evidence; hiding someone ....

lying in court

Yeah I missed the bit where she was asked and lied, hence my confusion

Thank you for explaining Grumpy. I had somehow missed the bit where she lied about the affair in court.

Yes, I realise that, it just seemed unlikely that they would mount a separate trial for someone lying about having had an affair.

You swear to tell the truth. Then she af utter she lied.

Ahem! Admitted!!!