Broadchurch finale: Erin Kelly's short stories will help with any withdrawal symptoms

Series 2 of ITV's hit series concluded earlier this week

Do you miss Broadchurch already? Are you pining for Hardy, Miller and that vicar who looked sinister, but wasn’t? (Or was he?).

Then Erin Kelly’s Broadchurch short stories are for you. Kelly, a thriller writer best known for The Poison Tree, won the contract to write the novel of the first series, which was published in August last year.

For the second series, in keeping with the growing hype, she was asked to write a series of mini e-books. They were released at midnight on Mondays for the eight weeks that the show was on television.

“There’s more to it than just taking the script and putting in ‘says Miller’ or ‘says Hardy’”, Kelly explains. Each of the eight short stories is dedicated to a different character – starting with Miller, and ending with Hardy – and fleshes out their back story and inner thoughts. “They fill in the gaps between series one and series two. There are so many unanswered questions about Claire, for example,” says Kelly.

“It’s a show about the individual characters, as much as plot.” She worked closely with series creator Chris Chibnall, who checked her tales for potential spoilers. Kelly was given the script for series two last September – “You won’t believe the contract I had to sign” – and finished the last story a few weeks ago.

“The script was watermarked and I couldn’t even talk about it over email. I had to wait a long time for the eighth episode. I didn’t know whodunnit, which is remarkable for someone who writes psychological thrillers for a living.” Will she be back for the third series?

“Oh god, I can’t say anything about that. But I could do this for ever.”