Countdown’s Susie Dent opens up on exciting new career away from C4 hit

She paints a revealing picture of her TV role... “The moment the clock starts ticking down I start to feel that adrenalin,” admits Susie. “I’ve never been bored. In a word, it’s joyful.”

Susie, 59, is talking about her role in Dictionary Corner on Channel 4’s Countdown – where she has been the resident wordsmith for more than 30 years.

The lexicographer, whose “word of the day” attracts thousands on social media, insists dictionaries bring her “drama and magic”.

So it should come as no surprise that she has turned her talents to writing. Her debut novel Guilty By Definition is set amid the spires of Oxford. Think Agatha Christie meets Countdown, with twists, turns and clues to be deciphered as the story unfolds.

And Susie says she sees plenty of parallels between being a word detective and a real detective.

She explains: “We are always looking for clues and digging for evidence – looking for the footprints that lead you to the answer.

“I’ve always loved that parallel and I thought that if I set my book in a world I love and know, then maybe it won’t be as daunting as it feels like now.

“A lot of it is autobiographical but I had to resist putting everything about myself in and making the main character Martha sufficiently different. I’m a worrier and I don’t think Martha is.

“I wonder if subconsciously I was deliberately making Martha the person I would like to be. She doesn’t anticipate the worst. I’m going to be more Martha!”

Despite writing many non-fiction books, she is fretting about how her novel will be received.

“They say write about what you know and Oxford is a city that I love,” says Susie.

“But also I wanted to disrupt the stereotype that it’s very privileged and entirely constructed of these dreamy spires. It’s so much more.

“It has its share of deprived areas and a darker underbelly as well.

“It’s not all Inspector Morse – although Colin Dexter did bring out the dark side sometimes.”

Asked why we love thrillers so much, she says: “I think it’s the idea of secrecy first and foremost, as well as the exploration of human motivations. Crime fiction also gives us the thrill of cracking a code or solving a puzzle.

“There is an unacknowledged side to all of us, things that happen below the surface, dark impulses that we don’t really talk about.

“I’ve always been fascinated too by the way we shapeshift in our language, depending on who we are with. We can change our accents and language.”

She bats away sneering views about “cosy crime” and turns to the success of fellow quizzer Richard Osman. “Richard’s brilliant, he sticks up for the genre and tries to combat the cynicism about it.”

Osman’s The Thursday Murder Club is being made into a Netflix film starring Pierce Brosnan and Dame Helen Mirren. So who would Susie cast as Martha in an ideal scenario? “Maybe Emma Stone? I can dream big!” Susie admits her love of words includes listening in on other people’s conversations: “To be a good linguist you have to be a good eavesdropper and tune into the rhythm of language.

“For as long as I can remember I have been drawn to language, whether it was tuning into other people’s conversations or trying to decipher the ingredients on condiment bottles as a child.”

Susie, who speaks German and French, reveals that Countdown was actually adapted from a French show – Des Chiffres et des Lettres, which translates as “some numbers and letters”.

“There was a professor in my role and I don’t think there was much playfulness in it. It was much more serious than ours.”

And this is certainly true of Channel 4’s irreverent spin-off “8 out of 10 Cats Does Count-down”, hosted by Jimmy Carr and also starring Rachel and Susie. In Manchester she films five episodes of regular Countdown a day, three days in a row – “in the same studio as University Challenge and The Voice”.

The show started in 1982 and she joined in 1992, encouraged by her lexicographer boss at the Oxford University Press.

She formed a team alongside host Richard Whiteley, who died in 2005, and mathematician Carol Vorderman. Carol left in 2008 and was replaced by Rachel Riley. Susie says Richard’s memory very much lives on, with today’s champions awarded the Richard Whiteley Memorial Trophy.

“Richard wore his heart and emotions on his sleeve. If he was grumpy, you could cajole him out of it. He had that unmistakable laugh. I think of him when certain words come up on Countdown.

“Leotard was his favourite – he loved the fact it’s named after Jules Léotard, a French trapeze artist. And he loved the word moonset, which is beautiful as well. I remember him quizzically saying when the word limpet came up ‘Carol, how do limpets make love?’ We just fell about laughing.”

She still hears from Carol: “She sent me a lovely text to congratulate me on the MBE, so we are still in touch – but I haven’t seen her for ages. She does message me if I post a word she particularly likes.”

Susie says she doesn’t plan her words of the day in advance on social media.

“It’s something that I’ve read or sometimes they are just because I’m feeling that way.

“I don’t put any specific reference or what the inspiration was.

“Language is so versatile people immediately assume I’m talking about something.

“Often they thought I was talking about Boris Johnson or the Australian Prime Minister. When Donald Trump returned I came across the word recrudescence – the return of something unpleasant after a time of reprieve.”

Susie is separated from teacher husband Paul Atkins and has two daughters.

She grew up in Surrey and has dedicated her book to her father Malcolm, who died last year.

She says: “Dad always encouraged me to find my own voice in my writing and even in his last months made the effort to ask how the story was going. I’m just sorry he won’t get to read it.”

● Guilty by Definition by Susie Dent (£16.99) is out on Thursday. Visit www.expressbookshop.com or call 020 3176 3832. Free UK P&P on online orders over £25.