May 18th, 2009 by admin.
I had the pleasure of visiting Crimefest in Bristol last week. It was my first crime conference so I was a little unsure what to expect, but what I found were scores of crime fans (a number had flown in specially from the US) and crime writers (both British and foreign) with a smattering of agents, editors and critics thrown in for good measure. The event - held at the very comfortable Marriott Royal - was extremely well organised, with two writer panels running concurrently almost every hour during the day and social events scheduled for the evenings. If you’ve never been to one of these events, I highly recommend it. It’s a great opportunity to meet writers in an informal setting (ie in the bar), and the panel discussions cover crime writing in all its many guises, from gory to cosy and all points in between.
There were a few familiar faces there, and it was great for me to talk informally to other crime writers about the business of writing and to catch up with some insider gossip (very interesting - too interesting, in fact, to repeat here - sorry…). I had a discussion over dinner with Simon Kernick, Paul Johnston, Declan Hughes and Stephen Booth over the optimum length for a book, and was surprised to discover mine are shorter than many. Should I make them longer? I’m happy to hear your views! Stephen is from this neck of the woods - or at least he sets his books here in the Peak District, and in fact he’s made a murder scene out of an ancient site only half a mile from our house…
Back at the grindstone, the second draft of book four is progressing well. The paperback of ‘The Taint of Midas’ was published last week (you can’t miss it in the bookshops - its cover’s a wonderful yellow) whilst ‘The Doctor of Thessaly’ comes out early in July. I’m still waiting for the Doctor to appear on Amazon, but if you’d like to pre-order, it’s available on Waterstone’s website, and Borders. Just don’t read the blurb too closely; whoever wrote it (not me!) seems unaware that Thessaly is not an island of my imagination, but a real part of Greece, similar to an English county. Don’t go looking for the town of Morfi on the map, though - it isn’t there…
April 13th, 2009 by admin.
Time flies, doesn’t it? I can’t believe it’s Easter already, and a quarter of 2009 is in the past! On the other hand I’m feeling slightly smug (which is a very dangerous way to feel, in this business) as I’m only a gnat’s whisker away from completing the first draft of Book 4 in the series. Don’t be fooled, as I am trying to fool myself - a first draft, for me, is a very distant cousin to what the finished product will be. It’s like an artist’s outline sketch of a finished painting - the basics are there, but there’s a lot of work to put in before it’s something you’d hang on your living room wall…
Meanwhile, I’ve had my proof copy of Book 3, The Doctor of Thessaly, which is out at the beginning of July. It’s lovely to see an almost-finished, professional-looking product - but it is definitely ‘no going back’ time now, no changes, no revisions, and I always find something I wish I’d written differently. But I hope you’ll enjoy the story anyway, regardless of imperfections - its theme is Envy, which I think is one of the darkest, nastiest sins.
I was disappointed not to attend Torquay’s new crime festival in the end. My son has had suspected glandular fever, and has been very unwell indeed, though he’s on the mend now. But I shall definitely be in Bristol in May - wouldn’t miss it for the world!
I celebrated my 50th birthday last week, and really made it count, as it’s the last birthday I plan on celebrating (I think I’ll start counting backwards now). One of the highlights was lunch at a new restaurant in Bradford - Zouk’s Tearoom - absolutely brilliant and well worth the trip. If you get the chance to go, don’t miss the mango cheesecake. And we’ve been spending some time with family this holiday, which always includes plenty of physical activity, thanks to my brother-in-law. For today, he’s conceived the idea of a nine-mile hike over Mam Tor, which - if you don’t know it - is one of the Peak District’s most scenic spots. Getting to the top involves a lung-burstingly steep gradient, but the views make it all worthwhile. Well, almost…
February 18th, 2009 by admin.
Hello Reader,
I’m proud to welcome you - at last - to my new website, and to my first-ever blog. I read somewhere this week that there are already tens of millions of bloggers here on the world-wide web, which made me wonder - briefly - about doing this. But there are tens of millions of books out there too, and I suspect that, in the same way all books eventually find themselves in the hands of the right readers, bloggers too reach their perfect audiences, given time, luck and a following wind.
Heavy snow and icy roads have kept me largely housebound for a large part of this month, which is no hardship as long as there’s wood for the fire and milk for cups of tea (of which I drink a heroic number whilst working). With no distractions, I whipped through my final, final read-through of the copy-edited manuscript of The Doctor of Thessaly (due out in July). It’s gone to the printers now, so if I want to make more changes, tough. Better not to look at it again - my inner perfectionist always finds something that’s not quite right. In a few weeks the proof copies will be out, and the first reader comments will be in. I’m very pleased with the Doctor - fingers crossed that readers like it too.
I’ve been working with Bloomsbury on an ‘out and about’ schedule for the first part of this year. So far I shall be in Torquay at the beginning of April - I’m doing a crime-writing workshop - and in Bristol in May. I’m very pleased to see Michael Connelly - one of my heroes! - will be in Bristol, though I didn’t manage to swing it to get on the same author panel as him. Well, not so far… Where there’s a will, there’s often a way. Failing that, I’ll join his book-signing queue…
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