You Heard It Here Second

The Last Properly Shaved Man in Britain (not my words but those of MC Beaton), Jake Kerridge, has written a properly excellent round-up of the magic and mayhem that is the Harrogate Crime Writing Festival for Shots Mag.

Find out who won the coveted Shirt-Most-Likely-To-Be-Seen-From-Mars Award! Don't find out who won the Harrogate Quiz! Learn Jake Kerridge's biggest regret! And place bets now for the likelihood of Stav Sherez heading up a cosy crime panel...!

(The only thing missing is the story of Barry (Barrington) Forshaw's early exploits as an illustrator for my favourite girl's comics. But I expect Jake (Jake) Kerridge preferred to draw a veil.)

Otherwise, it's all here, including the various excuses dreamt up by those in the know to address thorny questions like How Crime Writer, Why Crime Writer? It's either because we're all deranged misfits living miserable existences, or we're very, very nice. Take your pick. And be glad you were given a choice.


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Someone Else's Skin : a sneak preview

UPDATE: My first reader review is now online at Rebecca Bradley's blog!

What's more thrilling than seeing proof copies of your debut novel in the delegate bags at the biggest crime festival in Europe? Seeing proof copies of your debut novel in delegate bags NEXT TO the new special edition of The Silence of the Lambs... I'm so happy I've gone a bit dizzy. As Mark Billingham said, "You and Tom Harris? Like THAT," and crossed his fingers. This time last year I was at Harrogate without a book deal, without even significant optimism about getting one. Now here I am, writing book two and seeing book one begin to take serious shape. A big shout-out to all new writers out there: Never ever ever give up.

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Forty-eight faces, Lost & Found

Two snippets of non-novel writing news. It's been yonks since I had a new story published online, but Forty-Eight Faces (inspired by researching the Szondi Test) is in the Ilanot Review.

I had a terrific evening in Chester on Tuesday, where the Cheshire Prize anthology, Lost & Found, was launched. It's a handsome little volume (I'd love the artwork as a tablecloth), packed with great stories from the likes of Barbara Corfield and Rich Lakin. I read my story, Udumbara in Lytham St Anne's, almost without a hitch; seem to be getting better at this reading in public lark. The Cheshire Prize team not only run an exemplary contest with a huge prize (two thousand smackers) but they have resisted the temptation to charge an entry fee, which is pretty damn amazing in this day and age. Do enter their 2013 contest, for poetry. They have Roger McGough reading at the prize ceremony in November.

ETA: And a snippet of novel news: I'm very excited that Someone Else's Skin will be published in Swedish by Minotaur and in Norwegian by Cappelen Damm.

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Penguin USA to publish Someone Else's Skin and Long Gone

My happy news of the week is that Penguin have bought the US rights to my first two crime novels. My sister put it like this, "Penguin! Remember all those Penguin Classics on the bookcase when we shared a room, growing up? And now you're going to be one of them!" Well, not quite, but I know what she's means and I'm just as excited. My editor, Emily Murdock Baker, is Sophie Hannah's editor in New York, and she recently co-edited the Pulitzer Prize winning, Malcolm X: A Life of Reinvention. Between Penguin in the States and Headline in the UK, I feel very lucky to be in safe hands for this big adventure.

It occurs to me that I've said very little about the two books themselves, so I'm linking (below) to my agent's website which has a synopsis for each book:

Someone Else's Skin

No two victims are alike

DI Marnie Rome knows this better than most. Five years ago, her family home was a shocking and bloody crimescene. Now, she's tackling a case of domestic violence, and a different brand of victim. Hope Proctor stabbed her husband in desperate self-defence. A crowd of witnesses saw it happen. But as the violence spirals, engulfing the residents of the women's shelter, Marnie finds herself drawn into familiar territory. A place where the past casts long shadows and she must tread carefully to survive.

Long Gone

Being the perfect family has become a deadly pastime

 

DI Marnie Rome knows the sinister secrets that families can hide. She’s still trying to uncover the truth of what drove her foster brother to murder her parents five years ago, and he’s equally determined to keep her in the dark. But this new case surprises even her. Surely the corpses of two small boys, lying under concrete in a London garden, should be claimed by someone – grieved by someone?

In other news, I'll be at CrimeFest in Bristol from Thursday 30 May to Sunday 2 June. I'm looking forward to meeting up with fellow crime writers. Then I'm off to Crime in the Court in London on Thursday 4 July, which will be my first time at this infamous gathering hosted by Goldsboro Books in Cecil Court - an old haunt of mine from when I lived in Westminster. Finally, I'm returning to Harrogate for a second year of the marvellous mayhem that is the Theakstons old Peculier Crime Writing Festival, from 18 to 21 July (that's my brilliant agent, Jane Gregory, on the left of the group photo). My last year as an unpublished crime writer, so I must make the most of the anonymity...!

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What Lies Within by Tom Vowler

My review of Tom Vowler's debut novel, What Lies Within, is up at Eurocrime today. It's a great debut and I look forward to reading what Tom writes next.

The choice of a haunting backdrop for the story - deep into Dartmoor - is a perfect fit for Vowler's prose which is rich in places with the lilt of mythology, but pared down when the plot demands it. His choice of subject matter brings its own discipline.

I'm not sure exactly how many crime novels I've reviewed since I began, but this will be my last for a while.

My debut novel, Someone Else's Skin, will be published by Headline in February 2014 and it seems sensible to step back from reviewing for a variety of reasons. Do I think I will review differently when I'm a published author? No, but I think readers might expect me to. And, quite reasonably, the editors of the sites where my reviews appear want to avoid any conflict of interest, perceived or otherwise.

I'm very happy that my last three reviews were all of such stonkingly good books. Poppet by Mo Hayder, and The Ghost Riders of Ordebec by the marvellous Fred Vargas being the other two.

Jack Caffery has grown up quite a bit since BIRDMAN... Flea Marley is a fantastic character, as damaged in her way as Caffery, and the dance performed by the pair as they step around the untold truths of earlier stories is painful and poignant to watch.

You care, deeply, for Adamsberg and Danglard and their team. You care for poor besieged Léone and her sugar-hungry hound, Fleg, and for the crazy Vendermots... Damn it, you even care for the crippled pigeon that sleeps (and craps) in Adamsberg's shoe.




It's been great fun, I feel I've learned stacks from both reading and analysing these novels. I wholeheartedly recommend reviewing as an excellent pastime for any aspiring write. Lastly, I hope to continue reviewing short stories for the wonderful website, The Short Review, although possibly not crime anthologies. Luckily, there are so many brilliant short stories being written that I'm spoiled for choice.

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The Ghost Riders of Ordebec by Fred Vargas

My review is now live over at Eurocrime. I loved this book to bits. 2013 is turning into one of the best years in recent memory for great crime novels. Belinda Bauer's Rubbernecker is a superb book by any standards. Poppet by Mo Hayder is an instant classic: gothic, terrifying and with a depth of compassion that makes it easily the best book she's ever written. Vargas, too, has surpassed herself with this new Adamsberg novel.

Vargas breaks every rule ... You can't empathise with these characters; they're simply too strange. You don't recognise yourself or loved ones, or anyone, in these pages. Vargas doesn't manipulate your emotions in any conventional way, shape or form. She simply writes astoundingly differently. She dares to write this way, jumping from character to character across the page like one of the fleas in that filthy pigeon, inviting you to keep pace with her unruliness, her droll voice, her poetry. And it is anarchy on her part. Joyful, disturbing anarchy. Because who else is daring to break these rules, and doing it with such panache?

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Vanessa Gebbie interviews me about itchy wrists and never giving up

I was lucky enough to travel to Bantry in 2008 with Vanessa Gebbie, a supremely talented writer who also happens to be one of the most supportive and generous people I've ever met. She predicted my publishing deal long, long before I believed it would happen - and was one of the first to celebrate when my good news broke a couple of weeks back. She invited me over to her blog for a natter about how it felt to stick out the dry years of rejection, and how it feels now, to have reached where I wanted to be for so long. Vanessa always asks the most intriguing questions, and I enjoyed our chat very much. Do pop along for a read.

I know that what you’re writing Right Now might feel like the best thing you’ve ever written, and so it should. I know you’ll feel proud and protective of your story and especially your characters, and that’s okay. It’s allowed. What’s not allowed is letting that pride and protectiveness stop you in your tracks.

Vanessa's novel, The Coward's Tale, was published by Bloomsbury to critical reviews in 2011. A.N. Wilson picked it as one of his Books of the Year.

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