The Intel: Chris Lloyd

I’m guessing you didn’t just turn up here by mistake. Nobody comes this way, along that rickety bridge, down into the gaping ravine and then through those caves. Nobody in their right mind would make that journey, not with all the stories about what lives in the woods, not unless they’re really interested in new crime authors and new crime books. Or unless they’re deluded.

But, look, now you’re here, don’t feel bad about it. We’ve got a real treat for you. Chris Lloyd is the author of the new thriller City Of Good Death. It’s the first of a new series about Catalonian detective Elisenda Domènech. who must battle sceptical colleagues and bureaucratic stonewalling to catch a killer who is prowling the myth-soaked streets of Girona.

Author Chris Lloyd lived in Catalonia for over twenty years. Now back in South Wales, he works as a Catalan and Spanish translator. A generous and fascinating interviewee, Chris gives us the intel on Elisenda, Catalonia’s turbulent past, and how, as a writer, you have to make friends with the delete button.

Tell us about Elisenda Domènech…

That’s a tough question as I’m still learning about her. Initially, she’s very straightforward and down-to-earth, but the things that have happened to her have made her tremendously complex. At first glance, she’s a middle-class, well-educated Catalan woman who loves her family, is loyal to the people she cares for, has a huge respect for her culture and traditions and longed to return to her native Girona after years in Barcelona. But when I dig deeper, I see that even with all of that, she’s rebelled in her own way against other people’s expectations of her. She was expected to have a glittering career as a lawyer, but chose instead to go against everyone’s wishes for her by joining the newly-formed Catalan police, one of the first women to enlist, at a time when most middle-class, well-educated Catalan women still had to be convinced it was the career for them. She’s irreverent and sharp-witted, a hater of hierarchy and ceremony, but so much of her nature, her innate sense of fun and enjoyment of life, is hidden under layers of grief and guilt at the death of her daughter.

How did you get the idea for City Of Good Death?

Really, it was a series of moments that found their way to each other. I was researching in the municipal archives in Girona when I came across the history of the Virgin of Good Death, a statue over one of the old gateways into the city. In medieval times, she was there to bless convicted criminals as they were led out of the city to be executed. The statue was not far from the archive, so I went straight outside to look at her and I was immediately enchanted. I couldn’t help wondering what she had witnessed over the years. The same week, in the same archive, I also discovered dozens of legends about the city I’d never heard before. One was about a face carved into a wall, which I found, and showed to a friend, someone from Girona, who’d never seen it. Those two finds pretty much sowed the seed of the idea of how easy it is to forget the stories of our own culture, and of how someone might act in an extreme way in the face of that.

All of this happened at the same time that policing was being devolved to Catalonia. Essentially, a new police force was being put in place. They knew how they wanted the police to be and were working hard at breaking with the past, but they were still finding it difficult to change history and the perceptions of their role. And they were having to learn as they went along, handling change the best they could. It just seemed the perfect counterpoint to the whole idea of change versus tradition and the rights and wrongs of them both.

You lived in Catalonia for twenty years – why is it such a good place to set a crime series?

There should be an easy answer to that, but it’s so hard to pin down. And that’s probably why it is so perfect as a setting. I think it boils down to contradictions. Once in Girona, I saw two cars parked side-by-side being loaded, one with skis and the other with an inflatable boat. The first was two hours from the Pyrenees, the second was half an hour from the beach. For me, it sums up a variety – or a contradiction – that I think you’d be hard pushed to find in many places in the world. Catalonia’s had a turbulent past, it’s known wealth and poverty, supremacy and oppression, and that breadth of experience and history distils into a character and a mood that’s so abundant in stories and that can switch from one extreme to another. On a purely practical level, it also means I can base one story in a beautiful and bustling medieval/modern city, with all the contradictions inherent in that, and the next on an isolated winter headland overlooking the Mediterranean.

What kind of crime fiction and authors are really popular in Spain?

It’s changed greatly over the years. Spain never really had a tradition of police procedural novels, or heroes, and that’s largely because of the way policing was seen for so long. Throughout the Franco era and for some time after, the police weren’t perceived to be there to solve crime or protect the public, but as a force for control and punishment. And I think that was reflected in what readers chose for their crime fiction. People wanted escapism. So, when I first went to live in Spain, there was a taste for cosy crime stories, a real escape from reality. Agatha Christie was hugely popular, as were the more traditional or established British crime writers, such as GK Chesterton and Conan Doyle. Probably more so than the American writers, although the greats like Chandler and Hammett were popular. Home-grown writers were few and far between, and for years Manuel Vázquez Montalbán, with his very politicised private detective Pepe Carvalho, writing against a backdrop of post-Franco changes in Barcelona and beyond, was very much a lone voice. And a sign of what was to come, I think.

But as the country’s changed, so have tastes. Spanish society and the roles in it have shifted. As the country prospered and became more confident, so readers were more open to trying new writers and new sub-genres within crime fiction. Things shifted from the cosy to the socially critical. From the tea-and-deduction type of fiction to the more hard-boiled and realistic, with modern British and American writers, along with the Nordic authors and new generations of Spanish writers. And this has deepened since the financial crisis. Now, instead of books that escape reality, we’re seeing a taste for fiction that uses it as the setting. Interestingly, we’re at the point where we’re seeing a lot of home-grown police procedural crime fiction. On the one hand, cops are steadily becoming more acceptable as heroes, and on the other, readers in Spain want stories that reflect the reality of their own country, more so at a time when there are so many problems. Crime fiction is a way of trying to understand what’s going on in tough times.

What’s the hardest lesson you ever had to learn about writing?

Patience. With yourself and with the process. First of all, you have to be patient with yourself: it was a shock to realise that I was never going to write a 90,000 word novel in one sitting! I’ve had to learn how to break the story down and concentrate on the bit I’m working on, then move on to the next bit and then the next bit, and keep going until I have a first draft. And you have to be patient with yourself when you have those moments where you write 2,000 words one day and delete the lot the next. You also have to learn patience with the whole process, over which you have no control. Once you send out your work, you simply have to get on with a new story. Don’t sit around waiting because everything takes a lot longer than you think it will, and you can drive yourself up the wall trying to second-guess what’s happening to your manuscript.

Who are the authors you admire, and why?

For crime, I’m a great fan of the Nordic writers, especially Mons Kallentoft and Arnaldur Indridason. I love their sense of place and how that forms the character. The same holds true for my other favourites, Stuart MacBride, Val McDermid, Ian Rankin, Philip Kerr, David Downing. They all have an extraordinary ability to create a powerful protagonist and a world that’s unique to them. I also admire writers who can break down the conventions of crime, like Malcolm Pryce with his amazing stories set in an alternative Aberystwyth, and Christopher Brookmyre, who is constantly surprising.

For non-crime, I love the exquisitely layered stories of Jonathan Coe and Robertson Davies, the intense atmosphere of Milan Kundera and Michel Faber, and the off-the-wall world of Hunter S Thompson and Tom Robbins.

Give me some advice about writing…

You have to learn to kill your babies. And to save them. That beautifully-crafted piece of prose simply might not work in your story or a character you love writing might just be getting in the way, so you have to make friends with the delete button. But before that, learn to use the paste button. I save everything I cut in files in an offcuts folder and check back from time to time in case something there gives me an idea for later on. One of the characters in City of Good Death was a development of one I cut from an earlier draft but saved in the offcuts folder. A snippet of dialogue helped form the basis of another completely different scene.

What’s next for Elisenda and her team?

They’re still reeling after the events of City of Good Death and still fighting for the survival of the unit, so Elisenda is doubly annoyed at being given a cold case, which she sees as a forerunner to their being closed down. But the case, a thirty-year-old murder that echoes an ancient Iberian form of ritual execution, proves to have repercussions today. It throws up a trade in illicit antiquities, while also revealing a past practice under Franco of destroying archaeological sites if they didn’t fit in with the official history, or simply because of economic expediency in the hotel building boom of the early tourist industry. The people who benefited from that want to protect the secrets of the past.

***

City Of Good Death, published by Canelo, is available as an ebook from places like this.

The Intel: Tom Callaghan

Earlier in the week we walked the charming streets of Bishkek in Tom Callaghan’s excellent debut, A Killing Winter, which features the debut of Inspector Akyl Borubaev. Callaghan’s brutal post-Soviet noir is brutal and muscular and funny. In a corrupt state full of bad eggs, Borubaev is as hardboiled as they come.

We promised you Tom Callaghan would give you the intel on Borubaev, Kyrgyzstan and his writing, and here at Crime Thriller Fella, we deliver. Born in the North of England, Callaghan is quite the gadabout. An inveterate traveller, he divides his time between London, Prague, Dubai and Bishkek. Me, I get a nose-bleed crossing postcodes.

Tell us about Akyl Borubaev.

Inspector Akyl Borubaev of the Bishkek Murder Squad in Kyrgyzstan is tough, honest and dedicated. Having recently lost his wife to breast cancer, he is in mourning, unsure that he does any good, caught in a deep depression. But the murders continue, and he has to solve them.

Where did you get the inspiration for A Winter Killing?

I’ve always loved crime fiction, hard-boiled noir for preference, and so that was always going to be the kind of book I’d write. But who needs another crime book set in NYC, or LA, or Miami? Kyrgyzstan is an unknown place, with a lot of problems – what more could a crime writer ask for? As for the plot; (whispers) I made it up.

In the novel, Kyrgyzstan is a state engulfed by gangsters, corruption and sleaze – what do you think the good citizens of Bishkek would make of it?

After two revolutions in ten years, it’s clear that the Kyrgyz will put up with a lot as long as there is food on the table, but when corruption becomes too overt, they act.

What’s your own relationship with the country?

I was married to a Kyrgyz woman, I have a Kyrgyz son, and a home in Bishkek. It’s a country I love, for its beauty, for its culture, for its people. It’s a unique place, in an increasingly homogenised world.

It’s a very timely novel, what with many of the post-Soviet satellite countries afraid that Russia is flexing its muscles again. What do you think the future holds for Kyrgyzstan?

Now that the US air base at Manas has closed, following troop withdrawals from Afghanistan, and with Kyrgyzstan signing trade agreements with Russia over import and export tariffs, people are worried about a decline in living standards. Only time will tell. But I don’t see Putin moving eastwards.

How did the spellchecker on your computer cope with some of the more challenging, consonant-heavy names?

I ignore it: I know how to spell, to parse a sentence and the rules of grammar. Orwell’s rules are ones I live by.

What’s the hardest lesson you ever had to learn about writing?

Laundry and doing dishes always seems more important when you stare at a blank screen.

How do you deal with feedback?

As a professional writer, I have no problems with other people reading what I’ve written. I like to think I’m reasonable and open-minded to fair comment. At the same time, I’ll defend my work if I think I’m right. If I can improve my work through someone else’s suggestions, I will.

Who are the authors you admire, and why?

The Classics: Raymond Chandler, Dashiell Hammett, Jim Thompson. Murder taken out of the drawing room and put down a dark alleyway, where it belongs.

The Hard-Boiled Americans: Lawrence Block, James Lee Burke, Robert Campbell, Michael Connolly, Robert Crais, James Ellroy, Carl Hiassen, Joe R. Lansdale, Elmore Leonard, Ed McBain, George Pelecanos, Peter Spiegelman, Andrew Vachss. Crisp dialogue, more twists and turns than an electric eel, great locations.

The Bold Brits: Mark Billingham, John Connolly (alright, Irish, but I had to list him somewhere), John Harvey, Mo Hayder, Simon Kernick, Val Mcdermid, Ian Rankin, Peter Robinson. Murder doesn’t just happen in the USA, you know.

Foreign Settings: John Burdett (Thailand), Sebastian Fitzek (Germany), Stieg Larrson and Henning Mankell (Sweden), Jo Nesbo (Norway), Mike Nichol (S Africa). Because murder happens to non-English speakers as well.

What’s next for you?

The sequel, A Spring Betrayal, is with my agent and publisher, both of whom are very encouraging, and I’m plotting the third book now. Both of them feature Akyl Borubaev. A Killing Winter is already out in German, UK paperback and US publication is in the autumn, and Spanish and Portuguese editions follow next year.

Give me some advice about writing…

Don’t talk about it  –  nothing diminishes the desire to write as quickly as having told everybody the story. Read a lot. I mean a LOT. Read every day. Write every day. Ask for criticism, not praise; that’s what mirrors are for.

Follow Kingsley Amis’ advice: apply the seat of your trousers to the seat of your chair. Learn to spell and use grammar correctly; if you can’t make yourself clearly understood, how is your reader going to cope? Love one genre, but explore others; everything is an ingredient, to use or not, as you see fit.

Try not to be afraid of the blank page/screen, but don’t be over-confident either.

The Intel: Hemmie Martin

Hemmie Martin spent has been a Community Nurse for people with learning disabilities, a Family Planning Nurse, and a Forensic Nurse working with young offenders — she’s now a novelist with four books under her belt.

The latest, Rightful Owner, was published this month by Winter Goose Publishing — just in time for Christmas! It’s the second in her crime series featuring her copper protags DI Eva Wednesday and DS Jacob Lennox, and features a murder at an exclusive swingers club!

Hemmie gives us The Intel about mind maps, mango chunks, getting caught slap-bang in the middle of a prison lockdown — and, of course, her writing process!

Tell us about Rightful Owner…

Rightful Owner is the second novel in the DI Wednesday series. The crime takes place in a swinger’s club, when one of the members is found dead. The victim’s rather an enigma to most of the group, so Wednesday and Lennox need to work hard to discover clues and a motive. Wednesday’s personal life continues to be embroiled with her mother’s mental health issues, and Lennox’s personal life takes a nose dive, thanks to his teenage son.

The book is set among an exclusive swinger’s club – how does one go about researching such a setting?!

Wouldn’t it be exciting if the answer was I joined such a club with my husband, and used every experience in my novel? Alas (or perhaps not), neither myself nor my husband have been members of such a club. However, I’ve always had a fascination for the sexual underworld, and over the years have watched any programme exploring scenes such as S&M clubs in America, to dogging in Epping Forest. I don’t want to mock the individuals, but try and understand that world from their point of view, this way, I hope I can write about realistic characters with different backgrounds.

How would you describe your protagonists, DI Eva Wednesday and DS Jacob Lennox?

Eva Wednesday is thirty-seven, and lives in a three bedroom detached Georgian property on the outskirts of Cambridge. She leans towards being passive aggressive, and can appear aloof to colleagues, but only because she likes to keep her personal life private, for good reasons. She is fragile and sensitive, but tries to keeps those traits well hidden. Eva’s method of working is organic, and being aware of her gut feelings, whereas Jacob Lennox works in a regimented and meticulous manner; their partnership works well.

Jacob is thirty-nine, and lives in a bedsit following his divorce. He is handsome, and knows it. He’s a natural flirt around the station, causing fluttering hearts amongst the officers. However, his self-assurance can come across as being arrogant. His personal life is in tatters, and the path is teenage son causes him embarrassment. Jacob is hedonistic, which sometimes jars with those around him.

How do you go about researching your DI Wednesday novels?

I worked as a forensic nurse in a Youth Offending Team. My experiences of visiting prisons, police cells and courts, add some (I hope) realism to my novels. I remember vividly the pressure of the job, the claustrophobic feeling of the cells, and the general malaise clinging to the atmosphere in the prisons. I was visiting an offender once, when the prison alarm rang. A fight had broken out, and lock-down was being enforced. Although I was completely safe, adrenaline riddled by body. I also remember taking a group of male adolescents to a male adult prison, with the idea of dissuading them from a life of crime. Walking within the grounds, men were hurling obscenities at myself and my female colleague, which was an uncomfortable experience.

I now liaise with a DI in the major crime unit in the Metropolitan force, who answers my questions with regards to procedures and crime. I reserve the right to use artistic licence, however, as sometimes the police procedure is too long and complex for the purpose of the story.

I am due to attend jury service in the near future, which I hope will add another dimension to my writing.

I have a plethora of books on policing, forensics, poisoning, true crime, and criminal psychology, to name but a few.

Take us through a typical writing day for you…

I’m afraid that to aid my concentration when writing, I drink coffee, eat mango chunks, and chewy sweets (Drumstick Squashies, to be precise for those who are curious to know). I like to write in my chair in the lounge if the house is quiet enough, otherwise I sit on my bed and spread my mind-map across the top of it. I sometimes listen to music, depending on the scenes I’m writing. I like to listen to classical music which I find less distracting, but if I’m writing aggressive scenes, I enjoy bands such as Green Day or Guns ‘N Roses.

I work three days a week, then divide the rest of my time between writing, running a family household, and going to watch bands in local pubs. I write better in the afternoons, after I’ve completed my chores; I hate to write amongst clutter.

What’s the hardest lesson you ever had to learn about writing?

That I’m never satisfied with my writing. I edit at least four or five times prior to sending it to my Editor at Winter Goose Publishing. We then do a couple of edits together, but even as I do the last read-through, I constantly see sentences and words I wish to refine and change, but my Editor stands firm! After my first novel, The Divine Pumpkin, was published, I opened the paperback and glanced at a random chapter. Straight away I saw a sentence that displeased me, so I’ve never opened any of my published novels since, although a copy of each are on a bookshelf.

How do you deal with feedback?

I do read reviews, as any feedback which could help me improve my writing or stories, is most welcome. I always ‘like’ the review on the site, whether that be Amazon or Goodreads. Once, on the latter, a woman gave me three stars for Attic of the Mind, the book she won via a giveaway. After ‘liking’ her review, she moved the rating down to two stars. I wasn’t sure whether she was wanting to engage me in a debate about her thoughts, but I would never comment on a review, even if I’m intrigued by it, as reading a book is an individual experience, and it wouldn’t be professional for me to engage negatively with a reader.

Who are the authors you admire, and why?

The first authors who grabbed my attention as a teenager were Anita Brookner and Vera Brittain. The latter wrote Testament Of Youth, and living near Buxton, where Brittain once lived, the book shaped my adolescence in part. Although it was an autobiography of a young woman facing war, I related to her. Brookner wrote wonderful fiction focusing on people and relationships, something I enjoy writing about myself, perhaps influenced by Brookner.

I, of course, enjoy reading crime fiction. I’m fond of Agatha Christie, P.D. James and Ian Rankin, as they all write in a way that draws the reader in. Rebus, is a genius of a character created by Rankin, and Christie depicted quintessential England with finely penned characters.

Give me some advice about writing…

Read extensively, but don’t imitate other authors. Find your own voice by writing and rewriting. When reading your work, read it out loud, and see how it sounds. Is the speech believable? Do the sentences run easily off the tongue? Vary the length of your sentences to keep the writing alive. Write what you enjoy, even if you need to research it; if you’re enjoying the story, hopefully the reader will too. If you’re bored, chances are the reader will be too. Lastly, I would say, enjoy the process of writing and creating a story. Enjoy!

What’s next for you?

The third DI Wednesday novel, ‘Shadows in the Mind’, comes out in May 2015. The crime in this story takes place in a psychiatric unit. Then in June 2015, a contemporary novel, Garlic & Gauloises, is released. This story takes place mainly in France, in a writing retreat. I like to write both crime and contemporary fiction to keep my mind and writing fresh.

I already have a contract with the publisher for the fourth DI Wednesday novel, What Happens After, which takes place in a hotel, where the guest are all attending a divorce workshop.

The Intel: Adam Bromley

Adam Bromley is an author and comedy writer, who has won two radio Sony awards for his work — which includes Think the Unthinkable, The Party Line, Hut 33, The Problem with Adam Bloom and The Now Show. He also created CBBC hit sketch show called Stupid! 

Adam’s new novel Unknown Unknowns, published by Piqwiq, is a comedy thriller featuring a host of larger-than-life characters. It’s about Kat Foster of the Foreign Office. Given one last chance to save her career, Kat is tasked with travelling to Ozerkistan to debrief a prisoner know as The Chemist.

He has contacted a US embassy claiming to have valuable information about a former Russian weapons programme, codenamed Pandora , which he will trade in return for his freedom. The only snag is that Kat’s destination, Ozerk City, does not appear on any printed maps and Ozerkistan does not appear to exist…

Adam tells us about Unknown Unknowns, dreaming up an entire country – and how getting to the end of your first draft is only the beginning…

Tell us about Unknown Unknowns…

The novel is a comic thriller about WMDs, sociopathic spies and a diplomat who punches a sex pest into a pile of pastries. In a sense it’s a slapstick version of The Fourth Protocol, or The Bourne Identity with jokes.

Why is the Intelligence game such a fertile subject for comedy?

It’s a world of false identities, deception and misinformation – which is the same as farce, though of course the stakes are much higher. In a farce, a character might find a mislaid pair of briefs and storm into a bedroom causing social embarrassment. In the intelligence world, a president may receive a misleading briefing and invade another country, destabilising the entire region.

You get to create your own country in the novel, Ozerkistan – how much fun is that?

I thoroughly enjoyed inventing Ozerkistan and am a little disappointed that I can’t visit my own creation in the real world. Although speaking as a foodie, the one thing Ozerkistan definitely lacks, aside from proper sanitation and a police force, is decent restaurants, so perhaps it’s for the best.

How different are the challenges in writing a novel compared to a script?

Writing a script is a more technical exercise as there are constraints on time, cast size, location and action. It can be frustrating for the writer to be told by the producer that the grand party scene is now cut to an dinner for one at home, but sometimes the limits help by giving you firm boundaries. With a novel, there are no such barriers apart from the grunt work of typing lots of words, and your sanity when you lose track of that crucial plot point in chapter 3 which means you will have to re-write the entire ending.

The main difficulty for me was to stay focused on the core story, without going off on too many tangents whilst keeping the reader engaged on the journey. I was always asking myself, is this chapter gripping, will it keep the reader hooked?

Take us through a typical writing day for you?

As I have a full time job running a production company, it’s rare that I would have a whole day to write. Usually my writing time is at the expense of a weekday evening or sometimes a whole weekend – when I tell my wife this, it can jeopardise my Husband of the Year ranking! For each session I set myself a task: complete a chapter, rewrite a section or fix a problem.

What’s the hardest lesson you ever had to learn about writing?

No matter how painful and tiring it was to write the first draft of the book, that is only the start of the process to get to the final draft. The adage goes: writing is rewriting. It’s true and the really hard part is when you work out just how many hours that’s going to take. At that point, I recommend having a drink or several.

How do you deal with feedback?

I love praise; criticism makes me curl into a foetal ball and cry. In all honesty, I appreciate feedback. The only way you can improve as a writer is to know where your weaknesses lie and address them in your next work. Praise is food for the soul to help with the grind of getting words on the page; criticism, if phrased constructively, can move your craft to the next level.

Who are the authors you admire, and why?

Right now, I am re-reading the South American trilogy by Louis de Berniéres, which is a pure delight. He combines comedy, tragedy, satire and romance in this fabulous, OTT world which still feels original twenty-five years since it was first published.

In the spy genre, John Le Carré is the master. No debate allowed.

For gritty crime, a good Rebus novel by Ian Rankin is hard to beat. Knowing Edinburgh well, I relish the sense of place and the way Rankin blends the real city with his fictional locales.

And if you haven’t read PJ O’Rourke’s books, then you have missed out on one of the funniest non-fiction writers of the last fifty years. I’d recommend Eat the Rich or Holidays in Hell, books that I have read and re-read yet they still entertain.

Give me some advice about writing…

Start typing. Seriously, if you want to write, start typing, writing long hand or carving your work into the bare rock. A computer is probably the easiest of those three options, in which case you have to fill that white space on the screen with words. Don’t go all Shining and start typing ‘All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy’, because that’s cheating as well as being certifiable. But if you want to write, write. Singers sing, painters paint, writers must write, ideally every day. It may seem obvious but you’d be surprise how many people talk about writing rather that doing it. Get it down, get past the first draft, then go back and make it better. Then go back and rewrite it again. And again etc.

What’s next for you?

I’m playing around with an idea for a new novel with the same lead character, Kat Foster, which I will start work on later this year. Meanwhile, I’d like to write a crime novel with a comic angle, where the Westway motorway is a key location. For reasons I don’t fully understand, I am a little obsessed with the Westway – maybe in a former life I laid the tarmac or was struck by a car on the day of its grand opening. In any event, writing about it should be cathartic.

The Intel: Barbara Nadel Reloaded

Crime Thriller Fella is taking a much-needed summer break. But don’t get down – we’re going to meet up again right here very soon. However, do keep coming back. Over the last year there’s been all sorts of stuff we’ve enjoyed plonking on the internet, and which you may have missed. This Intel interview with the excellent Barbara Nadel, for example…

We love writers here — I may have mentioned that before. With Barbara Nadel’s second Hakim and Arnold mystery, An Act Of Kindness, due to be published in paperback, Barbara kindly tells us about her new series of East End thrillers, her writing and why variety really is the spice of life.

Photo credit: Teri Varhol

As well as the Hakim And Arnold books — the first is A Private Business – Barbara has also written fifteen Inspector Ikmen novels, set in Turkey, and four books about undertaker Francis Hancock, set during the Blitz.

There’s a real sense of place in An Act Of Kindness. How would you describe the contemporary East End?

The contemporary East End I write about is a place that is changing fast. In a way this is in the tradition of the area which has always embraced new industries, innovation and immigration. However since the middle of the last decade and the coming of the Olympics, change has been very rapid and in some cases divisive. New cracks have appeared in the human make up of places like Newham which now run less along ethnic rather then income and social class lines.

You live in Lancashire now. How do you keep up with the extraordinary changes in the Upton Park area over the last few years?

I spend a lot of time in the East End and of course I have many contacts there. But it’s hard work and I’m moving much closer, to Essex, in June this year.

There’s a very real sense that the characters in the Hakim and Arnold books are struggling to keep their heads above water. How important is it to you that you address the grinding poverty in that part of London?

Addressing issues of poverty in my old home is very important to me. Newham has always been poor. When I was a child in the 1960s and 70s it was appallingly shabby and some people, including my own grandparents, lived in the kind of poverty that is more usually associated with Charles Dickens London.My own family had no proper heating, most people had outside toilets and we were all, often sick. But that was a long time and many advances in medicine and social care ago. Or is it?

One of the reasons I write the Hakim and Arnold books is to flag up the fact that for a lot of people in Newham very little has changed. In some cases things have got worse. And that offends me to the soul. If my stories can raise awareness of these issues as well as being good crime novels then I can feel I’ve done my job.

You’ve now three different series under your belt – the Inspector Ikmen, Francis Hancock, and Hakim and Arnold books. Do you thrive on the variety?

Yes I do thrive on variety. I’m a restless somewhat hyperactive person and I like to spread myself around. Crime is my first love but I have a fair few horror, magical and saga novels in my head (and some in an old drawer!) too. I’d also, at some time, like to take the Blue Badge London guide course as well. I’m told my unofficial tours of the East End are really great.

Take us through a typical writing day for you?

I generally get up early (about 6.30am) and then, if I can I go to the gym for an hour. I arrive home pretty wrecked if I’m honest but I have a shower and start writing at about 8. Then it’s straight through until 1 with about half an hour for lunch. I’ll usually work until 5 or 6 in the evening. Long hours and strict discipline for one so disorganised as myself but I do write two books a year and so it has to be this way.

Who are the authors or you love, and why?

I’m quite left field and so I don’t tend to read a lot of hugely famous and successful crime novelists with the exception of Ian Rankin, James Lee Burke and Jeffrey Deaver. I love Rebus, adore James Lee Burke’s southern American vibe and just admire the hell out out Deaver’s plotting. But my read favourites include Lee Jackson’s London Victorian novels which remind me so much of the weird world of my death obsessed ancestors, Anya Lipska’s East End Polish novels which just reflect that world so accurately and I love the Hull novels of David Mark.

Outside crime I am a huge fan of Stephen King and I am an absolute Charles Dickens obsessive. Crime or not I like tales that include vignettes of everyday life and the struggles that afflict so many people in our apparently tidy world of Ikea and the school run. Not all lives include those things including my own!

What’s the hardest lesson you ever had to learn about writing?

That I’m not Marcel Proust. When I first wrote my first book ‘Belshazzar’s Daughter’ I thought  it was literary fiction. It wasn’t and isn’t and that’s OK but it was a shock at first!

How do you deal with feedback?

I like to be edited as it is my belief that an author can become too close to his or her work to be objective. I’m lucky inasmuch as I have always been edited sensitively and well. Predictably I take praise well and criticism less so. Although in my defence I have to say that I take constructive criticism well.

What I don’t like is when someone gives one of my books one star on Amazon reviews and then fails to review the book. To my mind that is cowardly and shows lack of courage of conviction. I would never do that to anyone however much I didn’t like their book. Every book has been written in good faith and deserves a truthful review even if it is negative.

How have your own experiences shaped your writing?

With regard to the Hakim and Arnold books the experiences that have most affected my writing are growing up in Newham and being poor. I’ve lived in damp, cramped slum landlord owned accommodation I’ve been a poor, far too young parent, I’ve been threatened by violent neighbours and exploited by criminal landlords. I know what it is like to be hungry and, like Mumtaz Hakim, I have been through the experience of being at risk of losing everything.

On another level as a graduate in psychology  who has worked for social services and in mental health services I  have met and worked with a vast range of people down on their luck and in poor health. I’ve worked with sexually abused teenagers, mentally ill in patients and offenders, drug dealers, prostitutes, immigrants (including those traumatised by the war in the former Yugoslavia) and of course social workers, doctors and the police.

Give me some advice about writing…

Don’t wait for the ‘muse’ to strike before you put pen to paper. Writing, except in very rare cases, really is 90% perspiration and 10% inspiration. Get going!

What’s your best advice for an author looking to get into the marketplace…

Find your own niche and make it yours. Don’t try to be the next anyone, be yourself and write what you care about. If you care enough then that will transfer to the reader.

What’s next for you?

Next for me is building my Hakim and Arnold series and putting those parts of Newham that are not the Olympic stadia or Westfield Shopping Centre on the map. I’d like to see my headscafed detective on TV or film – it’s about time that happened. As an aside I did some tour guiding for one of the script writers on the new Newham based fire service drama The Smoke last year, and so we’re getting there.

Apart from that I’m working on a new Ikmen novel set in Turkey last year during the Gezi Park protests. That’s a challenge! And then of course in a couple of months I have to move.  As I said before, I’m hyperactive…

***

We’ll be reviewing An Act Of Kindness at Crime Thriller Fella next week — look out for that.

The Intel: Mason Cross Reloaded

Crime Thriller Fella is taking a much-needed summer break. But, chin up – we’re going to meet up again right here sooner than you could possibly hope. However, in the meantime, do keep coming back. Over the last year there’s been all sorts of stuff we’ve enjoyed plonking on the internet, and which you may have missed, such as this Intel interview with one of the talented new kids on the block… Mason Cross.

We love it when there’s a buzz about a new author. Thriller writer Mason Cross is picking up all sorts of great reviews for his gripping story of a FBI manhunt for a deranged sniper.

Crime Thriller Fella reviewed The Killing Season only last week and now, as promised, Cross gives us The Intel on new-hero-on-the-block Carter Blake, and on his own path to publication. If you’re a writer quietly plugging away at your craft, I strongly suggest you take a read…

Give us the lowdown on Carter Blake – he’s kind of a mysterious guy…

Ahh – that would be telling! He is indeed a mysterious guy. Suffice to say that he has a past that has furnished him with the skills and experience he now calls upon to do his job. That past occasionally comes back to haunt him, and we’ll find out a little more about it in the next book…

Blake hunts for a deranged sniper in The Killing Season – what is it about random killers that so fascinates us?

I think we do have a morbid fascination with serial killers. It’s probably because, while we can perhaps understand acts of violence committed in the heat of the moment, the impulse to cold-bloodedly take a human life is utterly alien to most of us. Thankfully, most of us don’t have that faulty gene. A sniper is particularly chilling, because they can strike from afar and you’ll never see them coming. It’s also the only type of cold-blooded killing that can be a legitimate profession: the military will actually train you up and pay you to do it.

How do you get inside the head of a man like that?

I suspect there may be some crossover in the psychological profiles of serial killers and crime writers; a little more overlap on the Venn diagram than is normal. Again, there’s a grim fascination for a writer in the idea of plotting and getting away with murder, although fortunately for society, we tend to keep our murders on the page.

In The Killing Season, I found that writing the villain was similar to writing the hero in a lot of ways: both are very driven, very methodical, very professional. They’re intelligent, capable men doing what they do. Blake would probably make a very good serial killer if he was that way inclined.

How did the idea of The Killing Season come about?

The initial idea was to pit two equally matched adversaries against one another. A hunter who can find anybody versus a lone wolf who’s adept at evading capture. I was interested in this idea of a very personal one-on-one contest amidst the backdrop of a massive multi-agency manhunt. The rest of the plot developed from that.

What kind of research did you have to do?

I read widely about serial killers, snipers, and police and federal manhunts. I read a book about the Washington Sniper case from 2002, and a couple of other books that dealt more with the history of snipers and the psychological warfare aspect of killing from a distance. A book I happened to read on J Edgar Hoover and the birth of the FBI turned out to be unexpectedly useful. I did a lot of local research into the locations I wanted to use. I spoke to my American friends to pick their brains and run ideas past them, and called on my own experiences visiting the States.

Perhaps as importantly as any of the direct research, I read a hell of a lot of thrillers, from the old masters to the authors who are in the bestseller charts today. I got to know the clichés to avoid, I stole some techniques I liked, and generally learned to avoid some of the common pitfalls. It’s interesting that the core elements of what makes a great thriller haven’t changed too much over the course of a century.

The Killing Season is your debut novel – what was your journey to getting published?

It involved a huge amount of luck! I’d been submitting stories to various magazines and competitions for a few years with occasional success. My story ‘A Living’ was published in the Quick Reads Sun Book of Short Stories, which encouraged me to keep at it. Some of the stories I posted on Harper Collins’s Authonomy site. A few months later, they got in touch to tell me that an agent, Luigi Bonomi, was interested in getting touch with me based one of the stories I’d posted.

I was sceptical at first, as it sounded too good to be true. But when I did a bit of Googling, I quickly realised that not only was Luigi the real deal, he was one of the top agents in the business. Luigi and his colleague Thomas Stofer were really encouraging about my writing and suggested I develop a novel. Fast forward a couple of years and we were ready to send The Killing Season out on submission.

Fortunately for me, Jemima Forrester at Orion read and loved it, and they offered me a deal. I was particularly pleased about signing with Orion because they have such a great track record on thrillers, and publish so many of my favourite authors.

Take us through a typical writing day for you?

I have a day job, so I normally have to fit the writing in around my other commitments. Luckily, I’m able to do that fairly easily – I’ve trained myself out of the habit of sitting around waiting for divine inspiration. I can write anywhere: planes, hotel rooms, cafés, pubs, libraries, park benches… I’d say my ideal writing environment is actually a quiet train carriage with no wifi. I would be unbelievably productive if I lived on a train.

Who are the authors or you love, and why?

Too many to mention them all, but off the top of my head I’d have to include Lee Child, Michael Connelly, Raymond Chandler, Michael Chabon, Ian Rankin, Neil Gaiman, Stephen King, Tom Wolfe. All of the above have one thing in common – it’s a physical effort to stop reading them once I’ve started.

What’s the hardest lesson you ever had to learn about writing?

Sometimes you have to get rid of the bits of a book you really like, either by editorial mandate or because you know it just isn’t working. It’s tough, but often necessary. The other really difficult thing for me is, once I’ve got what I think is a reasonably finished version of the book, to let anyone else read it. That’s the most terrifying moment, because you’ve spent months flitting between thinking the book is fantastic and thinking it’s terrible, and you know you’re about to get an outside opinion on exactly where it falls on that scale.

How do you deal with feedback?

Generally pretty well, as long as it’s someone who knows what they’re talking about. I’m possibly unusual in that I quite enjoy the editing process – stepping back from the book, messing about with it, deciding what works and what doesn’t and reassembling it so that it runs as smoothly as possible.

I’m lucky to have an agent and an editor who both have excellent instincts about what makes a thriller work. It’s rare that what I’ve written can’t be improved by listening to some knowledgeable advice and having another go at it – it’s always better after a rewrite. I also like to get reviews from readers – a book either works or doesn’t for someone, and it’s useful to know why in either case.

How have your own experiences shaped your writing?

Friends, family, work, travel, death, love, children, good experiences, crappy experiences – it all feeds in. Another writer told me it’s essential to have spent some time doing a regular job and having a life before you can be a writer, and I’d definitely agree with that. It all comes down to writing convincingly about people and places, and to do that you need experience of as many different kinds of people and places as possible.

Give me some advice about writing…

Keep going. Try to write every day, even if it’s only 500 words. Finish things. Invest some time in plotting, but be open to change – it’s important to have a path from which to wander. The internet should be avoided during writing and embraced during research.

And read a lot! Everybody says that, but that’s because it’s true – not just to learn from the best, but to learn why some things don’t work so well so you can try to avoid making the same mistakes.

What’s your best advice for an author looking to get into the marketplace?

Be lucky! I’d definitely recommend trying to get an agent, as mine has helped me so much beyond the usual business of dealing with the publisher; giving me support and encouragement and invaluable feedback on early drafts. Think about the market, but try not to over-think: don’t write something you don’t like just because you think it will be marketable, because it probably won’t end up being very good. Play to your strengths. Try to be pleasant to work with and professional – it only started to happen for me when I began treating writing as a job. Read a lot.

What’s next for you?

Right now, I’m really looking forward to launching The Killing Season at Waterstones in Glasgow and doing the whole reading and signing thing. The next Blake book – called The Samaritan – is just about done (there’s an excerpt in the back of the first book) and I’m thinking a lot about book three, where we’ll learn more still about his shadowy past.

Aside from that, I’m really excited that one of my stories is going to be published in a forthcoming issue of Ellery Queen, which was one of my long-standing ambitions. I’m going to be on three panels at Crimefest in Bristol, and I have a couple of other festival appearances later in the year that I’m not allowed to talk about yet. When I get the okay, I’ll be sure to let people know at my blog.

 

The Intel: David Mark Reloaded

Crime Thriller Fella is taking a much-needed summer break. But, hey, we’re going to meet up again right here very soon. However, do keep coming back. Over the last year there’s been all sorts of stuff we’ve enjoyed plonking on the internet, and which you may have missed, such as this Intel interview with McAvoy man David Mark…

We love writers here. Last week we reviewed David Mark’s terrific Aector McAvoy novel Original Skin, and in a couple of weeks — April 3rd, to be precise — the brand-new McAvoy opus Sorrow Bound is published. It seemed like a pretty good excuse to talk to Mark about McAvoy, Hull and, of course, how he gets those pesky words on a page. David Mark gives us The Intel on his writing.

How would you describe DS Aector McAvoy to a potential reader?

He’s a good guy, really. A pretty normal guy. He’s caring and clever and a bit baffled by how the world works. He never really knows how he feels about anything until he’s checked with his wife and his boss but he does truly believe that murder is wrong, which is why he’s a good cop. He’s dogged and very human. I hope he’s reminiscent of the actual detectives I knew when I was a journalist. He cares most about his family but would like to make his little contribution to the world. Physically, he’s 6ft 5, Scottish and able to pull a criminal’s head off if he so choose. The thing is, he’s also shy, clumsy and frightened of hurting anybody by accident. I’ve made life rather difficult for him.

Sex parties and swingers clubs form the backdrop to McAvoy’s investigation in Original Skin. I hesitate to ask what kind of research you did for this book?

Well, being a journalist for so long meant that I’m well used to asking people personal questions about what they get up into their spare time and I wrote several features on alternative lifestyles and spent a lot of time with outwardly very average people who happen to spend their weekends getting up to all sorts of things with all sorts of people. I visited a couple of ‘alternative’ clubs and spent about 40 seconds in a sex cinema in Huddersfield, which seemed like something that should have been dreamed up by Dante. I did a lot of online research and spent some time on forums that would boggle your mind.

I couldn’t get away from the feeling that people were allowing their arousal to make them forget their safety, and that was kind of the jumping-off point for the plot. There are people online asking complete strangers to come to their house and abuse them. I’m not judging, but does that not sound a little fraught with peril? And just imagine if there was a serial killer out there, setting people up for their own elaborate demise ….

Hull is a terrific location for a series of crime thrillers. What is it about the city that fascinates you?

I’m still not totally sure. There’s something about the architecture and the feel of the place that  simply seems perfect for the kind of books I want to write. It has history, and attitude, and it’s right at the end of the railway line. It’s taken its fair share of beatings and at times it seems like it’s completely on its arse. And it has a crime rate, so the people aren’t surprised by very much, which means that the murders in my books would kind of exist in the real world without anybody batting an eyelid, which adds a kind of authenticity. I guess I’m attracted a certain kind of washed out and desolate beauty. I like being able to describe the crumbling mercantile palaces and the cobbled streets next to the boarded up fish factories and the dying carnations sellotaped to lampposts. It’s just the canvas that my brain likes to hurl itself at.

What’s your writing process? What comes first – plot or character?

With writing a series based around recurring characters, these days it’s all about the plot. But I don’t do what many writers do, which is dream up an elaborate death and then try and find a reason for it afterwards. I try and come up with real people and work out why they would want to do something horrible to somebody else. Everybody has a perfectly good reason to want at least one or two people dead. Most people simply don’t do it.

I’m writing in my head all the time and when I meet somebody who starts telling me about their bastard boss or their bitch of a mother-in-law, I can’t help but start mentally riffing and expounding on how they would do it. The thing is, I come up with foolproof ways of doing it, which is no good to McAvoy, as he has to catch them at the end. In essence, I’ve met so many interesting people in my life that putting together believable characters comes quite easily. I just steal liberally from everybody I’ve ever met.

Take us through a typical writing day for you?

It used to be hellish finding the time to write. I was working full time, nobody gave a damn about my dreams and I was writing in a state of feverish compulsion and a desperate desire to change my life. Nowadays I write for an actual publisher and have deadlines and an accountant and lots of grown-up things to think about. Which means that ideally I’m at my computer by 9am, and will write until one of my loved ones comes home or rings me and tells me to stop, or have a sandwich or go for a pee.

Then I walk the dogs or do something that frees my brain up a little bit, and then I go into dad mode and pick up the kids or take something out of the freezer or fall asleep on the sofa in front of some improving but dull documentary on Sky Arts. Then it’s all whisky and mental anguish until the next day. I love it.

Who are the authors you love, and why?

One should never love an author. It’s okay to love their books but don’t ever think that they are representative of the person whose mind they were born in. I love various authors through having met them and become friends. For that reason I love Mari Hannah and Mel Sheratt and Danielle Ramsey. They are some of the nicest and most giving people I have ever met. In terms of which books I love, that’s a hell of a list. I truly admire the works of Ian Rankin and John Connolly, because they’re simply very well written and clever.

I admire the consistent high quality of Val McDermid and the late, great Reg Hill. I like the ambition and writing style of Stav Sherez. I always look forward to new books by Denise Mina, Belinda Bauer and Simon Lelic. Then there are people whose books changed my life when I was a kid, like Terry Pratchett and Bernard Cornwell and Robert Westall, who all made me want to become an author. Of all the questions I get asked, that’s the hardest one to answer!

What’s the hardest lesson you ever had to learn about writing?

I’ve learned a lot these past couple of years and I guess the hardest lesson was the old cliché about ‘less is more’. I have a kind of poetic and lyrical turn of phrase and sometimes I’ll spend four or five pages describing a sunset or a thought process or a glass of wine in intricate detail, which is all very lovely but doesn’t really move the plot along. Cutting that stuff is hard, but the years of being brutally hacked by sub-editors on newspapers gave me some kind of preparation for it. Just because it’s pretty doesn’t mean it helps the book. Thankfully, my editors are brilliant and are very tactful in the way they suggest I lose tracts of beautiful prose.

How do you deal with feedback?

I’m pretty thick-skinned so I don’t get upset by idiots on Amazon leaving me a one-star review because they don’t like the fact I’ve written in present tense or given a character a name they can’t pronounce. What am I supposed to do to please everybody? Some people just like to knock your average score down a couple of notches, and that’s because some people weren’t punched enough as teenagers. I do like to have a discussion with readers and I’m more than happy to hear other people’s opinions and love to chat about their impressions of my work – even if they don’t like it. As for positive feedback, I get all squirmy and embarrassed and uncharacteristically shy about the whole affair.

How have your own experiences shaped your writing?

We all draw on our own experiences. A baby wouldn’t have much to write about unless they were planning a surreal animated novel about life in the womb. I’m a journalist for a rough area in the North so I’ve seen a lot of things that lend themselves to crime fiction. I’ve seen acts of great charity and love, and plenty of brutality. I’ve met people from every walk of life and discovered that everybody’s pretty much the same but some are considerably more interesting than others. I guess that if I were better travelled and been born rich, I wouldn’t have set my books in one of the few cities I’ve visited, and wouldn’t have had the same burning desire to achieve something notable. This is all start to feel like a psychological assessment. Leave me alone.

Give me some advice about writing…

Just write, for God’s sake. So many people faff about wondering whether they will get a deal or pondering whether to self-publish on Amazon when they haven’t even bloody written anything yet. Get on with it. Writing is the second most fun you can have by yourself. Do it because it makes your brain work harder. Do it because you’re creating something nobody has ever written before. Don’t worry too much about plot or character or settings or accuracy in the first draft. Just get going and you’ll be amazed what your imagination hands you when it wakes from its slumber.

What’s your best advice for an author looking to get into the marketplace…

Try and come up with something new, but not terrifyingly so. The publishing world is an odd one. Publishers don’t really know what they want but they seem to know what they’re scared of. Just be true to yourself and write a book you would want to read. Then take as much advice as you can without starting to second-guess yourself. And please, for me, give yourself time to get a traditional publishing deal rather than self-publishing on Amazon three months after you’ve finished the first draft. Publishing is a slow business. Seriously, it’s not just slow, it moves like a snail dragging an anvil. But when you get a proper book deal there really is no feeling like it.

What’s next for you?

Well, it’s 11.22am on a Monday morning and I don’t think I’ve had any breakfast, so I may go see if there are any toffee muffins left in the bread-bin.  On a grander scale, I’ve finished the fourth McAvoy book, written a  historical crime novel set in Hull in 1850, and the first McAvoy book is being adapted for TV, so there’s plenty on the horizon. To be honest though, it’s the muffin I’m most excited about.

The Intel: Shari Low

So you’re probably hard at work thinking about what books to pack when you go on holiday. You’re thinking, glamour! You’re thinking, gossip! You’re thinking, dark secrets!

Author Shari Low and showbiz presenter Ross King have teamed up – becoming Shari King in the process – to write Taking Hollywood, a tale of scandal and secrets in modern-day LA. In the novel, three Glaswegian friends become major Hollywood players – but the events of a fateful night many years ago threatens to tear their lives apart, and a nosy investigative journalist is on the case.

Taking Hollywood is released on August 14th, so you’ve got plenty of time to pre-order it right here!

In the meantime, Shari Low has kindly taken time out to answer questions about her sizzling summer read, about the joys of writing with someone else, and working in the dead of night…

Where did the inspiration for Taking Hollywood come from?

Ross and I had talked about writing a book for years, but we thought it would probably be a biography of his extraordinary life. It was only last year that we decided it should be a novel. We met to have a chat about it and many hours (and many cups of tea) later, we had the concept, characters and storyline mapped out. We realised early in the conversation that we wanted it to be a dark blend of Hollywood drama and Glasgow crime. The book we ended up with is exactly the one we envisaged that day.

Are the characters secretly based on any real-life Hollywood stars?

Absolutely not – although we’ve taken many of the elements of Hollywood life and celebrity scandals and woven them into the story. No actual A-listers were harmed in the making of this book.

Why are we so fascinated by Hollywood scandals and secrets?

I think it’s human nature to be curious. I can sit in a café and people watch all day (in a non-stalker, non-restraining order kind of way). A fascination with celebrity just takes that a step further. It’s intriguing to see the risks and dramas that the famous indulge in and just like we all love to watch a great movie, it’s sometimes captivating to watch a scandal play out. And of course, many big names make it so easy for us to be astonished by their antics. Thank you, Charlie Sheen.

How do you write in a partnership – and avoid tears and tantrums?

Ah, pass the tissues! Actually, there was never a moment that came even close to either tears or tantrums. Ross and I have been friends for over 25 years and we are both pretty straight-talking. We also work in industries where you have to be able to take criticism and listen to the opinions of others without flouting off in a diva strop. There were a couple of lively debates, but it helped that we had exactly the same vision from day one. I’ll keep my diva strops for book 2.

What rules did you set yourself about working together?

No egos, total honesty, and we wouldn’t stop until we’d created a novel that we were both proud of. Other than that, we pretty much just took it day by day.

Take us through a typical writing day for you?

The writing content varies, depending on whether I have deadlines for my two newspaper columns  (an opinion page and a literary page). However the hours remain fairly consistent. And long. I work from around 9am until 4pm, then the next few hours are dedicated to the usual chaos of family stuff.  I’m usually back at my desk at around 9pm and work until some time pre-dawn. I’m lucky not to need much sleep and I’m very nocturnal so I work best at 3am when everything around me is silent. However, it’s a schedule that’s depressingly conducive to bloodshot eyes and wrinkles.

What’s the hardest lesson you ever had to learn about writing?

That’s such a good question and it took me a while to come up with an answer because 15 books down the line, I’m still not sure I have it sussed. Or ever will. I suppose the most significant thing I’ve learned is that I need to start trusting that it will all come together. When I’m mid-book, I’m invariably a hot mess of panic, doubt and anxiety, yet somehow, every single time it all falls into place. I’ve no idea how that happens, but my blood pressure would be a lot lower if I just had faith and confidence in the process.

Who are the authors you admire, and why?

So, so many, for lots of different reasons. I grew up on the work of Harold Robbins, Sidney Sheldon, Jackie Collins and Shirley Conran. Later, I became a huge fan of Martina Cole, Harlan Coben, Michael Connelly, Ian Rankin, Denise Mina, Val McDermid, William McIlvanney, Iain Banks.

I never miss a new release from Marian Keyes or Tasmina Perry. I’ll stop, because I could honestly go on for pages, but not before mentioning that my favourite book of all time is Nobel House by James Clavell.

Give me some advice about writing…

There’s no set way to do it, just find a method that works for you, start typing and have faith. See, I’m absolutely trying to learn that whole trust thing.

 What’s next for you – will you and Ross be working together again?

Definitely! We envisage this as a five book series and we’re currently in the midst of book two. I’m due a diva strop any day now.

The Intel: Mason Cross

We love it when there’s a buzz about a new author. Thriller writer Mason Cross is picking up all sorts of great reviews for his gripping story of a FBI manhunt for a deranged sniper.

Crime Thriller Fella reviewed The Killing Season only last week and now, as promised, Cross gives us The Intel on new-hero-on-the-block Carter Blake, and on his own path to publication. If you’re a writer quietly plugging away at your craft, I strongly suggest you take a read…

Give us the lowdown on Carter Blake – he’s kind of a mysterious guy…

Ahh – that would be telling! He is indeed a mysterious guy. Suffice to say that he has a past that has furnished him with the skills and experience he now calls upon to do his job. That past occasionally comes back to haunt him, and we’ll find out a little more about it in the next book…

Blake hunts for a deranged sniper in The Killing Season – what is it about random killers that so fascinates us?

I think we do have a morbid fascination with serial killers. It’s probably because, while we can perhaps understand acts of violence committed in the heat of the moment, the impulse to cold-bloodedly take a human life is utterly alien to most of us. Thankfully, most of us don’t have that faulty gene. A sniper is particularly chilling, because they can strike from afar and you’ll never see them coming. It’s also the only type of cold-blooded killing that can be a legitimate profession: the military will actually train you up and pay you to do it.

How do you get inside the head of a man like that?

I suspect there may be some crossover in the psychological profiles of serial killers and crime writers; a little more overlap on the Venn diagram than is normal. Again, there’s a grim fascination for a writer in the idea of plotting and getting away with murder, although fortunately for society, we tend to keep our murders on the page.

In The Killing Season, I found that writing the villain was similar to writing the hero in a lot of ways: both are very driven, very methodical, very professional. They’re intelligent, capable men doing what they do. Blake would probably make a very good serial killer if he was that way inclined.

How did the idea of The Killing Season come about?

The initial idea was to pit two equally matched adversaries against one another. A hunter who can find anybody versus a lone wolf who’s adept at evading capture. I was interested in this idea of a very personal one-on-one contest amidst the backdrop of a massive multi-agency manhunt. The rest of the plot developed from that.

What kind of research did you have to do?

I read widely about serial killers, snipers, and police and federal manhunts. I read a book about the Washington Sniper case from 2002, and a couple of other books that dealt more with the history of snipers and the psychological warfare aspect of killing from a distance. A book I happened to read on J Edgar Hoover and the birth of the FBI turned out to be unexpectedly useful. I did a lot of local research into the locations I wanted to use. I spoke to my American friends to pick their brains and run ideas past them, and called on my own experiences visiting the States.

Perhaps as importantly as any of the direct research, I read a hell of a lot of thrillers, from the old masters to the authors who are in the bestseller charts today. I got to know the clichés to avoid, I stole some techniques I liked, and generally learned to avoid some of the common pitfalls. It’s interesting that the core elements of what makes a great thriller haven’t changed too much over the course of a century.

The Killing Season is your debut novel – what was your journey to getting published?

It involved a huge amount of luck! I’d been submitting stories to various magazines and competitions for a few years with occasional success. My story ‘A Living’ was published in the Quick Reads Sun Book of Short Stories, which encouraged me to keep at it. Some of the stories I posted on Harper Collins’s Authonomy site. A few months later, they got in touch to tell me that an agent, Luigi Bonomi, was interested in getting touch with me based one of the stories I’d posted.

I was sceptical at first, as it sounded too good to be true. But when I did a bit of Googling, I quickly realised that not only was Luigi the real deal, he was one of the top agents in the business. Luigi and his colleague Thomas Stofer were really encouraging about my writing and suggested I develop a novel. Fast forward a couple of years and we were ready to send The Killing Season out on submission.

Fortunately for me, Jemima Forrester at Orion read and loved it, and they offered me a deal. I was particularly pleased about signing with Orion because they have such a great track record on thrillers, and publish so many of my favourite authors.

Take us through a typical writing day for you?

I have a day job, so I normally have to fit the writing in around my other commitments. Luckily, I’m able to do that fairly easily – I’ve trained myself out of the habit of sitting around waiting for divine inspiration. I can write anywhere: planes, hotel rooms, cafés, pubs, libraries, park benches… I’d say my ideal writing environment is actually a quiet train carriage with no wifi. I would be unbelievably productive if I lived on a train.

Who are the authors or you love, and why?

Too many to mention them all, but off the top of my head I’d have to include Lee Child, Michael Connelly, Raymond Chandler, Michael Chabon, Ian Rankin, Neil Gaiman, Stephen King, Tom Wolfe. All of the above have one thing in common – it’s a physical effort to stop reading them once I’ve started.

What’s the hardest lesson you ever had to learn about writing?

Sometimes you have to get rid of the bits of a book you really like, either by editorial mandate or because you know it just isn’t working. It’s tough, but often necessary. The other really difficult thing for me is, once I’ve got what I think is a reasonably finished version of the book, to let anyone else read it. That’s the most terrifying moment, because you’ve spent months flitting between thinking the book is fantastic and thinking it’s terrible, and you know you’re about to get an outside opinion on exactly where it falls on that scale.

How do you deal with feedback?

Generally pretty well, as long as it’s someone who knows what they’re talking about. I’m possibly unusual in that I quite enjoy the editing process – stepping back from the book, messing about with it, deciding what works and what doesn’t and reassembling it so that it runs as smoothly as possible.

I’m lucky to have an agent and an editor who both have excellent instincts about what makes a thriller work. It’s rare that what I’ve written can’t be improved by listening to some knowledgeable advice and having another go at it – it’s always better after a rewrite. I also like to get reviews from readers – a book either works or doesn’t for someone, and it’s useful to know why in either case.

How have your own experiences shaped your writing?

Friends, family, work, travel, death, love, children, good experiences, crappy experiences – it all feeds in. Another writer told me it’s essential to have spent some time doing a regular job and having a life before you can be a writer, and I’d definitely agree with that. It all comes down to writing convincingly about people and places, and to do that you need experience of as many different kinds of people and places as possible.

Give me some advice about writing…

Keep going. Try to write every day, even if it’s only 500 words. Finish things. Invest some time in plotting, but be open to change – it’s important to have a path from which to wander. The internet should be avoided during writing and embraced during research.

And read a lot! Everybody says that, but that’s because it’s true – not just to learn from the best, but to learn why some things don’t work so well so you can try to avoid making the same mistakes.

What’s your best advice for an author looking to get into the marketplace?

Be lucky! I’d definitely recommend trying to get an agent, as mine has helped me so much beyond the usual business of dealing with the publisher; giving me support and encouragement and invaluable feedback on early drafts. Think about the market, but try not to over-think: don’t write something you don’t like just because you think it will be marketable, because it probably won’t end up being very good. Play to your strengths. Try to be pleasant to work with and professional – it only started to happen for me when I began treating writing as a job. Read a lot.

What’s next for you?

Right now, I’m really looking forward to launching The Killing Season at Waterstones in Glasgow and doing the whole reading and signing thing. The next Blake book – called The Samaritan – is just about done (there’s an excerpt in the back of the first book) and I’m thinking a lot about book three, where we’ll learn more still about his shadowy past.

Aside from that, I’m really excited that one of my stories is going to be published in a forthcoming issue of Ellery Queen, which was one of my long-standing ambitions. I’m going to be on three panels at Crimefest in Bristol, and I have a couple of other festival appearances later in the year that I’m not allowed to talk about yet. When I get the okay, I’ll be sure to let people know at my blog.

 

The Intel: Barbara Nadel

We love writers here — I may have mentioned that before. With Barbara Nadel’s second Hakim and Arnold mystery, An Act Of Kindness, due to be published in paperback, Barbara kindly tells us about her new series of East End thrillers, her writing and why variety really is the spice of life.

Photo credit: Teri Varhol

As well as the Hakim And Arnold books — the first is A Private Business – Barbara has also written fifteen Inspector Ikmen novels, set in Turkey, and four books about undertaker Francis Hancock, set during the Blitz.

There’s a real sense of place in An Act Of Kindness. How would you describe the contemporary East End?

The contemporary East End I write about is a place that is changing fast. In a way this is in the tradition of the area which has always embraced new industries, innovation and immigration. However since the middle of the last decade and the coming of the Olympics, change has been very rapid and in some cases divisive. New cracks have appeared in the human make up of places like Newham which now run less along ethnic rather then income and social class lines.

You live in Lancashire now. How do you keep up with the extraordinary changes in the Upton Park area over the last few years?

I spend a lot of time in the East End and of course I have many contacts there. But it’s hard work and I’m moving much closer, to Essex, in June this year.

There’s a very real sense that the characters in the Hakim and Arnold books are struggling to keep their heads above water. How important is it to you that you address the grinding poverty in that part of London?

Addressing issues of poverty in my old home is very important to me. Newham has always been poor. When I was a child in the 1960s and 70s it was appallingly shabby and some people, including my own grandparents, lived in the kind of poverty that is more usually associated with Charles Dickens London.My own family had no proper heating, most people had outside toilets and we were all, often sick. But that was a long time and many advances in medicine and social care ago. Or is it?

One of the reasons I write the Hakim and Arnold books is to flag up the fact that for a lot of people in Newham very little has changed. In some cases things have got worse. And that offends me to the soul. If my stories can raise awareness of these issues as well as being good crime novels then I can feel I’ve done my job.

You’ve now three different series under your belt – the Inspector Ikmen, Francis Hancock, and Hakim and Arnold books. Do you thrive on the variety?

Yes I do thrive on variety. I’m a restless somewhat hyperactive person and I like to spread myself around. Crime is my first love but I have a fair few horror, magical and saga novels in my head (and some in an old drawer!) too. I’d also, at some time, like to take the Blue Badge London guide course as well. I’m told my unofficial tours of the East End are really great.

Take us through a typical writing day for you?

I generally get up early (about 6.30am) and then, if I can I go to the gym for an hour. I arrive home pretty wrecked if I’m honest but I have a shower and start writing at about 8. Then it’s straight through until 1 with about half an hour for lunch. I’ll usually work until 5 or 6 in the evening. Long hours and strict discipline for one so disorganised as myself but I do write two books a year and so it has to be this way.

Who are the authors or you love, and why?

I’m quite left field and so I don’t tend to read a lot of hugely famous and successful crime novelists with the exception of Ian Rankin, James Lee Burke and Jeffrey Deaver. I love Rebus, adore James Lee Burke’s southern American vibe and just admire the hell out out Deaver’s plotting. But my read favourites include Lee Jackson’s London Victorian novels which remind me so much of the weird world of my death obsessed ancestors, Anya Lipska’s East End Polish novels which just reflect that world so accurately and I love the Hull novels of David Mark.

Outside crime I am a huge fan of Stephen King and I am an absolute Charles Dickens obsessive. Crime or not I like tales that include vignettes of everyday life and the struggles that afflict so many people in our apparently tidy world of Ikea and the school run. Not all lives include those things including my own!

What’s the hardest lesson you ever had to learn about writing?

That I’m not Marcel Proust. When I first wrote my first book ‘Belshazzar’s Daughter’ I thought  it was literary fiction. It wasn’t and isn’t and that’s OK but it was a shock at first!

How do you deal with feedback?

I like to be edited as it is my belief that an author can become too close to his or her work to be objective. I’m lucky inasmuch as I have always been edited sensitively and well. Predictably I take praise well and criticism less so. Although in my defence I have to say that I take constructive criticism well.

What I don’t like is when someone gives one of my books one star on Amazon reviews and then fails to review the book. To my mind that is cowardly and shows lack of courage of conviction. I would never do that to anyone however much I didn’t like their book. Every book has been written in good faith and deserves a truthful review even if it is negative.

How have your own experiences shaped your writing?

With regard to the Hakim and Arnold books the experiences that have most affected my writing are growing up in Newham and being poor. I’ve lived in damp, cramped slum landlord owned accommodation I’ve been a poor, far too young parent, I’ve been threatened by violent neighbours and exploited by criminal landlords. I know what it is like to be hungry and, like Mumtaz Hakim, I have been through the experience of being at risk of losing everything.

On another level as a graduate in psychology  who has worked for social services and in mental health services I  have met and worked with a vast range of people down on their luck and in poor health. I’ve worked with sexually abused teenagers, mentally ill in patients and offenders, drug dealers, prostitutes, immigrants (including those traumatised by the war in the former Yugoslavia) and of course social workers, doctors and the police.

Give me some advice about writing…

Don’t wait for the ‘muse’ to strike before you put pen to paper. Writing, except in very rare cases, really is 90% perspiration and 10% inspiration. Get going!

What’s your best advice for an author looking to get into the marketplace…

Find your own niche and make it yours. Don’t try to be the next anyone, be yourself and write what you care about. If you care enough then that will transfer to the reader.

What’s next for you?

Next for me is building my Hakim and Arnold series and putting those parts of Newham that are not the Olympic stadia or Westfield Shopping Centre on the map. I’d like to see my headscafed detective on TV or film – it’s about time that happened. As an aside I did some tour guiding for one of the script writers on the new Newham based fire service drama The Smoke last year, and so we’re getting there.

Apart from that I’m working on a new Ikmen novel set in Turkey last year during the Gezi Park protests. That’s a challenge! And then of course in a couple of months I have to move.  As I said before, I’m hyperactive…

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We’ll be reviewing An Act Of Kindness at Crime Thriller Fella next week — look out for that.