The Intel: Leigh Russell

Some people have crime authorship sequenced into them at a genetic level. Take Leigh Russell. An incredibly prolific author, she can write two, perhaps three crime novels a year. She’s the author of the Geraldine Steel and Ian Peterson crime series, and her first novel Cut Short was shortlisted for for CWA Debut Dagger Award for Best First Crime Novel.

Now she’s begun a series starring a brand new, globe-trotting heroine – Lucy Hall. In Journey To Death Lucy arrives in the Seychelles determined to leave her worries behind. The tropical paradise looks sun-soaked and picture perfect – but as Lucy soon discovers, appearances can be very deceptive. A deadly secret lurks in the island’s history, buried deep but not forgotten. And it’s about to come to light…

For many years Leigh taught pupils with specific learning difficulties. She guest lectures for the Society of Authors, universities and colleges, and runs regular creative writing courses. She also runs the manuscript assessment service for the CWA. She’s even got her own YouTube channel. Oh, and she only wears purple.

Leigh’s an enthusiastic and fascinating writer, and a generous interviewee – so Crime Thriller is thrilled that she gives us the intel on Lucy, her extraordinary writing routine and how a writer must nurture their own voice…

Tell us about Lucy Hall…

At twenty-two, Lucy Hall is struggling to recover from a broken engagement. Hoping to cheer her up, her parents invite her to accompany them on a holiday to the idyllic island of Mahé in the Seychelles. The trip takes a dark and twisted turn as a secret threatens to destroy them. As she fights for her life, Lucy learns that she is far tougher and more resourceful than she had realised. 

Where did you get the inspiration for Journey to Death?

I was intrigued by a first hand account of a political coup that took place in the Seychelles in the late 1970s. This true account was the inspiration for my story. Apart from the historical background, the narrative is fictitious, as are the characters. Like all my books, it started with the question, ‘what if?’, this time set against a beautiful tropical island background.

The novel is set in the Seychelles – what kind of research did you do on the tropical paradise?

My story was virtually written when I went to the Seychelles to check on the location. We spent two weeks walking along sandy beaches watching the fishing boats setting out at dawn, swimming in the warm ocean, and watching the sun set over the Indian Ocean. It was a magical trip. I spent time at the British High Commission, visited several police stations, walked around the market in the capital, Victoria, and went up into the Cloud Mountain, all of which feature in the book. Everyone I approached was incredibly generous with their time and expertise, and it all helped to add depth and credibility to my narrative.

You’re incredibly prolific, you write two or three books a year, and yet you’ve said you have no writing routine – how do you manage to fit it all in?

I ask myself that question all the time! The only answer I can give you is that I love writing. It’s fitting everything else in that’s the problem. I spend a lot of time on research, and also appear at literary festivals along with all the rest of the promotional activities required of authors. It’s great fun, but I am often exhausted. My typing is quite fast, but a book is not about putting words on the page. It’s about thinking and ideas, backed up by working out and research. Once my story is in place, off I go. My schedule is incredibly busy but I like to work hard, so as long as the ideas keep coming, I’ll keep writing.

You run the manuscript assessment service for the Crime Writers Association – what’s the one piece of advice you would offer aspiring crime writers?

The one piece of advice I would give is to trust yourself. Other people will challenge and question what you do all the time, and it’s vital for a writer to be able take advice on board when it feels right, but you need to have that inner core of belief in yourself as a writer or your voice will be lost.

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

A number of negative reviews appeared on amazon shortly after one of my books reached number one on kindle, but you have to learn to take negative experiences like that on the chin. I try to focus on the many positive reviews, and the encouraging messages fans send to my website, which I find really inspiring. I think most authors worry that readers might not like their books, so it’s important to be reminded that there are fans who appreciate what you do. So far I’ve been thrilled by the positive response my books have received. I’m keeping my fingers crossed that Lucy Hall is also well received.

Who are the authors you admire, and why?

Having spent four years studying English and American Literature at university in the UK, my reading taste is quite varied. I admire so many authors, it’s very hard to pick just a few, but names that spring to mind are John Steinbeck, Harper Lee, Edith Wharton, Kazuo Ishiguro, Charles Dickens, Emily Bronte… I could go on. Among contemporary crime writers Lee Child, Jeffery Deaver and Peter James, all of whom are fans of my books, Val McDermid, Ruth Rendell, Michael Robotham, Alexander McCall Smith… again I could go on. There are so many great writers around, we are spoilt for choice, thank goodness!

Give me some advice about writing…

The late great William McIlvanney wrote: ‘I didn’t tell people how to write. I encouraged them to write and to see that defying my advice was possibly as valuable as following it.’ To my way of thinking, this is excellent advice. There are no rules in writing, other than to make your writing work. If you want to try something that has never been done before, of course there might be a reason why no one else has attempted it, but why not give it a go? If you don’t try, you will never know if you could have succeeded. And challenging yourself is part of the thrill of writing.

What’s next for you?

I’m currently working on the second book in the Lucy Hall series. This one sees Lucy in Paris, which of course required more research. We stayed in several locations near the centre of the city, visiting sites like the Eiffel Tower, and exploring fascinating areas off the tourist map. While we were there, we tried out different sorts of French food and wine…  Yes, all this research is hard work!

***

Journey To Death is available now as a paperback and in ebook, published by Thomas & Mercer.

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: Sinéad Crowley

Earlier in the week we reviewed Sinéad Crowley’s chilling tale about what happens when — sleep-deprived and vulnerable — you place your trust in the hands of an anonymous person on the internet. Can Anybody Help Me? has generated a lot of buzz since it was published last year, and Sinéad’s growing legion of fans await with anticipation the next novel to feature her feisty, no-nonsense heroine Claire Boyle.

In the meantime, we’re delighted to say that Sinéad — the Arts and Media Correspondent for RTE, Ireland’s national broadcaster — has kindly agreed to  give us the intel on the inspiration for her debut novel, online dangers, and waiting for the ‘Big Idea’…

Where did you get the inspiration for Can Anybody Help Me?

Online! When I was pregnant, and then on maternity leave with my first child in 2009 I became a frequent user of parenting forums. One day I recognised another poster from the ‘real world’ and it made me conscious of just how much information these women were sharing, all thinking they were completely anonymous. I started to wonder what would happen if one forum user recognised another user online and didn’t wish them well. . .

How would you describe Claire Boyle to a new reader?

Clever, driven, pregnant and cranky! She’s a very ambitious Detective Sergeant who is working on her first murder investigation and doesn’t want to let the fact that she’s six months pregnant interfere with that. Even when her body starts to slow her down, her mind is still racing ahead to solve the crime. She’s great fun to write.

Why do you think we are so ready to reach out to a total stranger on the internet? 

These days, no matter what problem we have or question we want answered, we Google it. Women who are pregnant for the first time, or are first time parents have a million questions and sometimes they don’t want to bother their nearest and dearest with them, or are embarrassed to do so. So it makes total sense to talk to a stranger who you think might have the exact answer you need, or who you feel won’t judge you. That’s not a bad thing, by the way!

I communicated with several really interesting women online when I had my first baby and had some great chats, discussions and debates. You just have to be sensible about it, don’t take medical advice from a total stranger and don’t say or do anything online that you wouldn’t be happy to say or do in the real world.  And be careful when somebody who you only know online wants to meet in real life! That’s not always a bad thing either, of course it isn’t. But you have to take certain precautions.

The novel is partly set in the Dublin media world – did you draw on your colleagues for any inspiration for the characters?

No, I didn’t. One of my main characters, Yvonne, the new mother, has a husband who works in the media. I needed her to feel very isolated and lonely, so I needed him to have a job that kept him out of the house for hours, and busy and preoccupied even when he was at home. It made sense to give him a job in the media because I knew I’d be able to write that accurately. It also added a bit of glamour to the book as I could add in a night at a TV awards show.

But I very deliberately didn’t base the characters on anyone in real life and I even invented an entirely new Irish television station to avoid confusion. My second book also has a journalist in it but he also works for Ireland 24, a totally made up station.

You set yourself the task of writing a novel before your 40^th birthday – why put such pressure on yourself?

I started my first novel when I was 7! I got a typewriter for my birthday and sat down and immediately typed the words ‘Chapter 1’. So the goal was always there. I also wrote a novel in my late 20s, it wasn’t published but at least it proved I could finish a substantial piece of work. The main problem with that book was that it didn’t have a strong enough hook, and it wasn’t until I started using the parenting websites six or seven years later that I got that ‘Big Idea’ that I needed. So I just said, right, you’re in your late 30s, this has always been the dream. Throw everything at it now, give yourself a deadline and, if it doesn’t work out then at least you know you tried your best. I’m a journalist, I work best to deadlines.

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

The idea is the easy bit! I have lots of ideas floating around for books, but sitting down and writing them is a totally different matter. It’s like running a marathon, one step at a time. Don’t think of the 26 miles, just the end of the next page.

How do you deal with feedback?

There was a lot of work to be done on my first draft but I really enjoyed working with my editor. It definitely helped that I’m a journalist because I’m using to other people having an input into my work. It also helped that I got on very well with my editor. So I think I’m okay with feedback, actually!

Who are the authors you admire, and why?

Oh, so many! In the crime genre – Erin Kelly, Jane Casey, Val McDermid, Adrian McKinty to name a very few. I loved Robert Galbraith’s “The Silkworm” and Clare Mackintosh wrote one of my favourite recent debuts, “I Let You Go.” What they all have in common is the ability to combine a great plot with the story behind the crime, and they all write really believable and interesting characters. I want to hear about the investigator’s life after he or she leaves the office for the day. Having said that I love Agatha Christie too for pure plot heaven

Outside the crime genre I read widely. I don’t like to discriminate between ‘literary’ and ‘commercial’ fiction – you can get excellent books (and some dodgy ones) in every genre

Give me some advice about writing…

Make time for it. It can feel very self indulgent, especially if you have a family or a busy life to close the door on the world and spend time writing fiction. But think of it as time for yourself. If you wanted to run a marathon nobody would blink if you told them you were getting up at 5am to train or that you were giving up your Sunday afternoons to do long runs. Treat writing the same way, time for yourself, time to do something you really want to do. Even if you have to work late into the night or get up at 5am. It’s worth it.

What’s next for you?

There will be a minimum of three books in the Claire Boyle series, book 2 is with the editor and I’ve just started book 3. So all going well there will be three books in the series initially and then I think I’d like to write something else. But I may well return to Claire after that – she’s a great character to work with.

TV Crime Log: Club, Leftovers, Legends & Strain

Crime Thriller Club very much covers the same territory we do here – crime fiction and TV – but it’s got Bradley Walsh going for it instead of The Fella.

*tumbleweed rolls past*

Anyhow. It’s returning for another six week series on ITV3, which is the channel your in-laws watch. Walsh is joined by some of the stars of the biggest crime thriller shows, goes behind the scenes of upcoming new crime dramas, and plays quizmaster as he sets out to find a ‘Criminal Mastermind’.

At some point in that last sentence we slipped into blurb speak, so we may as well print the rest of it:

Culminating in the glittering Crime Thriller Awards 2014 – the ‘Oscars’ of the crime thriller world – this series delivers exclusive access to the stars and sets of some of Britain’s best known crime thriller programmes – including much-loved shows like DCI Banks, Whitechapel and Silent Witness – as well as gripping new dramas like the BBC’s Interceptor.

Each week, Bradley interrogates a leading actor from a major crime thriller – including the likes of Robert Glenister and Stephen Tompkinson – and casts a forensic eye over the career of a literary Living Legend, profiling blockbuster authors including Robert Harris, Dean Koontz, Lynda La Plante, Michael Connelly, and Wire In The Blood creator Val McDermid.

Across the series, Bradley’s also aided and abetted by renowned authors including Adele Parks, Peter James, Mark Billingham and Kate Mosse, who join him to help review an outstanding new crime thriller book of the week – and we hear what inspired their creators, including Lucie Whitehouse, James Carol and Peter May.

So that’s Crime Thriller Club at 9pm on ITV3. Just keep pressing the down button on your remote and you’ll get there.

Just by hitting the return bar, we arrive at 9pm on Tuesday — or as you pedants like to call it: tomorrow —  and the beginning, on Sky Atlantic, of The Leftovers. Now this is not strictly a crime drama – but you know what? My blog, my rules.

Based on Tom Perrotta’s novel, it envisages a world three years after a certain proportion of the population are whisked off in the Rapture, and the population left behind feels very sorry for itself indeed.

The main guy in it, played by actor and scriptwriter Justin Theroux is the town sheriff – so there’s a crimey link if you really insist on one. The Leftovers has proved marmite in the US because of its insistence on focusing on the shattered personal lives of the people left wondering what happened to their disappeared loved ones rather than investigating its mysterious supernatural conceit.

Wednesday night sees the first episode of The Strain on Watch at 10pm. It’s a television adaptation of the trilogy written by Guillermo del Toro and Chuck Hogan – who wrote Prince of Thieves! It’s basically a modern-day retelling of Dracula, in which an airliner arrives at JFK, a la the Demeter, its lights off and doors sealed. An epidemiologist and his Disease Control unit is sent to investigate — and a vampire virus is unleashed on New York.

The first novel in The Strain trilogy was an interesting new take on ancient material. The second and third volumes, The Fall and The Night Eternal… not so much. Del Toro said he wanted to reinvent the vampire novel as a modern-day procedural.

So, in case you’re wondering whether to invest your precious hours in these serials, The Strain has been renewed for a second season — along with The Leftovers. The aim is to tell the entire trilogy over, er, four seasons. It stars the ever excellent Corey ‘Cards’ Stoll and David ‘Hartnell’ Bradley.

There’s more adapted drama on Sky 1 at the same time, Wednesday at 10pm. Legends is based on Robert Littell’s book of the same name. Sean Bean stars as Martin Odum, a Deep Cover agent who changes identities in the same way other people change their underwear. Which is, hopefully, a lot. Trouble is, Odum begins to wonder whether his own identity is also a lie.

It’s a great concept, but the ratings in the US have been somewhat tepid, and there’s still no word on whether it’s going to get renewed.

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: 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.

All The Fun Of The Festival

You writer types like to squirrel yourself away for most of the year to do your thing, I understand that. But building a career as a writer is also about getting yourself out there. Meeting other authors, building a platform, making connections and chilling,

You don’t need some idiot on a blog to tell you that, so you’ll know there are a couple of festivals on this weekend – they start today, in fact.

For the crime writers and readers among you, Bloody Scotland runs from today to Sunday in Stirling. Ann Cleeves, Arne Dahl, Denise Mina, Lee Child and Quintin Jardine are among the many authors attending the event.

Cleeves and Mina, of course, have been nominated for the Deanston Scottish Crime Book Of The Year 2013, which will be announced at the gala dinner.

Here’s the full list of nominations:

Ann Cleeves – Dead Water

Gordon Ferris – Pilgrim Soul

Malcolm MacKay – How a Gunman Says Goodbye

Denise Mina – The Red Road

Val McDermid – The Vanishing Point

Ian Rankin – Standing in Another Man’s Grave

There are crime writing masterclasses and a whole host of talks and events to keep you scribbling notes all weekend. And this being a crime festival I’m guessing there’ll also be a fully-stocked bar should you inexplicably require such a thing. For more details check out the link I have cunningly inserted above.

Aspiring writers will also get the opportunity to mingle with agents, publishers and editors at the Festival of Writing in York this weekend. Whether you write literary, romance, crime, sci-fi – whatever’s your bag — there are genres panels and workshops, mini courses and one-to-ones, competitions and a gala dinner – and the chance to network like mad.

Every year, apparently, a number of the delegates come away with agent and publishing deals, and that’s got to be good, right, after all that hard work, the highs, the lows, all those late nights and early mornings, that hour grabbed at lunch scribbling away.

Booking has closed for this year’s festival, but think about it for next year. Because whether you’re interested in the craft of writing, keeping up with the constantly-changing publishing environment, or just hanging with other writers, it’s the perfect jumping-in point to get to know the industry and the other crazy souls who are impelled to write shit down. And, who knows, you may even get to meet me there.