Popped down the M4 to Bristol yesterday to attend CrimeFest 2022 where the CWA Dagger Awards Shortlists were due to be announced along with the Margery Allingham Short Mystery Award. Very surprised and chuffed to be announced as the winner, so many thanks to the Margery Allingham Society for choosing ‘Locked In’, the concept for … Read more …
Cameron Kyle has a small problem. It’s around 2mm wide and stuck in the middle of his brain. A bullet fragment; the same bullet that killed his best buddy wasn’t finished when it exited his body. A 1.5mm chunk still had enough velocity to enter Kyle’s skull, where it came to rest in the third … Read more …
The new DCI Brendan Moran novel is out NOW! For more details, please go to the books page.
I can’t believe it’s been so long since I wrote anything on this blog page. I say that every time. Well, here we are, right in the middle of a highly unanticipated situation across the entire globe. I only hope and pray that the virus will be conquered more rapidly and efficiently than current forecasts … Read more …
The latest in the series, ‘Silent as the Dead’ is proving to be the most popular DCI Brendan Moran book yet, and I’m curious to know why. I suspect it may be to do with the revelations of Moran’s early life in Ireland, and the way in which these events impacted his future. We learn … Read more …
I’m going to kill myself. I wanted to tell somebody, record something for posterity. Gives me something to do I suppose, while I wait. I’m not frightened. It’s getting hotter. [Pause] I was expecting that. I’ve got a torch with plenty of batteries, just in case. I want to make sure I can see what … Read more …
Cards on the table. I love paperbacks. New ones. The smell, the feel. The glossiness of the cover (or mattness – is that a word?). I love being in Waterstones, or any bookshop really, WH Smith being the exception (they don’t know what they are at the moment, do they? Bookshop? Fast Food outlet? Bric-a-brac shop?). Bookshops … Read more …
So now I’m told that, in the new world of agile authoring, I must produce three books a year. Or more, if possible. It’s possible, but is it beneficial? Author Jonathan Kaye completed his debut novel, After the Affair, in three years. He laboured over it, perfected it. I’ve not read it yet, but I … Read more …
Morse has his opera. Banks has a wider repertoire of taste: everything from Miles Davis to classical, to the Grateful Dead. Is music important in a novel? As a musician myself (I’m a drummer – hey, no drummer jokes, OK? 🙂 ), I was a little surprised recently when I realised that music isn’t strongly represented in the … Read more …