Sometimes ideas hit you. Sometimes they don’t. The latter sucks. When trying to come up with an idea for a crime novel or novella, the last thing you want to do is to sit around for weeks pondering dark [...]
There’s a story to be heard on every corner and every bar in Scotland, but why, we ask, are they normally of the dark and murderous variety? I moved here seven years ago and have been a tourist ever [...]
Why do us Brits love crime so much? I mean the genre and not crime as an extracurricular activity. But before I bang on about my love of solving a case from my comfortable station as an armchair detective, let [...]
Books, TV shows, documentaries, news broadcasts, popular music…it’s everywhere. Crime drama, mysteries, murders, and detective stories. As a nation we’re hooked on them. Well, I know I am, and looking at the top rated shows on TV, so are [...]
What’s a mystery without a sensational killer? Well, OK, not every fictional mystery needs a good murder, but every fictional assassin is almost always shrouded in a good mystery. So what makes a sensational killer then? Or, more specifically, an [...]
In 2014, the wife and I spent an evening with Val McDermid. Well, unfortunately, not only us three. We were only two among many listening to Val talk about her then new book, The Skeleton Road, at Norwich Theater [...]
So, this was Ylva’s first Young Adult/New Adult month ever! A lot of authors blogged for us about topics related to queer YA/NA. In case you missed some of the great posts, we collected all of them. In June, [...]