The Book Stops Here
Long ago when I was doing an English degree I chose an option on American Literature that involved reading a novel every week for a seminar. One week it was Moby-Dick by Herman Melville. It is a long novel – around 600 pages of densely written prose – and though I tried very hard, I […]
What to read in a hospital waiting room
I have a rare congenital eye disease and I have been going to Moorfields Eye Hospital in London for – well, let’s just say over forty years – sometimes travelling a long way to get there. It is an excellent hospital with a world-class reputation and over the years I have spent an awful lot […]
What’s your favourite crime-writer?
Now and then someone asks me who my favourite crime-writer is, as they did last night at my book-group. My mind always goes a blank and I mutter something about still loving Agatha Christie. Last night I did in the end manage to come up with Andrea Camilleri, Michael Connolly (recent worthy winner of the […]
Where were you when . . .
Some people have music on in the background when they are writing. I don’t tend to do that, but there is sometimes a particular piece of music or song that I associate with something I am writing. With Cold, Cold Heart, the Hank Williams classic actually gave me the title as well as playing a […]
I didn’t see that coming!
‘I’ve read so many crime novels that I’m rarely surprised by plot twists or startling solutions. So I was pretty sure that I knew where things were heading when I recently read Fredric Brown’s The Far Cry – but he totally pulled the wool over my eyes. What an ending! So, fellow fans of GA […]
Hidden Gems
‘They must have one,’ I said to my daughter, ‘all good hotels have one . . .’ and this was an lovely little hotel on the shores of Lake Garda. In the end I did discover it on a window sill along a little-used corridor: a small collection of books left behind by earlier visitors. […]
A Fresh Start
It is years, quite literally years, since my desk looked like this. In fact, has it ever looked like this? Today I at last got to work, vacummed cobwebs off the windowsill and washed the window. I took all the papers and miscellaneous stuff off my desk and sorted them and then I cleaned it. […]
Shortlisted for a CWA Dagger!
I was delighted to learn tonight that my story, ‘Accounting for Murder’ in the CWA Anthology, Mystery Tour, has been shortlisted for the CWA Short Story Dagger. Here is the announcement of the Dagger Short Lists in full. CWA Dagger Shortlists 2018 25/07/2018 by The CWA Latest news The Crime Writers’ Association announced the shortlists […]
My best ever buy in an Oxfam shop
It’s forty years since I bought the first of many books in an Oxfam shop. I know that because I have the book open beside me and the date is written inside: ‘July 1978’ along with the place: ‘Birmingham.’ It was a new book, The Oxfam Vegetable Cookbook by Rose Elliot, and it cost 75 pence. Did […]
The Case of the Missing Editor
Recently I was reading a novel by a well-known writer and came across the phrase ‘tyres hissing on the blacktop.’ That was fine, but then it was used again a few pages later. Similarly someone was described as ‘all squared away’ and soon after that someone else was also described as ‘all squared away.’ Am […]