Scottish Authors Infiltrate Crimefest

Another year and another Crimefest, and no matter where I turned this year I kept bumping into Scottish authors. They were all over the place. You can’t keep a good Scot down!

So, this year I’m not going to write about all the various panels and what a good time I had. I’m just going to entertain you with a rogues gallery of the writers who weren’t fast enough to escape from me. So, here goes, in surname alphabetical order:

Lucy Cameron

Lucy Cameron. It was great to see Lucy on a panel this year after many years of attendance as a spectator. Lucy has just published her debut novel Night is Watching and I have it on my reading list. I talked to her before she took part in her first panel Nightmares and Trauma and she admitted to shaking in her shoes. But she put up a brilliant performance and I’m sure by her second debut authors’ panel she would have been in her stride.

Mason Cross

Mason Cross. I often meet Mason at CWA (Crime Writer Association) lunches so it’s always a pleasure to see him take part in these events. His Cat and Mouse: Playing with your readers on Friday, was a delight.

Doug Johnstone

Doug Johnstone. Author, journalist, and musician appeared early in the programme on Thursday, talking about the dark side of human nature in the panel What are you hiding?

Michael Malone

Michael Malone. It’s always good to catch up with Michael whom I’ve known for many years and it’s great to observe his success as an author who now has eight books to his name. I read his most recent one A Suitable Lie and it was a cracker, joining the relatively new domestic noir category of crime fiction.

Wullie McIntyre

Wullie McIntyre, who currently writes as W. S. McIntyre. I’d never met Wullie before although I’d brushed shoulders with him on Facebook, and I hadn’t realised he was a criminal defence lawyer. You would expect someone in this career to be somewhat formal but his presentation was humorous and it led me to start reading one of his books Present Tense, and I must say that although it is quite definitely crime fiction, I haven’t stopped laughing since page one.

Caro Ramsay

Caro Ramsay. Another author I’ve known for a long time and count as a friend, floated past me a couple of times with the promise from both of us that we’d meet up. But it didn’t happen, we both seemed to be spiralling in different directions. Next time, I’ll nail her to the floor.

Anne Randall

Anne Randall. I haven’t known Anne quite as long. I’m not sure whether it was last year or the year before we met. But she’s a lovely person and generated enough interest on her author panel, when she spoke about her books and writing, for me to download her first book Riven to my Kindle. I’ve made a mental note to myself that I must read this one ASAP.

Of course, I was also there having a whale of a time and, naturally, I’ve already paid my deposit for next year.

 

Chris Longmuir

Chris Longmuir

https://www.chrislongmuir.co.uk/

Amazon:   Author page

Dangerous Authors Meet at the CWA Conference

How do you like my new friend from the CWA Conference

I arrived in Edinburgh for the Crime Writers' Association conference with a suitcase that weighed a ton. However, once I’d offloaded books to Blackwell’s Bookshop it was a lot more manageable.

Hotel check-in went smoothly and I popped up to the seventh floor in the lift only to be faced with a small downward flight of stairs to get to my room. It reminded me of the time that SAW had their conferences in Blairgowrie, odd sets of stairs all over the place. Went down one set and then up another all on the same floor. The Queens Hotel in Harrogate was like that as well. Maybe it’s a feature of old buildings.

I think the poor duck is traumatised
by what he is seeing!

The room, once I got there was lovely. But why do hotels put masses of cushions on their beds. I only wind up heaving them on the floor. Oh, and because it was an Apex Hotel I had a room share with one of their plastic ducks! I found him perched in the shower soap tray

I was on the registration table and it was great meeting everyone as they arrived, ticking them off on the list, and issuing them with halyards while an army of volunteers presented everyone with a goody bag. Inside were some lovely books and a posh notebook as well as lots of other stuff.

As soon as registration was over it was off to the welcome reception with drinks and canapés and Ian Rankin in conversation with Alexander McCall Smith.

Alexander McCall Smith and Ian Rankin

Ian and Alexander had a wide-ranging conversation about Edinburgh and its influence on literature and crime fiction. They mentioned the grave robbers Burke and Hare, Deacon Brodie who was a respectable alderman during the day but who turned to burglary during the hours of darkness, the Stevenson family of lighthouse builders and the author Robert Louis Stevenson who preferred writing to joining the family business. And, of course, Arthur Conan Doyle who was heavily influenced by his time in Edinburgh.

Saturday morning arrived, bright and sunny, and after a superb breakfast, in the company of some of the other delegates, we embarked on the activities of the day.

Tom Halpin and Alex Gray

Tom Halpin, who was formerly the Head of CID Operations at Strathclyde Police and Deputy Chief Constable at Lothians and Borders Police, gave an entertaining talk which he called “Reflections of an optimistic detective”. The audience was spellbound as he regaled us with his experiences of various murders and the conflicting interests that arose during the course of investigations, plus his problems with the police hierarchy. Aly Monroe described his task as “a realistic and moving account”.

After the talk, there was a chance to mingle with the other delegates during the coffee break and to catch up with old friends and meet new ones. The atmosphere was electric and the room buzzed with voices.

 

Some of the goodies on offer at the coffee break

Lin Anderson and Lorna Dawson

Professor Lorna Dawson, Scotland’s top forensic soil scientist was on next with “The application of earth science to the criminal justice system”. Once again, this was an interesting and informative talk amply illustrated by slides.

Saturday afternoon was free time with two excursions on offer. One group set off for the Real Mary King Close which was a guided tour of the underground streets that lie below the High Street, otherwise known as the Royal Mile. The tour gives a flavour of what life was like in these narrow alleyways and is known for ghostly presences.

The second group was taken to the Writers’ Museum, a seventeenth-century residence close to Edinburgh Castle, which commemorates Sir Walter Scott, Robert Burns, and Robert Louis Stevenson. They then visited The Museum on the Mound which is part of the Bank of Scotland. On this part of the tour, there was the opportunity to see what a million pounds looks like and to try to crack a safe.

Others explored Edinburgh to suit themselves and there is certainly plenty to see in Edinburgh. I think all the delegates were impressed by the city and they certainly seemed to be enjoying everything Edinburgh had to offer.

Creasey Bell presentation to Martin Edwards by Susan Moody

Martin Edwards chaired the AGM which went smoothly. Following the AGM the Creasey Bell was presented to Martin by Susan Moody former chair of the CWA.

The gala dinner was the perfect ending to Saturday. The food was excellent, the company was good, and the evening was rounded off by the guest speaker, the Rt Hon Leeona, Lady Dorrian, Lord Justice Clerk, who entertained the company with an informative and witty after dinner speech.

I staggered up in the lift and then down the stairs to my room and collapsed into bed where I slept like the proverbial log.

Chris Longmuir with James Grieve

Sunday started off with a talk by James Grieve, professor of forensic pathology. He is a brilliant speaker who was highly entertaining, describing the highlights as well as the lows of his profession.

After the coffee break, Tom Wood, former Deputy Chief Constable at Lothian and Borders Police talked about “The Legacy of the World’s End Murders”. It was a fascinating account of an investigation which took 37 years before the killer was convicted of the murder of two girls in 1977. His partner in crime was by that time dead. I have a copy of Tom Wood’s book The World’s End Murders. It’s next on my list to read.

Tom Wood’s talk was the last thing on the agenda for the CWA conference, but we weren’t finished. An additional event had been arranged at Blackwell’s Bookshop where 26 authors met readers. It was speed dating with crime fiction authors. I was on a table with the Mulgray Twins and Wendy H Jones, and it was great fun.

 

Mulgray Twins, Wendy H Jones, and Chris Longmuir
at the Dangerous Authors event at Blackwells Bookshop

Finally, it was time to run for my train. It was the London to Aberdeen train which is about two miles long and, of course, I was at the wrong end of the platform for my carriage. I never knew I could still run!

Absolutely exhausted, I left Edinburgh behind. Roll on the next conference!

Chris Longmuir

website:  https://www.chrislongmuir.co.uk/

Amazon:  Author Page

Bloody Scotland Highlights 2015

It's that time of year again. It's time for my annual excursion to Stirling to attend Bloody Scotland. This is Scotland's very own crime writing festival, and it's hard to believe this the fourth year it has been running, and it just keeps getting better and better.

This year was slightly different though, because I took my thirteen year old granddaughter with me, and she had a ball. I have no doubt she enjoyed it because she wants to go again next year.

The other thing that was different was the hotel. The Stirling Highland Hotel was completely booked, so we checked into the Golden Lion. It was an older hotel, but the service and accommodation were top class, although the lift was deadly slow. On the other hand, we didn’t have to climb the hill to get to the hotel. I swear that hill up to the Stirling Highland Hotel gets steeper every year.

Because Amy was coming with me to Bloody Scotland, I had to wait until she finished school for the day, so we weren’t able to get to Stirling in time for the first event which was a shame because it meant we missed Val McDermid and Peter May in conversation. However, we were in time for Whose Crime is it Anyway, three top crime authors improvising a crime story on stage from clues and prompts from comedian Hardeep Singh Kohli, the audience, a spinning wheel, and phrases from a copy of Katie Price's (Jordan) autobiography. The authors, Caro Ramsay, Christopher Brookmyre, and Kevin Wignall, took up the challenge with gusto each one contributing and twisting the plot in turns. But just as they were getting into their stride Hardeep threw them a curveball from one of the prompts. Needless to say as the story developed it became more and more outrageous, and the writers more and more manic. It was a hilarious event and I'm sure the laughter of the audience must have been heard all over Stirling. This was a fantastic start to a great weekend.

The first event on Saturday morning was Forensics with Val McDermid and Lin Anderson. I had been looking forward to this, and it didn’t disappoint. They started the event off with the thing that most crime writers know, that when writing stories forensics is only a tool and that it is the character who creates suspense, But then they branched off into the rise of technology, and how this has impacted on storytelling. The discussion ranged over a wide-ranging variety of topics such as – computer science, maggots, blood spatter DNA, toxicology, soil forensics, and so on.

Some interesting facts came to light during the discussion. For example, did you know that flies can smell blood from a kilometre away, and even if they can’t get to them they will lay their eggs, even through zips if necessary? As for blood spatter, pigs are used to test this because their blood splatters just like human blood. The most interesting thing I heard about DNA was in relation to maggots. Apparently maggots tear flesh, and you can get fragments of DNA from between their tiny teeth. I’ll pause for a shudder here. Oh, and before I forget, there is a bone in your ear which can be analysed to reveal where your mother was living when she was pregnant with you. All very fascinating stuff.

Keeping up with forensic details is a massive task because science is constantly changing, therefore it is up to the writer to make things sound authentic. And a word of warning from Val – it’s the things you think you know that trip you up.

We attended other panels and events, but those two were the highlights as far as I am concerned. Although this year, because I had my granddaughter with me, I actually went to the football match – English authors versus Scottish authors (I’m not a football fan). It was hilarious and I found myself shouting, along with everyone else, when a goal was scored. And it resulted in a five all draw (I think). I believe that last year the Scottish authors won by fourteen goals to one.

All in all we had a great weekend, and arrived home on Sunday night absolutely knackered.

Chris Longmuir

http://www.chrislongmuir.co.uk/

Amazon

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Apple iBooks

ITunes Book Page UK

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Bloody Scotland on Tour

Bloody Scotland Panel - Val McDermid, Professor Sue Black (forensic anthropologist), and Stuart MacBride

Just in case you’re wondering, it’s Scottish Book Week, and Bloody Scotland is going on tour. If you don’t know what Bloody Scotland is, then it’s time you did. You see, Bloody Scotland is a crime festival that is held in Stirling every September. It’s been going for two years now, and was the brain child of Alex Gray and Lin Anderson, both of them well-known and best-selling crime authors. After thinking up the original idea of holding a crime festival in Scotland they were joined by crime authors, agents and promoters to form a committee to take the idea forward. The result was the highly successful Bloody Scotland.

Readers and writers travel from all corners of the globe to attend the festival and the tickets have been a sell out for both of the years it has been held. If you are thinking of coming along in 2014, I’d advise you book early. And if you do attend then you’re in for a treat because all the big names are there to entertain you. This year we numbered Lee Child, Jo Nesbo, and Christopher Brookmyre. Regular supporters of the festival include Ian Rankin, Val McDermid, and Stuart MacBride. There are many more, most of them well known crime authors, and the majority of them best-sellers.

Well, that’s enough about what Bloody Scotland is, and if you want to know more pop onto the website and check it out. Here is the link.

So, this year, for the first time, Bloody Scotland is going on tour. Here is the link for the tour programme. There are loads of treats at all sorts of venues, and a lot of best-selling crime authors appearing. Check the programme for details. But the thing I really wanted to share with you is that I will be part of a panel of authors appearing at the Steps Theatre in Dundee, on Monday 25th November, from 7pm to 8.30pm. The panel members will be Gillian Galbraith, Chris Longmuir (me), Gordon Brown, and Will Jordan. It’s going to be a great evening, so if you’re anywhere near Dundee on Monday why don’t you pop along to the Steps Theatre and join us in, what I hope will be, a lively session.

 Chris Longmuir

http://www.chrislongmuir.co.uk/

Amazon Author Page

Amazon UK

Amazon.com

Bloody Scotland on Tour

It’s a Crime

I was thrilled to be accepted as crime writer in residence for the Edinburgh eBook Festival because crime in all its aspects has always intrigued me, and I think I have been reading crime fiction and nonfiction most of my adult life. I even went to the extent of studying a course in criminology which I passed with flying colours.

So what is it about crime that fascinates me so much? Well, it’s simply my way of trying to understand what makes the criminal what he or she is, but at the end of the day it often comes back to the nature/nurture argument. Are criminals born to commit crime, or is it the influence of their parents, the type of parenting they had, the influences of their peer group, or what? I honestly don’t think there’s an easy answer, but the mindset of people who commit crimes is something I endeavour to understand.

Of course there have been various theories over the years. There were the physiological and biological theories which indicated that a criminal could be identified by the way he looked. Llombroso in particular believed that criminals were evolutionary throwbacks whose physical features included enormous jaws, high cheekbones, ape-like features, among other things. At one time it was thought that feeling the bumps on someone’s head could reveal whether or not they were a criminal. If only it were so easy! The biological theories in respect of criminology have now been largely discredited, but elements linger on in eugenics, as well as some popular ideas that ethnicity is linked to criminality. This is illustrated in the belief of some ethnic groups that they suffer from discrimination as well as police harrassment.

I find the psychological theories of more interest. There are humanistic, behavioural and cognitive theories through which crime and the criminal can be studied. And we are back to nature and nurture, with a bit of conditioning thrown in for good measure. But I’m sure you don’t want to know all the different theories, and which of those theories should take precedence when we consider criminals and crime. It is enough to state that the study of the criminal and the crimes they commit, continue to interest many people. Maybe that is the reason we read crime fiction and nonfiction. On the other hand, maybe it’s just because we like a puzzle to solve.

I gave a lot of thought to what I could do to interest you in crime writing in all its aspects and I thought I would study a spectrum of crime fiction. But where would I start?

Well, one of the main elements of most crime novels, is mystery. The story has to keep the reader guessing. So that’s where I thought I would start. Then I’ll work my way through the genres, starting from cosy crime, or as our American friends refer to it – cozy crime. As this is the Edinburgh eBook Festival though, I’ll stick to British spelling. So my first two posts will be mystery, followed by cosy, then I’ll work my way through all the different crime novel categories, finishing with noir crime, which is the darkest form of crime available, and a final post about serial killers in crime fiction.

But this involved an awful lot of reading and I didn’t want to dish up the authors everyone has heard about. I wanted new authors, the independent ones known as Indies, and I wanted to explore what was on offer. Now, it’s not possible to consider every author who has to published to Kindle so that meant I would have to compile a reading list, and I wanted the selection to be fairly random, maybe some authors I’d vaguely heard about, plus a good smattering of ones I knew nothing about.

I set about my task by checking the Amazon lists for different kinds of crime fiction, visiting the review sites to garner recommendations, then inspecting my choices. I read the Amazon reviews, and used the ‘Look Inside’ feature, then built my list. Now this can be risky because, although there are loads of good books published electronically, there can also be some that are somewhat lacking. So I decided that, if I hit any of the latter, I would read no further than I had to in order to make a decision, and would not include them in my posts. The only thing to remember is that the books I included are my choices, which may or may not appeal to you, but I hope it will give you encouragement to explore the world of Indie fiction, and I hope you won’t be disappointed.

It’s still time to come with me on this journey where I hope to discover many new authors along the way. And of course I’ll introduce them to you. So, let’s get started and hop over to the Edinburgh eBook Festival.

Chris Longmuir

http://www.chrislongmuir.co.uk/

Amazon UK

Amazon.com

Meet Jo Nesbo at Harrogate Crime Festival – Part 4

Finally it’s Sunday, the last day of the Harrogate Crime Festival and it’s up early to pack my suitcase. Now where can I put all those books I’ve bought, plus can’t forget to pack the bottle of Old Peculier that came in my goody bag. The only solution is to pack the canvas goody bag and carry it slung over my shoulder like a sack of potatoes.

 
Breakfast next, and I decide not to collect my flyers and bookmarks from the unwanted books table until after the first panel of the day – bad decision – when I went to collect them they’d all been binned. The Scot in me mourned the loss of my material, the hours spent preparing it, never mind the ink and paper. Ah well, that’s life. Next year I’ll be there a lot earlier.
 
The highlight of morning had to be the special guest, Jo Nesbo. The ballroom where all the events are held was packed, illustrating the popularity of this event. Jo Nesbo is one of the Scandinavian writers who have risen to popularity over the past few years. And he’s Norwegian, which means I have a special affinity with him because of my Norwegian grandfather, not that he’d know it, of course.
 

Mark Lawson interviewing Jo Nesbo

 

He was an entertaining speaker who expressed a reluctance to talk at events, however, he said he was forced by Mark Billingham to come. He claimed to be unable to write in his apartment and said he preferred to write on trains, planes and in airports, and that he was delighted when his plane was delayed. His main character is Harry Hole, which he said was a common Norwegian name which should be pronounced ‘Hoola’. The first of his books published in the UK was The Devil’s Star, although the first book in the series is The Bat, which doesn’t seem to be available in a UK or US version.

 
He took five weeks to write the first draft of The Bat, which is set in Australia, however, Harry Hole was not fully developed until The Redbreast, his third novel. The Bat – in Norwegian it is The Batman – is based on an Aboriginal myth about a half-man, half-bat, with links to the devil.
 
His second book, also unavailable in the UK or US, is The Cockroaches and is set in Bangkok, Thailand.
 
The Redbreast his third book is the first of the series available in the UK and US. It is set in the trenches outside Leningrad, on the Eastern Front, in 1944. When talking about this book he provided details of his family’s dynamics. His mother and her family were in the resistance during the Second World War, but his father was in the German army and fought Stalin, therefore they were on opposing sides. This was not unusual in Norway at the time because many people fought against the Germans, and many fought with them, but most people did nothing. As a result of his wartime career his father was imprisoned for two years after the war. The Redbreast was written using his father’s memories of the trenches, and as a result he considers this his father’s book.

Jo Nesbo

 

I found this session with Jo Nesbo interesting, fascinating, and I’m glad I didn’t miss it. Now, I really must read his books.
 
I won’t bore you with the details of my journey home, including train breakdowns, but before I left, I made sure I paid my deposit for next year’s Old Peculier Crime Festival at Harrogate. I wouldn’t miss it for the world.

 

http://www.chrislongmuir.co.uk

 

Harrogate Crime Festival 2012 – Part 3

I can hear you say – at last, thought we were never going to get Part 3 of the Harrogate Crime Festival. that’s because I took time out last week to write about the Edinburgh Ebook Festival, because if I hadn’t the festival would have been over before it was posted. Anyway, thank you for your patience, and here is day three of the Old Peculier Crime Festival at Harrogate.
 
Before I start I want to give you a link. Remember in the last festival post I commented on the furore around the panel Wanted for Murder: The Ebook, when feelings ran high and caused quite a bit of media buzz. Well, the Harrogate Crime Festival site has produced an audio download of the panel discussion. It will cost you £3, but if you want to get at the truth around all the hype in connection with this panel, then you might want to listen to it. Here is the link http://harrogateinternationalfestivals.com/crime/shop/wanted-for-murder-the-ebook/

Peter James and Paul Blezard

So, on to Day 3 of the festival. We started off at 9 am, some of us more bleary-eyed than others, with the special guest Peter James who was interviewed by Paul Blezard. He was interesting to listen to and gave us snippets of information about his background. Like the time he worked as a cleaner for Orson Welles, but was sacked after a week because he was ‘not cut out for it’. Similar to a lot of writers he was an obsessive reader as a child, so I suppose his progression to being a writer was to be expected, although he said his first two books were very bad spy thrillers. He also had a stalker for over 5 years, and was given advice by the police to step up home security because they could do nothing unless she killed him. Lots of fascinating information in this interview, although, considering the furore the day before about cheap as chips ebooks, his publisher sells one of his books on Amazon for 20p and he has no say in this.

 

Deadlier than the Male panel

 
I missed the Golden age and the New Blood Panels because I was chatting with Alex Gray and then went out for a welcome breath of air. The Deadlier than the Male panel was interesting. It looked at why women write violent crime fiction, and why the majority of it is bought by women readers. The main points I took from that were –

1.  Violence is associated with males, which makes it more horrific when associated with a female.

2.  Women have a much more terrifying imagination than men.

3.  Women crime readers want to know what makes the dark side tick.

 

Special Event: Luther

 

The Special Event: Luther was something special. The panel was made up of Neil Cross, the creator of Luther; Claire Bennett, the producer of the series; Simon Morgan, police adviser; and two of the show’s stars, Michael Smiley who plays Benny, and Warren Brown who plays Ripley. Neil Cross talked about wanting an iconic police character, a mad copper. He is a lover of the TV show, Columbo, and he wanted to put his mad copper into a Columbo format. I must say I never associated Luther with Columbo before, but as he is the creator I take it he knows what he’s done. The panel also talked about Idris Elba having a ‘presence’, and they never thought they would get him, but he was keen to star in the show. One thing came out that I didn’t know, was that Idris Elba has a soul singer career on the side. There was lots more, but if I detailed it we would be here forever. So I’ll close this panel with the information that the next show in the series – Series 3 – is carnage from beginning to end.

 

Laura Lippman interviewing Harlan Coben

 The last guest of the evening was Harlan Coben who was interviewed by Laura Lippman. Harlan is an excellent speaker and he told us that when he finishes a book, he is empty, and it is only the fear of having to work in a department store which impels him to write again. He says he suffers from a level of insecurity and insanity when he is not writing well. He took up golf a few years ago, but when he is doing something else there is a voice in his head which says he should be writing. But when he is writing he fluctuates between thinking it is crap or genius, and he suffers from lots of self doubt. This was something that appeared over and over again during this festival, the insecurity of writers, no matter how successful, who all fear that they will never be able to write another good book. There is also something else he shares with most writers I know, and that is, if he writes and no one reads it, he is not a writer. He also said that he keeps writing because he hasn’t written the perfect book yet, and he never will. All I can say is that Harlan Coben is a thoroughly nice man.

 

Quizmasters extraordinaire - Val McDermid and Mark Billingham

 Considering Harlan didn’t stop speaking until 9.30 pm you would be excused for thinking the day would be over, but you would be wrong. There was still the infamous Harrogate quiz night chaired by those most experienced quiz masters, Val McDermid, and Mark Billingham.

The Scarlet Ladies - Sonia, Justine, Me, and Isobel

 
The quiz is always hilarious with lots of cheating going on and much good natured shouting. I was in the Scarlet Ladies team, which also included Lucy, Isobel, Justine, and Sonia, and we came fifth, which wasn’t bad going. I was really glad we didn’t come first, not as if that was ever a possibility considering the competition we had. I was also glad not to win the raffle. I can hear you asking – why on earth would you want to lose? Well, the reason was the size of the prizes. Massive hampers that I would never be able to carry, let alone get on the train with, plus the largest pile of books to go along with it. There were several of the prize hampers plus books and I was really glad not to have to cart them off. Mind you, the top prize of next year’s Harrogate festival for two, all expenses paid was a beaut.
 
Well, that’s Day three finished, time to stagger to bed. There’s only Sunday morning to go now before it’s all over for another year. But I’ll tell you about Sunday the next time.

http://www.chrislongmuir.co.uk/

Harrogate Crime Festival 2012 – Part 2

Friday at Harrogate started out with John Connolly who was interviewed by Mark Billingham, and I’m not sure which of the two was most under the weather. John Connolly, of course is known for his Charlie Parker novels which are set in America rather than his native Ireland.
 

John Connolly in full flow at Harrogate

 
His first book, Every Dead Thing, took him 5 years to write and he was rejected by everybody. He said that in every book he’s written he reaches the stage where he thinks it’s awful but he still has to finish it, and his first book was no different, if he hadn’t finished it he would never have written another book. He thinks that doubt is the thing that makes a book, and that every writer is doubt ridden, they live in fear of rejection. He still lives in perpetual fear it will all fall apart and being dumped is just round the corner. This was an honest and entertaining interview and I noticed the fear of rejection was a constant theme that was echoed by many writers during the weekend.
 
It would be far too lengthy to describe all the panels that took place on Friday because the day was so packed, so I’ll only include the highlights as I saw them.

Crime in Another Dimension Panel at Harrogate

 

The second panel of the day which was based on novels with a science fiction or urban fantasy setting was hilarious. It frequently went off track, and I’m not sure we learned anything, but there was loads of humour and the audience laughed a lot.

 

Wanted for Murder: The E-Book panel at Harrogate

 
A mid morning panel was also lively but in a different way because this is a subject that is quite contentious. It had the title Wanted for Murder the E-book. The panel included a well known writer of e-books, Stephen Leather; bookseller Patrick Neale; author, Steve Mosby; agent, Philip Patterson; and VP of the Publisher’s Association Ursula McKenzie; which I thought was weighted more to the traditional publishing model than the e-publishing one. To me Stephen Leather seemed to be the only one really defending the e-book corner, and he took some whacks from the others as well as from the audience. I kind of felt a bit sorry for him, although he did put his foot in it several times. Still, it couldn’t have been a comfortable experience and probably knocked him off course.
 
Some interesting points that came out of the panel were:-

• Three years ago Little Brown, Publisher, were only selling 3% e-books, they are now selling 20% overall, and 30% fiction.
• Stephen Leather sold 5% the first year he published e-books, and last year he sold half a million. He is now selling three times more e-books than his traditionally published print books. He sees the future as being 90% in favour of e-books.
• There is no e-book market in Germany or France (maybe that’s why I haven’t sold any there!)
• The cheaper than chips argument – the notion that an e-book does not exist physically, does not mean they should sell for 49 pence, although when physical costs disappear they should be cheaper. There was a view that cheap e-books undermine all books, with the assumption that it is independent authors who are pushing cheap books. Interestingly it came out several times over the course of the weekend that MacMillan (traditional publisher) was offering 20 pence books on Amazon. (If you’re interested look up Peter James books)
• Publishers will not vanish with the advent of e-books because a lot of authors won’t want the hassle of doing the business side of things, therefore they will need a publisher and/or agent to do this for them.
• Book sales – the bookseller indicated hardbacks were selling better than ever and thinks it will only be paperbacks in jeopardy from the rise of e-books.
• Stephen Leather thought a fair price for e-books was 70 pence for short stories; £1.99 for novellas; and £3.99 for novels. However he does give away some free books as a promotion for his paid books.

Interestingly there was quite a bit of aggro from the audience at question time, with many of the questions aimed at Stephen Leather, and I understand that since the conference there have been a lot of quite vicious comments floating around on Twitter. Phew, who would think a panel could produce that kind of reaction.
 
Here are 2 links to follow up to get a flavour of that aggro:-

http://www.publishingebooks.blogspot.co.uk/2012/07/appearing-at-harrogate-plot-thickens.html

http://www.theleftroom.co.uk/?page_id=243 (there are now 2 posts in this one, read the bottom one first)

 

Writing for Your Life panel at Harrogate

 
Writing for Your Life was a panel of former intelligence agents and investigative journalists who went into detail about the risks involved with acquiring information for their books. I was quite interested in Tony Thompson’s book Gangs which I thought would come in useful in relation to my own writing. He was a really nice guy and I had my photo taken with him.
 

Tony Robinson and me

 
The day had passed quickly with loads of panels, and all of a sudden it was 8.30pm and time to listen to Kate Moss, the author of Labyrinth, and the evening’s special guest. She was interviewed by Dame Jenni Murray from BBC Radio 4, and Jenni can always get the best out of her interviewees. It was an interesting session and hearing Kate talk about Labyrinth which she wrote as an adventure story was enough to make me download it to my Kindle. I think one of the things that attracted me to it was her interest in myth, magic, folklore, and nonsense, the gap between logic and the dark part. Now how could I resist that.
 

Special Guest: Kate Mosse at Harrogate

 
I bet you’re thinking the day was finished when we left the session at 9.30pm, but you’d be wrong. There was still the Special Guests Late Night Conversation between Ian Rankin and Peter Robinson. This started at 10pm and was, quite frankly unusual and interesting. The stage was laid out like a pub, complete with beer pump, table and chairs. Ian and Peter sat at the table, beer glasses in hand, and just chatted. Every now and then they would get up and refill their glasses from the pump. It was as if the audience wasn’t there, and I reckon they must have been quite merry by the end. I liked Ian’s description of what they were doing – ‘Two old farts sitting at a table’. They covered a variety of topics such as:-

• Whether or not to watch their TV series. Ian prefers not to.
• The return of Rebus.
• Trends and changes in crime fiction and the rise of lots of new writers. They both thought it was a different world now with changes in technology, although there was still a place for traditional crime fiction.
• Screw ups.
• Music.
• Being in a band or group.
• e-books.
• The Killing.
• Scandinavian fiction.

They thought it was a bit scary how quickly the world has moved on, and that their earlier books seem historical now. There was lots more but I think I’ve given the gist of it. So, at the end it was time to stagger to our rooms, although many of the audience went there via the bar.

 

Peter Robinson and Ian Rankin in a late night conversation at Harrogate

 
It was the end of another exhausting but exhilarating day. I’ll bring you Saturday’s events the next time, so watch this space.

http://www.chrislongmuir.co.uk

Harrogate Crime Festival 2012 – Part 1

It’s that time of year again – the time all crime writers look forward to – the Harrogate Crime Festival, where crime writers and readers gather to celebrate crime fiction in all its varieties.

Old Swan Hotel, Harrogate, where the crime conference is held

I’m not entirely sure what you would call a gathering of crime writers – would it be a murder of crime writers? Maybe not, because we don’t want to be associated with crows. After all it’s a murder of crows, isn’t it? What about a massacre of crime writers? Do you think that would suit any better? If you have any ideas I’d love to hear them.

Anyway, whatever you call them, you won’t find a bigger gathering anywhere this summer, than Harrogate. They all gather at the Old Swan Hotel, that’s the one where Agatha Christie was found after her vanishing act more years ago than I care to remember.

This is the tenth Harrogate Crime Festival, although to give it its proper title I should be saying the Theakstons Old Peculier (yes the spelling is correct) Crime Writing Festival. The first one took place in 2003, and it was meant to be a small weekend of literature events that would be part of the larger Harrogate International Festival. However, probably because of the early involvement of Val McDermid, it was like Topsy, it grew and grew, until it is now the largest and most prestigious crime fiction event in Europe.

Over the years many of the biggies of the crime writing world have appeared at Harrogate, including PD James, Val McDermid, Ian Rankin, Alexander McCall Smith, and many more. Not forgetting our international counterparts such as Jeffrey Deaver (a favourite of mine), Michael Connolly, Lee Child, Harlan Coben, Jo Nesbo, I could go on and on. But you don’t want a list of names of the world’s most prestigious crime writers, do you? You want me to get on and tell you about this year’s festival. The only thing is, there is so much going on, there is no way I’ll be able to get it all into one blog post, so I’ll talk about each day in a separate post, so you’ll just have to watch this space

Well, I arrived on Thursday afternoon. There were people there before me because the festival runs a creative writing day prior to the opening events on Thursday evening. I have taken part in the creative writing day in past years and it is something well worth attending. But because I didn’t do it this year I won’t comment on it.

Mark Lawson, from BBC Radio 4 Front Row

The festival started on Thursday night with the presentation of the awards. Mark Lawson introduced this with a hilarious speech, and I’m sure the laughter could have been heard in Harrogate town centre. The locals must have wondered what was going on.

Some of the bits I remember was where he referred to Cambridge being like downtown Detroit, and Oxford as the most lethal town in England, while going for a walk in Suffolk was quite risky because you’d be lucky to return from it. He also reckoned that with the recent reported drop in UK crime figures we’d all soon be out of a job.

 

Colin Dexter, author of the Morse series

Mark Billingham then came on stage to announce the recipient of the lifetime award for an outstanding contribution to crime fiction. This was presented to Colin Dexter, by Simon Theakston, the festival’s sponsor. Colin entertained us with a short speech, laced with his usual dry humour, and he got a standing ovation from the audience. He was a very popular choice for the lifetime award. But I wasn’t surprised by this, because Colin is a lovely man whom I’ve had the honour to meet on several occasions, and I still treasure the photograph he gave me earlier this year, of his portrait which hangs in the Randolph Hotel.

After this came the presentation of the Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year award which was won by Denise Mina, for End of the Wasp Season. I’ve read Denise’s Garnethill trilogy and she’s a great crime writer, so I made a note to myself – get End of the Wasp season as soon as possible.

Denise Mina with the Theakston Old Peculier award for crime novel of the year

We finished up with the Festival opening party, which was mobbed and quite quickly became uncomfortably hot. However, no one seemed to mind and there was lots of networking, chatting and meeting up with old and new friends. I spent a fair bit of the time with Sonia, Lucy, Justine and Isobel, and we had a lovely time.

The top tier of the cup cake mountain at the festival party

Oh, and by the way, Justine is now my BFF because she told me she’d read my book, Dead Wood, and loved it. She also said she was reading another author (quite a famous one, who shall be nameless), and thought my book was the better of the two. Yay, The perfect end to a perfect day.

From left - Isabel, Lucy, Sonia, and Justine

Well, that’s Thursday taken care of, I’ll write about the Friday events in the next post, so watch this space, and I’ll try not to be too long.

http://www.chrislongmuir.co.uk