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.
