Authors Electric

During the last year, my life has changed dramatically thanks to the people I've met and the books I've read. So when I had the opportunity to be part of World Book Night as a distributor, I was delighted. Yes, I know it was almost a month ago now, but hear me out. The Reading Agency's World Book Night took place on 23rd April this year. Their drive was to reach out to people in the UK who do not normally read for pleasure - and therefore 187,500 copies of 15 specially printed books - including titles from Ann Cleeves, Amanda Prowse and Sarah Hilary, to name a few - were distributed by reading enthusiasts. That included me. Sometime last year, I filled out an online registration form as to why I wanted to be involved, how I would distribute the books and choose the title I would like to receive. I didn't actually think I'd get chosen, but I did. I was given 16 copies of Ann Cleeves' short story, Too Good To Be True. It wasn't the book I had requested, ...

Me at Eshaness, Shetland Literary festivals aplenty both hither and yon have been honoured with my presence and performance, among them several Crime Festivals. The venues for these are becoming more and more atmospheric Noir-wise, especially with the burgeoning popularity of Scandi Noir. Last November, I was at Iceland Noir, snowmobiling on a glacier, enjoying the spectacular landscape in the four-ish hours of almost-daylight, and meeting some luminaries of Icelandic crime fiction, some of whom are now translated into English. This November, I again headed North, to Shetland for the eponymous Noir instigated by Ann Cleeves who has a series of novels based there, now on TV. View from my hotel bathroom... View from my hotel bedroom... bit wet out there. The festival got off to a thrilling start, with storm Abigail throwing our tiny planes with their cute little propellers all over the sky, until they stopped flying altogether (perhaps the rubber bands got tangled inside)....

Cracking crime! A while back, in this very blog, I came out as suffering from, or perhaps reveling in, Multiple Publishing Disorder. After making my name first of all as a poet, reducing, ditching and deleting to enrich my work, I then became a novelist. How to make a story that long, without padding! Ulp. Poetry, crime fiction, comedy fiction, stage and radio plays (of all lengths, and some including original songs), scientific articles, prose polemic/non-fiction, and a nice line in science-themed textual kinetic art installations became my lines of work: in other words, it was a shorter story to say that I wrote everything but short stories. Ooh missus!  As a reader, I love short stories (brilliant, intense, funny, scary, eg Char March's ' Something Vital Fell Through ' or Saki 's) and hate them (interminable inner monologues with long descriptions of cigarettes lit, coffee made and drunk, eg far too many I’ve been subjected to at spoken word events and ha...