Tag: crime Page 13 of 15

Guest Blog from Lucy V Hay – 3 HABITS OF EFFECTIVE BOOK REVIEWERS

On August 19, 2016

In Blog, Contemporary fiction, Contemporary Romantic Fiction, crime, Fiction, review, writing tips

Today I’m joined by my friend and Devon Writers business partner, Lucy V Hay – this is advice you can’t afford to ignore.

Over to you Lucy…

3 HABITS OF EFFECTIVE BOOK REVIEWERS

by @LucyVHayAuthor

1)They know what they like. I’m a big ‘grip lit’ fan – in other words, I’m most interested in female protagonists who are probably NOT police (or other related authoritative figures). I like mysteries, thrillers, unreliable narrators and characters who are not your ‘usual’, meaning I like diverse casts and I don’t feel have to necessarily ‘like’ characters to relate to their journeys. Plot-wise, I like strong concepts and prefer a fast pace with unexpected twists and turns. I favour psychological torment over actual graphic violence generally speaking. In terms of writing style, I like prose that’s lean, visual and sharp, almost literary.

That’s not to say I never read male protagonists, police procedurals or novels with torture and splatter in. I even read romance from time to time! But I favour ‘grip lit’ because ultimately I want to be entertained. Obvious, really!

effective book bloggers

BOOK REVIEWER TOP TIP: Know who you are, what you like and let people know – then you’re more likely to be approached by publishers, small presses and individual authors who have ARCs you would love to read.

2) They know their opinion is one of many. I don’t see the point in ‘hate reading’, so I always stop reading if I am not enjoying a book. My time is limited as a busy working Mum of three, why would I waste it on something I am not enjoying? What’s more, I never review books I haven’t finished. But most importantly, I recognise that just because I don’t like a book, doesn’t mean someone else won’t LOVE it! As book reviewers, we have to realise our opinion is just one of many.

BOOK REVIEWER TOP TIP: If you’re not enjoying a book, why not pass the baton on to another reader? You could always say to the ARC giver, ‘this wasn’t for me, but I think X would love it’.

3) They have a strategy. I keep a record of the books I’m reading and have read via my Goodreads page, plus I share my top crimefiction picks based around a theme on my ‘Best of 3’ feature on my blog. I also try and post to my blog at least twice a week, plus five or six times in Facebook groups and Twitter chats about reading and writing. In other words, in any given week, my fellow readers should hear approximately ten times from me.

But it’s NOT all about me and what *I* like: I also invite fellow crime fiction fans to submit THEIR ‘Best of 3’ picks to my blog, plus I also invite authors and screenwriters to take part in an interview feature called Criminally Good. Once a month, I’ll do an author chat on my FB page, CRIME, INK too

BOOK REVIEWER TOP TIP: Decide in advance how you will build up your platform. And try and stick to the 80/20 rule – if you’re talking about yourself and your site 20% of the time, make sure you’re taking about others (and their books or picks!) 80% of the time!

Good luck out there!

***

Lucy Hay

BIO: @LucyVHayAuthor is currently writing her first psychological thriller novel. She is also a script editor for movies and has written the nonfiction book, Writing & Selling Thriller Screenplays (Kamera Books). Join The Criminally Good Book Club to sign up for news, offers and giveaways.

***

Many thanks Lucy.

Jenny x

Guest Post from Nell Peters: Birthday Sharing

By Jenny Kane

On July 31, 2016

In Blog, Contemporary fiction, crime, Fiction

Somehow we’ve reached the end of another month, so I’m handing over my site to the lovely Anne Polhill Walton- aka crime writer- Nell Peters. Once again Nell has provided a brilliant blog- although a certain Mr Connery may not think so…you’ll see what I mean!

I urge you my friends, to read right to the bottom of the blog today. Life is full of twists of fate, some kind, some not so kind…

Birthday cake

Thank you, Jenny – and hello again, everyone J

As I mentioned in my last post here, Jenny and I celebrate our birthdays in July – both on the 13^th in fact. Unlucky for some – most especially me, as I was born on a Friday, according to my mother … which explains a lot. So, too late now for you to shower us with impressive gifts this year, but most definitely a red-letter date in your 2017 diary. We share our big day with Sir Patrick Stewart, who boldly went – although not being a fan of Star Trek, Captain Kirk was at the helm last time I saw the programme. Then there’s Ian Hislop of Private Eye, who has also on occasion boldly gone, but in his case into print, closely followed by a court appearance, defending a libel case. Harrison Ford joins the line-up too, he of Han Solo and Indiana Jones fame. I’ve never seen Star Wars – do I sense a theme here, as in I seem to avoid anything with ‘star’ in the title? I do quite like Starbucks however, but only for tea as I don’t drink coffee (just don’t tell coffee addict Jenny!)

With four sons, I was unable to avoid all the Indiana Jones films – did I really read recently they are making another? Seriously? Harrison Ford is well into his seventies and his on-screen father, Sean Connery, is more than ten years older than that! They’ll surely be cavorting around, wronging rights from their bath chairs? Probably pushed around by scantily-clad beauties, though, as Hollywood OAPs are somewhat more attractive than the common or garden variety – they perhaps don’t need their Winter Fuel Allowance either, in sunny California.

There is a Connery connection to Jenny – not Sean, but his nipper Jason (he of the long, flowing locks), who played the eponymous role in the last of the Robin of Sherwood TV series many years ago. Where does the Jenny link come in, I hear you ask – go on, please ask, or I’ll have to think of something else to prattle on about (imagine a sad, pleading face here – oh, and violins playing). Well, Jen has had a bit of a thing about Robin Hood since she was a wee gel – one of her books is even entitled Romancing Robin Hood (and a sequel is brewing) – you don’t get much more dedicated than that. After a gap of thirty years, surviving members of the original TV cast have reprised their roles in The Knights of the Apocalypse – an audio drama crowdfunded by fans. We could speculate that they went for an audio production because there simply wouldn’t be enough Polyfilla available for the cast to appear recognisably on screen, but that would be cruel. I have seen a pic of Jason C, however – gravity has taken effect with a vengeance and his only hair now is sprouting from his chin. Whatever … while our ardent groupie Madam Kane managed to blag a ticket and hobnob with the stars at the premier performance (I’ve seen those pics too!), for me the best thing is that the production company is called Spiteful Puppet – genius name!

I digress: our communal birthday was on a Wednesday this year, but both Jen and I had the main event the weekend before – in my case, a family invasion for a BBQ on the Sunday. #4 son arrived early with his family, acting quite strangely (not wholly unusual), and holding a large cardboard box. When I asked what was in said box, he said he’d brought a load of crisps along because it’s not something we ever buy (true) and guests might just fancy a scrunch or two. He then sat me down and told me to immediately open the gift he shoved under my nose – a large bag of Pavlova the chicken’s favourite bird seed was revealed. Card next; on the left hand side were the questions ‘Do you know who Svetlana Alexievich is?’ and ‘What is she famous for?’

I coaxed the long-dormant brain cell into life and gave him my answers, before being dragged outside (in my slippers! Tsk!) to inspect the crisp box … even I (Miss Hopelessly Naive 1802) was beginning to smell a rat by then. When the box was opened and tipped up gently on the grass, not a rat but a chicken emerged! A sister/playmate for Pavlova! Double trouble! And she had already been named Svetlana after the Nobel Lit Prize winner by #4 (maybe the school fees weren’t 100% wasted, after all?)

Bluebell

Svet is a magnificent Bluebell hen – her plumage has a definite blue hue in a certain light, and she was sixteen weeks old when she moved in. She is bigger than Pav with feet large enough to support a strapping 25 lb turkey, perhaps even a Pterodactyl. #4 lives more rurally than us and he chose Svet from a farm local to him, where numerous birds were housed in a large pen with a sandy floor. She was picked up on BBQ day and transported to her slightly more glamorous life – a third of an acre with grass underfoot – on the back seat, just as carefully strapped in as the GDs.

chicken Pavlova was doing one of her nesting stints when Svetlana arrived and so they didn’t meet until the next morning, when Pav came to feed – she was a little put out, but feathers didn’t actually fly and since then, while not yet bosom (or chicken breast) buddies, peace has been declared and there is no battle of the beaks to rule the roost. They really couldn’t be more different in personality (yes, they do have personalities!) – while Pav is quite skittish and aloof, rather like a cat who tolerates our presence as long as we know our place and keep her well fed, Svet is really laid back and friendly and follows us around like an adoring puppy. She doesn’t even mind the Grands chasing her and also talks incessantly (which the old chick on the block has never done, apart from very loud crowing when she thinks it’s chow time) making sort of mewling noises, rather like a Moomin with feathers.

Finally, I have reached the conclusion that the OH has been around my warped sense of humour for way too long and has lost his immunity. When no one was looking, he retrieved one of those Nando’s chicken on a stick things (liberated from the restaurant years ago by one of the boys) and stuck it in the grass by the communal food receptacle. Really!

Nandos Toodles! NP

***

PS-

OK, that was my original post for Jenny, written a couple of weeks in advance.

I’m so very sad to report that both Pavlova and Svetlana have since been killed – most likely suspect a cat new to the neighbourhood, that I’ve spotted in the garden at all hours of the day and night.

I know this is a first world problem – that there is dreadful carnage and unimaginable human suffering globally, to which the loss of two spoiled chickens cannot possibly compare, but I do so miss them. For instance, there is no one to greet me when I take an early morning stroll in the garden – they’d spot me a mile off and speed toward me with their silly run-trot, Pavlova making the most unholy din. Of course, I realise they were after food and not my scintillating conversation, but they always made me smile. And Svetlana, being a cheeky young upstart, had taken to sitting on the back door mat if the door was open, a few yards away from me when I was using my lap top at the table – just hanging out.

Goodbye, and thank you, little feathered friends. XX

***

Many many thanks fro such a great blog Nell. I shall certainly miss hearing about your chicken friend’s adventures. Pavlova in particular had become a very definite character in her own right. Thank you for sharing so much of her mischief with us on this blog. Hugs. Jenny xxx

(I can’t begin to imagine what the very lovely Mr C junior is thinking if he is reading this right now!!)

***

Bio

Nell Peters writes psychological crime novels and is published by Accent Press. Her next protagonist is going to be a chicken.

By Any toher name bus

mybook.to/BAON

Hostile witness bus

mybook.to/hostilewitness

Guest Post from Jackie Buxton: Glass Houses

By Jenny Kane

On July 15, 2016

In Blog, Contemporary fiction, crime, Fiction

I’m delighted to welcome Jackie Buxton to my blog today. Jackie is currently celebrating the launch of her brand new novel, Glass Houses, and is sharing some of the background- and a juicy extract- with us today.

Over to you Jackie…

BLURB

‘When she sent that text, all our lives changed for ever…’ 51 year old Tori Williams’ life implodes when she sends a text while driving on the M62 motorway and allegedly causes the horrific crash in which three people die. Public and press are baying for her blood, but Tori is no wallflower and refuses to buckle under their pressure or be a pariah in society. Instead, she sets about saving the nation. But can she save Etta, the woman who saved her life? Or will Etta’s secret be her downfall? This incredibly topical and contemporary morality tale appeals across generations and will find favour with fans of authors such as Liane Moriarty, Marian Keyes and Kathryn Croft.

Glass Houses COVER

BLOG POST

Many years ago, the picture of a car crash, with a woman slumped over the steering wheel, and a stranger holding her hand until the emergency services arrived, pressed itself into my brain so forcefully that I was worried I was having a premonition about a real life incident. I wasn’t, thankfully. Instead, it seemed the gods of book writing had sent me the idea for my novel: one with a guilty protagonist, who could be any one of us. As I started to plot Tori’s character, a driver who texts from the wheel and becomes Public Enemy Number One, I realised that two separate news items were really behind the car crash image.

The first was the face of Gary Hart, the driver of the Land Rover involved in the Selby rail crash in 2001. He’d had little sleep the night before, chosen to drive the next day, and fallen asleep at the wheel with the most tragic of consequences. It was a horrendous scene. 10 people died, 82 were seriously injured and Gary Hart survived.

He was public enemy number one.

But when I saw his face in the media, I kept thinking that his wasn’t the face of a killer, it was the face of someone who’d done something stupid, selfish perhaps, but not intentional. His life would also be changed forever. Maybe he didn’t need us to chastise him any more than he would chastise himself. It was easy to criticise him – he doesn’t come across well in front of the camera – and people did. But I couldn’t help thinking that I’d driven tired before. I’d been lucky. There was no perfect storm for me, I managed to get off the motorway before something catastrophic happened and we all lived to see another day. I wondered if Gary Hart was any more guilty than I was, just because the consequences of his actions were so very different.

The second news item was the film of the charismatic mother of a boy who’d been killed in the 7/7 London bombing in 2005. She stood on a box in a crowd and everybody listened. She wasn’t talking vengeance, hatred and justice, she was talking about forgiveness. I was struck by how much more powerful and effective this type of reaction was, than the undoubtedly human and more usual reaction of anger and revenge.

This shot me back to a childhood thought which has appeared and re-appeared all though my life. It’s the paradox of the human condition. How often do we hear people say, Oh, we all make mistakes,’ and, ‘Nobody’s perfect, we all have our foibles,’ and yet we see families feuding, colleagues resigning and neighbours not speaking because they are not able to forgive someone who didn’t behave ‘perfectly’. Sometimes this anger lasts a lifetime and beyond. As a child, and a rather idealistic adult, I couldn’t help feeling that the world would be a better place if we didn’t get quite so cross or, perhaps more importantly, we endeavoured to become ‘uncross’ as quickly as possible.

By the way, I’m not pretending I’m perfect. That’s the point, really.

I wanted to explore forgiveness, guilt and atonement and the image of the woman slumped over the wheel, with a stranger willing her to stay alive, gave me Tori and Etta and the framework to get started. I chose a text sent from the motorway to be Tori’s crime. I wanted it to be something that was a conscious act that most of us would find abhorrent, and yet if we looked closer, we might find we’d done similar ourselves. I wanted to play with this phenomenon that people can be guilty because it happened and not guilty because it didn’t. My dream for Glass Houses is that as well as being entertained by Tori and Etta’s stories, not to mention Tori’s antics as she clumsily tries to re-build her life and Etta’s ability to self-destruct, readers will be interested in this conundrum, too.

***

Extract: the beginning of the first chapter

THERE WAS BLOOD on the steering wheel. Etta stared at her fingers as they gripped the rim. She uncurled them, flexed them in and out, then turned over her hands to examine the grooves in her skin. She smiled – a surface wound. Just a surface wound. Her half-chewed nails had plunged into her palms.

She patted her face, her arms, her legs: everything was in place. Her neck was stiff but it moved. Her feet ached so she lifted one and carefully replaced it, then lifted the other. Nothing broken. She undid her seatbelt, leaned back against her seat and forced out a long, whistling sigh.

“Thank you,” she whispered, looking up as if to acknowledge the powers-that-be who’d looked after her.

She wrinkled her nose. Her eyes darted to the foot well where she saw her flask smashed into too many pieces to count, drowned in a puddle of milky coffee. She reached for her phone where it had fallen, narrowly missing the liquid, but she froze before she could lift it to her ear. Her engine had cut and the radio silenced but it was more than that. She placed the phone on her lap. The silence was too loud.

In the rear-view mirror she saw stationary vehicles. She held her breath, cast her eyes to the side, to the stream of cars travelling as if in slow motion in the other direction. Tentatively she turned back to the front. The smashed side window of the Jeep was only a few paces ahead of her.

Not again.

“M62, yes, eastbound.” She picked her way quickly over the mess of twisted metal and fragments of glass, covering her mouth against the stench of burning rubber. “Junction? I don’t—”

She dropped her phone, stared at the door to the Jeep which had come away in her hand. It was heavy. She let it fall and covered her ears as it smashed against the ground. She bent down to look inside the Jeep. Her body crumpled and she sank to her knees.

***

Bio

Jackie Buxton is a writer, editor and teacher of creative writing, living in Yorkshire with her husband and two teenage daughters. Jackie used her recent experience of an aggressive form of breast cancer to inform and dispel some myths about a cancer diagnosis via her popular blog: Agenthood and Submissionville. Her posts became the frame-work of self-help memoire, Tea & Chemo (Urbane Publications, November 2015) which receives heart-warming feedback, and has a five star rating from over 75 reviews. Jackie’s award-winning short stories can be found in three anthologies, as well as appearing regularly in Chase Magazine. When not writing or reading, over-seeing house and teens, Jackie can be found running, cycling or tripping up though the beautiful Yorkshire countryside.

Tea & Chemo cover

***

Links

Website: www.jackiebuxton.com

Blog: http://jackiebuxton.blogspot.co.uk

Glass Houses: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Glass-Houses-Jackie-Buxton/dp/1910692840/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=&sr=

Tea & Chemo: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Tea-Chemo-Fighting-Cancer-Living/dp/1910692395/ref=pd_sim_14_2?ie=UTF8&dpID=51VarAHlbnL&dpSrc=sims&preST=_AC_UL160_SR104%2C160_&psc=1&refRID=40W7ZSYWXQPDFB32377Z

***

Many thanks for dropping by today Jackie. Good luck with your new novel.

Happy reading,

Jenny x

Guest Post from Nell Peters: About 100 Years Ago…

By Jenny Kane

On June 30, 2016

In Blog, Contemporary fiction, crime, Fiction

I’m delighted to welcome back Nell Peters for her second ‘end of month’ guest blog of the year! This is a cracking (and I don’t just mean Pavlova’s eggs) blog post…

Over to you Nell…

Hi Jenny!

I’m afraid that Pavlova the chicken is on the naughty perch at the moment and can’t come out to play. All the attention and fan mail she received after last month’s blog post went straight to her comb and she’s behaving disgracefully. A real poultry diva, in fact. She’s been horribly mean to birds that she deems inferior, has been strutting her stuff like she owns the place and making such a noise, Tim Peake can probably hear her up in his space station. But worst of all, she’s taken to leaving very large deposits right outside the back door. Eeew! That’s it – I’m withdrawing the oxygen of publicity that she craves even more than her dried meal worms, and whether this is a permanent or temporary measure depends entirely upon her behaviour in the immediate future. She can put that in her beak and smoke it. Pavlova is in the hen house.

chicken

Now where was I?

Oh yes, I took a short break recently to meet up with an old friend. About a hundred years ago, I used to share a flat in Kew Gardens with someone I will refer to only as M, to protect the guilty. In case you were wondering, Kew Gardens is a place (now referred to as a village by those fortunate enough to be able to afford the zillion pound price tags of property there) in West London and not just the hallowed centre of horticultural excellence – ergo, we didn’t actually live in a potting shed. There was another girl too – Valerie, but M and I knew each other from ghastly temp jobs we had with British Gas and Valerie was a bit of an also-ran. I wonder whatever happened to her – she was something of a miserable cow (turned her nose up at the rot-gut sherry we used to drink by the bottle, I can’t imagine why) and totally lacked any sense of humour as I recall. Some sort of local government worker, I think, which could explain the comedic bypass.

On Friday evenings M and I used to frequent the local wine bar, run by a rather brassy dame in her forties (she seemed ancient to us then!) who had very amusing affectations, airs and graces, until she’d had one too many glasses – which she did frequently – then all hell let loose and dancing on the tables ensued. Not a pretty sight, as she was a rather large lady, who either didn’t believe in or chose not to invest in controlling underwear. Brassy wasn’t the only entertainment to be had chez Garfield’s – a guy used to sing and play acoustic guitar (both badly), expecting punters to buy him copious amounts of alcohol to keep his tonsils irrigated. It was actually worth buying him a glass or two for the bliss of silence during the (all too short) time it took him to neck the booze.

Kew is within a long stone’s throw of Richmond upon Thames, just two stops on the Tube – where we could have had a much wider choice of great venues to sup the vino, most with some form of decent live music, but there’s a lot to be said for being a short walk from home when the time comes to stagger out the door of a hostelry, especially in Winter. Besides, I always suspected that M used to fancy the singer and that terribly attractive aggressive snarl he shared, if nobody applauded his questionable vocal efforts.

Kew Gardens

I was at the flat for only a short time before I got a proper job and moved in not a million miles away with the OH. Valerie and M let my vacant room to a rather dishy Australian guy – and were both bitterly disappointed when they found out he was gay. Unfortunately, he repaid their hospitality by hightailing it back to Oz less than three months later – perhaps he suddenly remembered where he’d left his didgeridoo.

M’s life and mine took very different directions; over the years, I produced a few sprogs and we moved the family to a falling-down house in Norfolk. M visited as frequently as she could and, child duties permitting, I went to see her for some very welcome R&R. Wine was drunk. In abundance. She neither married nor had children – perhaps being the oldest of six had put her off – and eventually moved back to Scotland, from whence she hailed. The visits in both directions became less frequent because of the sheer distance involved and the responsibilities that life throws at us – it didn’t help that the OH would spend long periods working overseas, leaving me in sole charge of four smelly boys.

But children grow more independent with age and gradually they were no longer tied to my apron strings, so a new period evolved in the social lives of M and me. For several years, we have been meeting up intermittently in a variety of UK locations (let’s hear it for bargain air fares and cheap deals on train fares!) – for instance, Edinburgh, Dublin and Newcastle, the latter where we took in the most excruciating ‘Emperor’s New Clothes’ art exhibition (for want of a better description!) at the Baltic Centre. Well I say ‘took in’, but M stomped off in her size eight Doc Martens after about ten seconds – mumbling obscenities – to stick needles in her eyes. But was it art? Actually, no. A bit of a turkey is the kindest description I can manage – but I suppose you have to admire the exhibitor’s nerve. Plus, it was a few years ago now and I can still recall its sheer ghastliness in some detail (I didn’t have M’s nerve to exit, stage left, in a flurry of outrage at the flagrant waste of tax payers’ moolah, and persevered) so it did make an impression of sorts.

We met again most recently in Cambridge – I am now granny to six and M has a huge number of nephews, plus just one niece, so two old ladies sitting in deckchairs, to paraphrase Morecambe and Wise. J She took (very!) early retirement and is travelling a lot, so I was lucky she could fit me in! In all likelihood we will never again Run the World with Bob Geldof (though I’m not sure that he actually ran the first time!), or go on severely bracing hikes here, there and everywhere – or indeed puff, pant and wheeze our way to the top of Arthur’s Seat. That always sounds faintly rude, somehow. I did draw the line, though, at accompanying M to a Wham concert – she bought herself the most awful bright blue synthetic cap thing with ‘George’ plastered all over it, and actually wore it there and back on public transport!

Our main exercise now when we are face to face is talking, catching up generally – and, of course, drinking wine, though not so much as we used to as we’re older and so much wiser. Yeah right!

Just to prove what a wino I am (it was M’s fault – she led me astray), even my two crime novels published by Accent Press are drawn to the bottle.

Nell Peters books

Hostile Witness can be found at mybook.to/hostilewitness and

By Any Other Name is at mybook.to/BAON

See you next month for some more drivel? By the end of July, both Jenny and I will have celebrated our birthdays – actually on the same day, although I suspect she’s decades older than me … J NP

***

Another wonderful blog!! Many thanks Nell!

I shall be raising my coffee up to you on 13th July.

Happy reading,

Jenny x

Festival-ing: Tiverton Literary Festival 8-12th June

By Jenny Kane

On June 1, 2016

In Blog, Books For Children, Contemporary fiction, Contemporary Romantic Fiction, crime, Fiction, Historical fiction

Hello my lovely friends.

You may have noticed a dip in the number of blogs appearing on my site over the last couple of weeks. There is a very good reason for this. I’ve been neck deep in organising- with my two lovely colleagues- this year’s Tiverton Literary Festival!

Only a week away now, the last minute rushing around and sorting out things to make sure the festival runs smoothly is in full flow! It’s amazing how many tiny tasks are involved in event organising, and I take my hat off to anyone who does it for a living.

The line up really does offer something for everyone. We have poetry, romance, crime, writing workshops, a writer’s market, a children’s story trail, historical research, journalism, and even a tiny touch of erotica.

To make the week extra special, we’d love to see you there too!

Tiv Lit 2016 - main poster

Tickets for the events can be purchased online from www.tivlitfest.co.uk, or (if you are local enough) from Reapers on Bampton Street, and Tiverton Library.

Happy reading everyone!

Jenny xx

Tiverton Literary Festival…Not Long Now…

By Jenny Kane

On May 14, 2016

In Blog, Books For Children, Contemporary fiction, Contemporary Romantic Fiction, crime, Fiction, Historical fiction

For the past 5 months, my colleagues and I have been working our little socks off, so that we can bring you another brilliant book event.

Tiverton Literary Festival, 8th-12th June 2016

Tiv Lit - K Fforde and Judi

Our line up includes worldwide best selling author, Katie Fforde,

Michael Jecks, Katie Griffin, Ruth Ware, (a stunning trio of best selling crime writers),

Tiv Lit 2016 - Crime

and Jonathan Green (Dr Who fans DO NOT MISS THIS).

Tiv Lit 2016 - J Green

Not forgetting, Kate Lord Brown (with a brilliant writing masterclass); Marissa Farrar (back with her Self Publishing Workshop by popular demand), historian, writer, and radio presenter, Suzie Grogan; Rough Guide Writer and novelist, Rebecca Hall; renown journalists Fasial Islam and Alex Sehmer; novelist Laura Wilkinson and myself, talking about writing without agents or big publishers, and much much more!

Tiv Lit 2016 - K LBrown

On the Saturday (11th June, from 10am) we will be wandering through town with our children’s story trail. There will also be an authors’ market in the grounds of St George’s Church, Fore Street, Tiverton; where writers can sell their books, sign, and chat to the public and each other. If you would like to reserve one of these tables (free of charge) please contact me via info@tivlitfest.co.uk to reserve your space.

All the details about the events, and the link to buy tickets, are on the website- www.tivlitfest.co.uk

tivvibadge_website a

I would recommend securing those tickets very soon. Especially for the workshops, the tea with Michael Jecks and myself, and the ‘Real Life of an Erotica Author’ evening, as places are limited…

See you there!

Jenny x

My First Time: Patrick Whitehurst

By Jenny Kane

On April 27, 2016

In Blog, crime, Fiction, Interview

Today I am joined by a good friend from the other side of ‘The Pond’. Patrick Whitehurst is a multi-talented, multi-genre author. He first came to my attention with his erotic writing, but is now best known for his fabulous ‘Barker Mystery’ crime fiction. So, how did it all begin?

Over to you Patrick…

First Time

Can you remember writing the first story you actually wanted to write, rather than those you were forced to write at school? What was it about?

The first story I wrote that I actually wanted to write was a short story about a man in a cabin who fought off a werewolf attack. The story was likely influenced by my love for Stephen King. I was 16 at the time.

PW-1

What was your first official publication?

My first published story was a non-fiction humour piece about Valentine’s Day that appeared in the Arizona Daily Sun, a daily newspaper out of Flagstaff, Arizona.

What affect did that have on your life?

From that point on, my short non-fiction and even art began to appear more and more in northern Arizona publications, which led to college and a degree in journalism.

Does your first published story reflect your current writing style?

Not at all! Back then I tried to sounds smarter and write with my humour than I do these days. For me, the simpler the style the better and the more accidental the humour the better.

Mantula Cover-2

What are you working on at the moment?

I am currently editing “Mantula,” the story of a man born into the body of a tarantula. He teams up with a quail, himself a former meth addict, to find a cure for their affliction. With Catholic saints, curses, an evil centipede, and more; it’s the weirdest novella I’ve ever produced. Portions of the story are told in the form of faux news stories, memes and comic books. Mantula should be available on Amazon in March.

Patrick-trinip

BIO:

Patrick Whitehurst is a fiction and non-fiction author who’s written for a number of northern Arizona newspapers over the years, covering everything from murders to Rotary luncheons. In his spare time he enjoys painting, blogging, the open water, and reading everything he can get his hands on. Whitehurst is a graduate of Northern Arizona University and currently lives along the central coast of California.

Amazon Patrick Whitehurst page link:

http://www.amazon.com/Patrick-Whitehurst/e/B001V8P45Q/ref=sr_ntt_srch_lnk_2?qid=1453694163&sr=8-2

Author website:

http://patrickwhitehurst.com/

***

Many thanks Patrick.

Happy reading,

Jenny x

Nothing’s Forgotten: Booking at The Hooded Man Event

By Jenny Kane

On April 2, 2016

In Blog, Contemporary fiction, Contemporary Romantic Fiction, crime, Fiction, Historical fiction

What a year it’s turning out to be! There are days when I can’t believe my luck. Here I am, black coffee at my side (of course!), a packet of chocolate buttons on standby, a new book deal with WHSmith to sell my forthcoming novel, Another Glass of Champagne, in its airport, railway station, and service station shops, and two new novel contracts on the starting slopes- and, to add the cherry to my virtual cupcake, I have been invited to sell my part modern/part medieval novel, Romancing Robin Hood at this years celebration of all things ‘Robin of Sherwood’ – The Hooded Man II event.

romancingrhposterPROOF2

If you are a regular to this site, you’ll know that I have been running a series of blogs about Robin of Sherwood, which is being revived as a one off audio show called, The Knights of the Apocalypse. (#KOTA). If you’ve missed them, you can find the blogs here- Blog 1, Blog 2, Blog 3

I am looking forward to attending The Hooded Man event at Chepstow on 30th April- 1st May. I’m also a bit nervous!! This is a massive event, with people travelling from all over the world to attend- and I’ll be on my own with a pile of books!! However- I am SO excited. What an opportunity! Maybe- at last- I’ll be able to thank, in person, the people who set my life on its path of historical research and fiction!

RH- RoS 2

And what better day than this- 2nd April 2016- to announce that I’ll be attending this RoS event- as it was on this very day, at 5.35pm, 30 years ago, that Jason Connery first took his longbow as Robin Hood, in the opening episode of series three- Hernes Son (Part1) Where do the years go?!

I look forward to seeing some of you at the event!!

Happy reading,

Jenny x

My First Time: Nell Peters

By Jenny Kane

On March 30, 2016

In Contemporary fiction, crime, Uncategorized

This week it’s the turn of the always lovely Nell Peters, aka Anne Polhill Walton, to share her first time publishing experiences- and a picture of a chicken…Ummm…

Over to you Nell…

First Time

Can you remember writing the first story you actually wanted to write, rather than those you were forced to write at school? What was it about?

At a loose end over a summer in Montreal (early 20s, pre-children), living in a house with the St Lawrence at the bottom of the garden, I settled down at a picnic table and started writing stories for young children – in between swatting mosquitoes. They were the sort of traditional tales I’d been raised on – gentle escapism, make-believe storylines and not a boy (or girl) wizard in sight, as far as I remember. They were rubbish.

What was your first official publication?

That was a poem published in an anthology for Mother’s Day – I forget what year, but I had four children by then. It was entitled ‘Bonjour Maman’ and some of it was in French, so I had to translate for my mother as she doesn’t speak the lingo.

What affect did that have on your life?

I became rich and famous overnight. Oh no – that wasn’t me. Am eejit.

By Any Name final

Does your first published story reflect your current writing style?

As you specify ‘story’, that would be my psychological crime novel By Any Other Name, which was published in November 2014 by Accent Press. Obviously, my style hasn’t changed too much since then, but with Hostile Witness – launched February 2016, my editor took out a lot (actually most) of the humour I find impossible to resist, to make it quite dark.

Hostile Witness ver 2

What are you working on at the moment?

This questionnaire, silly!

Buy links

By Any Other Name – http://viewbook.at/By_Any_Other_Name_by_Nell_Peters

Hostile Witness – http://mybook.to/hostilewitness

Author Bio and links

Nell Peters is a pen name, as Anne Polhill Walton is something of a mouthful. After I abandoned my quest to become the next Enid Blyton, I started to write poetry and that remained my first love for many years, before I moved on to writing crime – a genre that very much suits my warped mind. Poetry as a therapy continues to be an interest.

I live in Norfolk UK and most of the family are close-ish, so we have some very chaotic weekend get-togethers, Christmases etc. We are collecting a frightening number of Grands – three of each at the last count. Oh, and Pavlova the chicken who turned up almost two years ago and just stayed. She is named not after a meringue dessert, but Ivan Pavlov (he of dog fame) because she responds to classical conditioning. Did I mention my warped mind?

chicken

On Facebook I have an author page: https://www.facebook.com/NellPetersAuthor/

And on Twitter I am myself as @paegon

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Many thanks Nell (Anne!)- fabulous! Love Pavlova!

Happy reading,

Jenny x

Guest Blog from Nell Peters: The Ides of March-ish

By Jenny Kane

On March 15, 2016

In Blog, Contemporary fiction, crime, Fiction

I love having guests on my blog. Some visitors I particularly look forward to, and today I’m thrilled to have one of my favourite guests sharing a little writers wisdom. Please welcome back Nell Peters.

Over to you Nell…

Hello, Jenny – thanks for having me again!

Last time I was a guest blogger here Christmas was approaching fast, with sleigh bells ring-ding-a-ding-a-ling loudly in our ears. Now we are a matter of days away from Easter. Scary! Of course, chocolate eggs and the like have been in the shops since 26^th December, possibly before – I wonder what days of the year that posh choc company designate to convert their gold foil-covered bunnies rather unconvincingly into reindeer, or vice versa?

Most of the Christmas break disappeared for me under various edits required for a 4/1 deadline and it will hereinafter be referred to the Swear Box Christmas. This in no way overshadows that of two years ago, which became the Bug Christmas. And I don’t mean those cute little ladybird creatures with innumerable legs and spotted backs.

A PW

On Christmas Eve 2013, the youngest boy was twenty-one and everyone and their dog was coming to stay for several days. In our infinite wisdom, the OH and I felt we should get the main bathroom tarted up a bit for the invasion. Big mistake. Work inevitably fell behind schedule and the self-imposed deadline (22/12) was getting perilously close, when OH managed to put his foot through the floor…which forms part of the dining room ceiling. Not a good look. When everyone arrived on 23^rd (actually our anniversary, but mostly forgotten after #4 son gate-crashed the party a week before his due date on New Years Eve) we had rather too few – shall we say – functioning facilities to accommodate the gathered masses. Pioneering spirit to the fore (we are British after all, don’t you know), we could have coped with that, had someone not turned up brewing a tummy bug. I’ll let you join your own dots from there – it was a challenging few days, to put it mildly, with enough left-over food to keep us going until midsummer. Oh, in case you were worrying about it, we did get the ceiling patched up in time – though that was really the least of our worries.

That’s all a distant memory now, and one we may (or may not) find amusing at some time in the future – if we live that long.

I’m pleased to report that Pavlova the chicken survived her second Christmas with us without ending up in the roasting tin – as threatened by various horrid sons throughout the year, amid pointed ‘fattening her up for Christmas’ remarks. Poor Pav didn’t know what she was getting herself into, when she turned up on our land a couple of years ago and decided to stay…

chicken

Back to the here and now…or almost. All the necessary edits were done and dusted on time for Hostile Witness – just as well, as it was on pre-order for a 4^th Feb launch, so there was little leeway. But most importantly, another little cutie entered our lives; GD #3 and our fifth Grand, arrived only a little late on 7^th Jan, and of course she is just as beautiful as her big sister, Isla. The baby is called Indie, so the ‘I’s have it in that household! Sorry …

Today, 15^th March, is the seventy-fifth day of the year (this being a Leap Year – I bet there’s some bright spark out there who knows exactly how many days there are until Christmas 2016. If you find them, please gag them) and was known to the Romans as the Ides – the middle of the month. It was the day in 44BC that Julius Caesar probably wished he hadn’t bothered to get out of bed, or had at least had the presence of mind to wear his dagger-proof Kevlar toga.

dagger

Anything Roman still reminds me of our Head of Latin at school, Miss Mackinder. She was a terrifying woman with protruding teeth and a passion for cats, if not her pupils. She had a glare that could kill at a thousand yards and like most of the staff at that very staid, traditional Grammar she was a spinster who seemed very old – as anyone over twenty does to a young teen. Miss Mack used to spend her holidays in Rome, rescuing stray cats (and quite possibly scaring the natives). The author Judy Astley and I somehow survived years of regulation indoor shoes, regulation outdoor shoes, summer boaters and winter felt hats (hat detention if seen outside school grounds not wearing the damned things), and flame-coloured summer dresses that suited no one and could be seen from outer space. All this amid wood-panelled walls, and an oppressive atmosphere where pupils (all gels, natch) should neither be seen nor heard, or be caught doing anything unladylike. There was a list of school rules as long as the M1 and woe betide anyone who stepped out of line – they still had the cane! Where was ChildLine when we needed it?

Anyway, I digress – fast forward to 15^th March 1493, when Christopher Columbus docked in Palos, Spain after his first trip to the Americas. It was a disappointing voyage of discovery because neither Colonel Sanders nor Ronald MacDonald had opened for business and so CC was stuck with paella for another few hundred years. Or maybe I imagined that bit?

Continuing the boat/water theme, in 1927 (when my mum was about six weeks old) the first Oxford v Cambridge Women’s Boat Race was held on the Isis in Oxford. It took place at 1.15 pm, when heads of colleges hoped young men students would be too distracted by their lunch to go along to gawp. To call it a race is a bit of a stretch though, because the boats rowed separately downstream and judging concentrated mainly on style and deportment – perhaps keeping their knees together, balancing books on their heads and not showing their bloomers? When that resulted in a tie, the teams rowed against each other upstream and Oxford won by two points. Ah…those were the days – remember this was a whole year before all women over the age of twenty-one in Great Britain and Northern Ireland were finally given the right to vote. Enlightened times indeed.

Before I send everyone to sleep, perhaps I should plug the latest masterpiece and go, so that you can get on with whatever floats your boat.

newrel

Immaculately edited psychological crime novel Hostile Witness can be found at mybook.to/hostilewitness

Because it was previously self-published, the book comes complete with two 5* reviews – always handy:

‘Many twists and turns – and a cliff-hanger ending. Quite an enjoyable read, with a delightfully twisty plot. Ms. Peters kept me guessing till the end.’

And

‘Thoroughly enjoyed this book and will look forward to the next one from this author. Keeps you guessing till the end.’

Common theme there, as in being kept guessing until the end – I know the end, but I’m not telling. Both reviews come from Amazon.com and were posted on consecutive days three years ago – slightly bizarre, but I’m not complaining!

I’m off now, but remember – beware the Ides of March. Et tu, Jenny! J

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How I remember my own Latin lessons. I was lucky enough to be blessed with a wonderful Latin master- the amazing Mr White. Amazing because he was so patient with me- I was not the best language student!!

Thanks Nell,

Happy reading,

Jenny x