BEST OF CRIME with Sarah Ward

Welcome to my latest BEST OF CRIME feature, looking at crime writers' top picks, from their favourite author and fictional detective to their best writing tip. 

Today I'm delighted to welcome 

SARAH WARD

to share her BEST OF CRIME ...

... AUTHORS
Is John Le Carre crime? Possibly not but spy fiction has often been discussed alongside other crime genres and Le Carre is just one of the best writers around. It was difficult for me to read his biography by Adam Sissman because I didn’t want the mystique taken away from his novels. I’ve reread the George Smiley books so often over the years and the pleasure hasn’t dimmed.

... FILMS/MOVIES
I’m not a huge movie watcher but I love The Day of the Jackal. Michael Lonsdale is one my favourite actors and I love the absurdity of Edward Fox disguising his gun as a crutch.

... TV DRAMAS
I’m so tempted to say Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy but I’ll mention Death of A Pilgrim which I’ve just watched. The series is based on books by one of my favourite Nordic writers, Leif G W Persson and dramatizes the investigation into the shooting of Swedish PM Olof Palme. The four episodes are compelling.

... FICTIONAL KILLERS
I find Patricia Highsmith’s Tom Ripley completely chilling. Lack of remorse is frightening to behold and Highsmith documents this so well. 

... FICTIONAL DETECTIVES 
I’m rather fond of CJ Samson’s Matthew Shardlake, the stopping Lincoln’s Inn lawyer. He’s both clever and frustrated and makes for a wonderful character.

... MURDER WEAPONS
The joint of lamb in Roald Dahl’s short story Lamb to the Slaughter still makes me laugh. It’s such a perfect solution.

    

... DEATH SCENES
The dentist’s chair in Agatha Christie’s One Two Buckle My Shoe. I can’t be the only one who thinks of death while at the dentist.

  

... BLOGS/WEBSITES
I find naming characters so difficult as I like to make sure first names are age appropriate. In www.britishbabynames.com I can search the most popular names in a particular year which helps.

... WRITING TIPS

Finish what you start. You learn so much from finishing a piece of writing, even if it’s just that endings are really hard! 

... WRITING SNACKS

I drink endless cups of tea but I try to get away from the computer to eat otherwise I’d never leave my desk. But I am fond of digestive biscuits… 

About SARAH WARD

Sarah Ward is the author of two DC Childs novels, In Bitter Chill and A Deadly Thaw set in the Derbyshire Peak District where she lives. Her third book in the series, A Patient Fury, is out in September. On her blog, Crimepieces, she reviews the best of current crime fiction published around the world, and she has also reviewed for Euro Crime and CrimeSquad. She is a judge for the Petrona Award for Scandinavian translated crime novels.

Find Sarah Ward on her website, on her Facebook page and on Twitter - @sarahrward1

About A PATIENT FURY

Publisher's description

When Detective Constable Connie Childs is dragged from her bed to the fire-wrecked property on Cross Farm Lane she knows as she steps from the car that this house contains death.

Three bodies discovered - a family obliterated - their deaths all seem to point to one conclusion: One mother, one murderer.

But D.C. Childs, determined as ever to discover the truth behind the tragedy, realises it is the fourth body - the one they cannot find - that holds the key to the mystery at Cross Farm Lane.

What Connie Childs fails to spot is that her determination to unmask the real murderer might cost her more than her health - this time she could lose the thing she cares about most: her career.

A Patient Fury was published by Faber on 5 September 2017.

Look out for more BEST OF CRIME features coming soon.

Click here to read more BEST OF CRIME features.

The Other Side of the Mountain by Fiona Cane

The Other Side of the Mountain
By Fiona Cane
Published by CreateSpace (11 June 2015)
ISBN: 978-1512237481

Publisher's description

It’s 2001, and amidst the political turmoil in Haiti, three disparate lives collide: Yolande, an impoverished farmer desperately looking for the sister her abusive husband has sold into slavery; Maddy, an eager British journalist on her first overseas assignment, set on making a name for herself; and Clare, an ex-pat gynaecologist who’s devoted the past eight years to healing Haiti’s downtrodden women. Divided by language, lifestyle and personality yet all driven by painful memories buried in their pasts, the three women unite to search for the missing child. It’s a quest that takes them deep into the city’s underworld, where poverty is rife, black magic thrives and violence is king; a world in which appearances can be deceptive and where survival is by no means certain.

My verdict

The Other Side of the Mountain is the story of three very different women who meet in Haiti at a time of political turmoil. It's a passionate and heart-wrenching book that's beautifully written and not easy to forget.

Young farmer Yolanda is hiding from an abusive husband. Maddy is seeking the ideal story that will further her career as a journalist. And Clare, a gynaecologist, is helping to heal Haiti's women. All are escaping their past in some way. Their search for a missing girl (Yolanda's younger sister) brings the three women together - and helps them overcome their personal challenges and fears.

The Other Side of the Mountain is a fascinating story with sad undertones, set in a country of poverty, destruction and violence. The tiny details, vivid descriptions and rich dialogue within the narrative are truly stunning and transported me to Haiti, with its sounds, aromas and sights. Fiona Cane is an amazing writer and storyteller. The story of these three women really touched me, especially as some of the events are based on real life.

This is certainly a book I'll be recommending!

I received an Advance Reader Copy from the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

Lindsey Davis: Veni, Vidi, Vici - Dialogue in Historical Fiction

I'm delighted to welcome Lindsey Davis to my blog today. Lindsey's latest Flavia Albia novel, The Graveyard of the Hesperides (Flavia Albia 4), was published by Hodder & Stoughton on 14 April 2016.

I loved all 20 books in Lindsey Davis's Falco series - I remember taking the 9th book (Three Hands in the Fountain) on my honeymoon in 1997!  Although I'm currently lagging behind with her latest series - featuring Falco's adopted daughter Flavia Albia - I'm definitely turning into an ardent fan of these books too.

Recently I put the following questions to Lindsey:

You write dialogue in today’s language. Why, as you are so historically accurate, do you give your characters today’s attitudes? Does it bring in readers who wouldn’t usually read historical fiction? How important is humour in your writing, especially in relation to your dialogue? 

Read below to discover her answers.

Dialogue in Historical Fiction

by Lindsey Davis

Well, I am loth to be too stroppy but I disagree. I don’t think my characters have today’s attitudes – or no more than the Romans really did (read Senecca, for example, on gladiators, read Cicero’s brother on how to get elected, which was the spin-doctoring tract behind Deadly Election, read any of the Roman satirists on trying to be a writer when nobody thinks they need to pay you for your work, read Ovid on sex…). Both Falco and Albia frequently muse on the idea of Romanness, its traditions and myths, its good and its bad points as they affect people and society. Falco is a proper Roman, even though he pretends he’s critical, and Albia is giving us the woman’s and the outsider’s viewpoint; she comes from Britain so she views the city as a foreigner might.

On language specifically, if I was entirely accurate I’d be writing in Latin, and a street-level kind at that. (What do you suppose the Roman version is of the “Thou art a varlet, sirrah, quoth he” style of historical writing?...) I choose modern idioms, while trying not to be anachronistic. People don’t get mesmerized, they are fascinated or struck dumb. They don’t say Oh my God, they mutter Titan’s turds! I invent swear words (and others – but Shakespeare did that, all the time). There is a fine movement in Australia to bring my ‘nicknackaroony bowls’ into current parlance. I would only use ‘parlance’ in a particularly mannered passage, incidentally, perhaps when being ironical. It’s all a question of selection. So long as whatever you say is clear in context, that is the only thing that matters.

I can be accused of being too English, too American, too slangy, too formal (I know how use clauses), or just too modern. The Microsoft grammar checker (which I turn on just so I can shout it down) thinks I use too many unfinished phrases. Its use of verbs does not comply with mine. People who think that way should just go and read a more pedestrian, ‘safe’ author instead. But I am writing in the first person, in a fast, elliptical, conversational style. If Falco and Albia are composing their ‘memoirs’ (as they both sometimes joke) then they are doing it as if they were talking directly to us.

About Lindsey Davis

Lindsey has been writing books for over 20 years, including the Falco series, the Albia series and several standalones (set in either the Roman period of during the Civil War. 

You can find out more about Lindsey on her website. 

Click here to discover more about her books.

The Graveyard of the Hesperides
By Lindsey Davis
Published by Hodder & Stoughton (14 April 2016)
ISBN: 978-1473613362

Publisher's description

Life is sweet for Flavia Albia and her soon-to-be husband Faustus. But his new job as a building contractor runs into a problem: At the Garden of the Hesperides a barmaid went missing years before; now the workmen start unearthing her bones.

Albia takes on the task of finding out what happened. Five more skeletons are discovered. Despite the fact that nobody seems to know or care who died, violent attempts are made to stop her enquiries.

Soon Albia is exploring the world of Roman streetlife, where bars are brothels, workers lead brutal lives, foreigners are muscling in on the gambling syndicates, and extortion is commonplace. What's more there's little time to solve the mystery before the wedding day when Albia is expected to show Rome that her affair with Manlius is a much more than a casual fling. The gods, however, have other ideas...

My review of The Graveyard of the Hesperides will be coming soon.