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.

BEST OF CRIME with Andrew Harris

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 

ANDREW HARRIS

for his A Litany of Good Intentions blog tour

to share his BEST OF CRIME ...

... AUTHORS
The Daddy for me will always be John le Carre. His perceptions of character are masterly, his writing so descriptive and the tension he creates is truly breath-taking. But underneath it all there is an aching sadness about what we’ve done – and continue to do – to our people and our beautiful planet.

... FILMS/MOVIES
It has to be The Third Man by Graham Greene. Even though it was filmed nearly 70 years ago, the drama is just as fresh. Orson Welles stole the show but the moody backstreets and haunting zither music set the scene perfectly. I went to Vienna to research The C Clef and found myself humming the tune.   

... TV DRAMAS
I wondered how they were going to portray The Night Manager as a TV Drama, given the complexity of the plot. It proved to be a real winner. I don’t think a film could have done it justice. Tom Hiddleston seemed a natural choice for Jonathan Pine but the casting of Hugh Laurie as Richard Onslow Roper was a stroke of pure genius. Think I would have stuck to le Carre’s ending though, much darker. 

... FICTIONAL KILLERS

I loved the animal complexity of Martin Vanger in Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. We had the charming façade of the sophisticated CEO who knew his way around a wine list and seemed to have everything under control. But his dark side could not be constrained. A chilling reminder that evil will always choose its own disciples.      

... FICTIONAL DETECTIVES 

Jo Nesbo’s finest creation – Harry Hole, which I discovered is pronounced ‘Hooola’. His unorthodox methods, flawed logic and vulnerability really got me wanting to help him. It’s not often you find yourself shouting at a book; C’mon Harry, pull yourself together, they need you!! It was great to see Nesbo’s writing style grow in confidence over his early books. For me his masterpiece – and Harry’s finest hour - was The Snowman. 

... MURDER WEAPONS

Firstly I must salute Jo Nesbo for creating the deadly apple device in The Leopard. I nearly choked reading it! But my favourite murder weapon has to be the Katana, the ancient sword of the Samurai warrior and weapon of choice for the coolest dude of all time, Nicholas Linnear. I must thank Eric van Lustbader for bringing the magical world of the Ninja to my hungry adolescence. 

    

... DEATH SCENES
I really enjoyed Dan Brown’s early novels and will always shiver at the swirling mass of hammerhead sharks circling in Deception Point. It seemed impossible to escape certain death. Brilliant writing. For me his genius for stretching the reader’s imagination came with Angels and Demons: the trial by fire was amazing.

  

... BLOGS/WEBSITES
Got to be Amazon and Wikipedia. I’ve stocked up my library with reference books through Amazon. And although I don’t believe everything I read on Wikipedia, it is a brilliant starting-off point for further research. I often wonder what Sir Arthur Conan Doyle or HG Wells could have created with the internet at their fingertips.

... WRITING TIPS
Best advice – keep going. Sometimes the words just flow, other times every word is a struggle. But keep going and enjoy it. The story is in there trying to get out – your job is to let it. And don’t listen to the negatives. It’s your story, you tell it your way. If people don’t like it, they can read something else. Nobody dies, at least not in real life.

... WRITING SNACKS
God invented marmite for a reason! The blessed union of marmite on toast, washed down with a mug of Yorkshire tea, has to be the ultimate writing snack. New Zealand marmite is a sad imitation – a miserable savoury plum jam. But you can still get the real thing over here. And Lurpak butter. It must be full of creative antioxidants!

About ANDREW HARRIS

Andrew Harris was born in Liverpool, survived a grammar school education and graduated from the University of Leeds. He had a successful career in people management and now lives in New Zealand.

One of his passions is crime fiction. Andrew strongly believes this genre provides the perfect vehicle for stimulating debate and challenging the status quo. He writes thrillers with a social conscience, putting fictional characters in real life situations.

A Litany of Good Intentions is the second book in Andrew’s The Human Spirit Trilogy, a series of thrillers with a social conscience based on exciting scientific discoveries in medicine, physics and biology. The second book follows The C Clef, published in April 2016 and available on Amazon.

In The Human Spirit Trilogy, Andrew combines the factual world of science with pacey, action-packed thrillers to explore urgent questions faced by humanity. Why isn’t there a cure for cancer? How do we end world poverty? What will eradicate addiction? How are we going to feed 9 billion people without destroying our precious planet?

Find Andrew Harris on The Faithful Hound website.

About A LITANY OF GOOD INTENTIONS

Publisher's description

Leading oncologist Dr Hannah Siekierkowski and her partner Lawrence McGlynn are visiting New Delhi for a conference on diabetes. They meet Lawrence’s old Rotarian friend Toby and his passionate daughter Okki, a charity worker. She introduces them to the organisation Sanitation In Action, and its charismatic leader, the young Chinese philanthropist Jock Lim.  

An end to world poverty is more than just a dream for Jock. Through his charity connections and his fiancée Nisha’s extraordinary scientific breakthrough, Jock has discovered a way to release 2.6 billion people from the imminent threat of death and disease. Caught up in their passion and energy, Hannah agrees to help present their project at a conference in Uppsala, Sweden.

But with the discovery of a dead body, they realise that someone will stop at nothing to prevent them from achieving Jock’s dream. As the clock ticks down to the Uppsala conference, Hannah and Lawrence are drawn into a web of corporate greed, racial prejudice and a seething hatred of the new world order: a hatred that originates back in the Second World War, with even earlier links to Albert Einstein’s general theory of relativity.

A Litany of Good Intentions is being published by Faithful Hound on 12 October 2017.

Look out for more BEST OF CRIME features coming soon.

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Follow the Blog Tour

Race to the Kill by Helen Cadbury - blog tour

It's my turn on the blog tour for Race to the Kill by Helen Cadbury. Race to the Kill was published by Allison & Busby on 21 September 2017.

Helen was one of the first crime authors I was in contact with before I even started blogging. She was one of the loveliest people I met in the book world. She supported everyone within the book community, from bloggers and reviewers to authors and publishers. I last saw her at the 2016 CrimeFest in Bristol, where she always had a smile on her face. Sadly, she passed away in June 2017. 


Race to the Kill
By Helen Cadbury
Published by Allison & Busby (21 September 2017)
I received an Advance Reader Copy from the publisher.

Publisher's description
It is the middle of a long night shift for PC Sean Denton and his partner PC Gavin Wentworth when they are approached by a dishevelled-looking woman desperate that they follow her. She leads them to the old Chasebridge High School where they find the dead body of a Syrian refugee. The investigation which points to the neighbouring greyhound stadium finds Denton caught up in a world of immigration, drugs and sexual abuse, and one in which his private life becomes increasingly entwined. 


My verdict
I read the first book in Helen Cadbury's Sean Denton series (To Catch a Rabbit) a couple of years ago, when I first made contact with Helen. I immediately warmed to Sean Denton and Helen's Yorkshire setting. Like so many books, the next book in the series, Bones in the Nest, sat on my 'To Be Read' pile and I assured Helen so many times that I would 'get to it'. As soon as I was asked to take part in the blog tour for this third book, Race to the Kill, I took Bones in the Nest off my shelf and read it so that I was up to date.

As with the first two books, I loved Race to the Kill from the start. This is character-led crime fiction, mixing police procedural with believable characters. Sean has now worked his way up from PCSO to PC, not letting his dyslexia get in the way of his career progression. He is a very bright and determined character who will do everything he can to investigate a crime. This makes a change from most other police procedurals, which tend to focus on more senior officers. Sean has a complicated family life too, which ends up intertwined with his professional life in this book.

There are two parallel stories here. Firstly, that of a homeless man found beaten to death at an abandoned school. And secondly, that of a young woman, Sarah, who lives at the local greyhound course, next to the school. The story is told through three distinct voices - that of Sean, his half-sister Chloe and Sarah. There's clearly a link somewhere, and the clues gradually reveal themselves in a twisty gripping plot.

Race to the Kill is very much a crime novel of modern times, covering key social issues such as drug use, poverty, sexual abuse, homelessness and refugees. I was totally absorbed from beginning to end, and felt very sad when I reached the final pages, realising that this is the last Sean Denton book.

Helen Cadbury was a talented writer, a warm person and is sadly missed.

Follow the Blog Tour

Sleep No More by P.D. James - blog tour

I am delighted to be today's stop on the blog tour for Sleep No More, a collection of six short stories by P.D. James. Sleep No More is published by Faber & Faber today, 3 October 2017.


Sleep No More
By P.D. James
Published by Faber & Faber (3 October 2017)

Publisher's description

As the six murderous tales unfold, the dark motive of revenge is revealed at the heart of each. Bullying schoolmasters receive their comeuppance, unhappy marriages and childhoods are avenged, a murder in the small hours of Christmas Day puts an end to the vicious new lord of the manor, and, from the safety of his nursing home, an octogenarian exerts exquisite retribution.

The punishments inflicted on the guilty are fittingly severe, but here they are meted out by the unseen forces of natural justice rather than the institutions of the law. Once again, P. D. James shows her expert control of the short-story form, conjuring motives and scenarios with complete conviction, and each with a satisfying twist in the tail.

My verdict
Sleep No More contains six short stories filled with murder and intrigue. All are very twisty tales, featuring varied voices, settings and characters, proving P.D. James' versatility as a writer. This book offers a masterclass in the planning, plotting and execution of short stories that not only entertain and thrill but also explore the dark nature of humanity.

P.D. James has given 'Golden Age of Crime'-style stories an emotional and psychological feel, fitting in well with current trends of psychological thrillers and domestic noir. These are all tales of revenge and justice, filled with dark humour and highly atmospheric writing.

Which was my favourite? I'm torn between three of the stories: The Yo-Yo (very disturbing school boy memories), The Victim (very much in the vein of today's psychological thrillers) and Mr Millcroft's Birthday (which made me laugh).

Sleep No More packs a powerful punch. This is a perfect Christmas stocking filler for a crime fiction addict.

Follow the Blog Tour

BEST OF CRIME with Antti Tuomainen

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 

ANTTI TUOMAINEN

for his The Man Who Died blog tour

to share his BEST OF CRIME ...

... AUTHORS

Elmore Leonard and Lawrence Block. Great writers who, with the help of a few others, got me into this writing life. 

... FILMS/MOVIES

Fargo. I recently watched it again and it was even better than I remembered. 

... TV DRAMAS

The Wire. In my mind, still the best television show ever. 

... FICTIONAL KILLERS
I probably don't have one. 

... FICTIONAL DETECTIVES 

Rust Cohle from TV show True Detective, season 1. Played pitch-perfect by Matthew McConaughey, Rust Cohle is the ultimate self-destructive, philosophical detective and the smartest guy in any room. 

... MURDER WEAPONS
There is a scene in my new book The Man Who Died in which the character has a self-inflicted accident with a samurai sword. That one is pretty good, if I say so myself.

    

... DEATH SCENES

Charles Willeford surprised me when I was young. In his novel Miami Blues, the psychopath arriving in Miami kills a Hare Krishna man by twisting his finger. 

  

... BLOGS/WEBSITES

www.stevenpressfield.com Pressfield has some very interesting things to say about writing and especially about working as a professional writer.

... WRITING TIPS

Write every day. Set realistic goals. Finish what you started. Learn from others. 

... WRITING SNACKS

Apples. They're great. Eating an apple is the perfect break, both timewise and energetically. Just make sure you get ones with plenty of delicious crunch. 

About ANTTI TUOMAINEN

Finnish Antti Tuomainen (b. 1971) was an award-winning copywriter when he made his literary debut in 2007 as a suspense author. The critically acclaimed My Brother’s Keeper was published two years later. In 2011 Tuomainen’s third novel, The Healer, was awarded the Clue Award for ‘Best Finnish Crime Novel of 2011’ and was shortlisted for the Glass Key Award. The Finnish press labelled The Healer – the story of a writer desperately searching for his missing wife in a post-apocalyptic Helsinki – ‘unputdownable’. Two years later in 2013 they crowned Tuomainen ‘The King of Helsinki Noir’ when Dark as My Heart was published. The Mine, published in 2016, was an international bestseller. All of his books have been optioned for TV/film. With his piercing and evocative style, Tuomainen is one of the first to challenge the Scandinavian crime genre formula, and The Man Who Died sees him at his literary best. 

Find Antti Tuomainen on his website, on his Facebook page and on Twitter - @antti_tuomainen

About THE MAN WHO DIED

Publisher's description

A successful entrepreneur in the mushroom industry, Jaakko Kaunismaa is a man in his prime. At just 37 years of age, he is shocked when his doctor tells him that he’s dying. What is more, the cause is discovered to be prolonged exposure to toxins; in other words, someone has slowly but surely been poisoning him. Determined to find out who wants him dead, Jaakko embarks on a suspenseful rollercoaster journey full of unusual characters, bizarre situations and unexpected twists.
With a nod to Fargo and the best elements of the Scandinavian noir tradition, The Man Who Died is a page-turning thriller brimming with the blackest comedy surrounding life and death, and love and betrayal, marking a stunning new departure for the King of Helsinki Noir.

Read a snippet of my review

'It made me laugh and grimace at times, and also made me sad. It's very different from anything else I've read in a while, with some brilliant twists that I really didn't see coming at all.'

To read the rest of my review, click here.

The Man Who Died is being published by Orenda Books on 10 October 2017.

Look out for more BEST OF CRIME features coming soon.

Click here to read more BEST OF CRIME features.