The seventeenth CrimeFest conference, opened on the 15 May 2025.
At the Grand Mercure Hotel in Bristol.
The conference was spread over 4 days and there were 60 panels
included several interviews.
For those of you who were unable to attend this year, several
Mystery People members have contributed short write-ups on one or two of the events and panels that they particularly enjoyed.
Lindsey Mellon reports on…..
Saturday 14:50-15:40
Left to Right, Simon Cornwell, Clare Cornwell, Simon Brett, and Nick Harkaway
CrimeFest was a literary feast for this author, and the last panel I attended – ‘
Ghost of Honour: John Le Carré’ –
provided particular pleasure. Two of his sons, a daughter in law and the ever-witty Simon Brett regaled us with insightful and humorous anecdotes of the great man, about whom we learned many fascinating things. 26 novels, 1 autobiography and 1 book of letters. 50 million books sold worldwide. 50 weeks at the top of the NY Times Best Seller List. Translated into 46 languages. Statistics provided by Clare Cornwell, just to soften us up.
Simon Cornwell described the making of the many wonderful adaptations of his books, how his father was ‘an extraordinarily mischievous man’, therefore, to be excluded, from acting in his adaptations, although he was a wonderful reader of his own books, capturing so well the voices of his wide range of characters.
Nick Harkaway, who recently published the excellent ‘Karla’s Choice’ recounted how his father was a talented cartoonist, who would draw Nick’s childhood nightmares for him, to remove their bite, and how the quality of fun between his parents was a sparkling ‘Festival of Lunacy. Tellingly, in speaking about his father’s many trips to remote and dangerous places, in pursuit of veracity of research, Nick said “The world forced him into the bleak world portrayed in his novels”. 40 minutes of joy, courtesy of CrimeFest! Thank you.
Lindsey’s most recent book is
The Sheikh
published by Northside House 2 May 2025.
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