Leigh Russell talks to Peter James

Peter James was born in  Brighton.  He was educated at  Charterhouse School and went on to Ravensbourne Film School. Subsequently he spent several years in North America, working as a screen writer and film producer.  He has written 25 books, the most recent of which feature Brighton-based Detective Superintendent Roy Grace. His books have been translated into 35 languages. He has also written supernatural thrillers, spy fiction,  and a children's novel.  Peter is currently the chairman of the Crime Writers Association.

I’m thrilled that Peter James agreed to be the first author featured in my monthly interviews of Mystery People members.

His new novel, Not Dead Yet, went straight to number 1 in the UK hardback bestseller list, Peter’s fifth consecutive number 1. The paperback will be out on September 27^th.

Q What did you find most exciting about writing Not Dead Yet?

A It was fun using my experience in the movie business.  Plus I’m a stickler for research so it was fascinating finding out about forensic podiatry, which has never before been used in a novel.

Q It’s encouraging to see a UK author reaching out to overseas readers.  Tell us about your visit to India. 

A Last March I did an author tour in India, which is the only country where print reading is on the increase. My publisher Macmillan have had a presence there for a hundred years and with a billion people inIndia, more and more of whom are reading in English, it’s a huge emerging market. It’s alwaysinteresting to visit different countries. What was lovely there was the amount of press interest, withfifteen to twenty newspaper reporters queuing for interviews. A lot of them asked me why I write crime novels, rather than ‘proper fiction’. Boy, did they ask the wrong person! ‘Do you like Shakespeare?’ I replied. “If he was writing today, I think he’d be writing crime novels.  Over half his plays have acourtroom scene!

Q My own detective recently relocated from the Home Counties to London. Could you imagine DS Grace ever moving away from Brighton to join another force?

A Location is incredibly important in the genre; location is as much part of a book as the central characters. I couldn’t imagine Rebus operating anywhere but Edinburgh, or Mark Billingham’s Thorne anywhere but London, or James Ellroy anywhere but LA. In Brighton it’s interesting that a number of junior police officers have moved up to the Met for higher pay, but most senior officers are passionate about the city. The Divisional Commander Graham Bartlett would have the opportunity to go for promotion to ACClevel, but this would almost certainly involve him in leaving the county, which he doesn’t want to do. This kind of stability places more emphasis on community policing as officers like Graham Bartlett – and Roy Grace -  get to know the local villains. I’ve been driving through Brighton with coppers who point out the drugs dealers,  house burglars, all all the other crims to me. That said, in Not Dead Yetthere are elements from outside the UK, and the book I’m writing now starts in Brooklyn. Criminals don’t stick to boundaries, and Roy Grace is based on a character who has visited the States several times on police business. 

Q You describe yourself as “a stickler for research”.  One of my own favourites was spending an after noon with a team of firemen; research involving live maggots was less enjoyable! Can you tell us about a highlight, and a low point, in your research.
A An absolute low point was when I was writing Dead Simple, the first Roy Grace novel. For a wedding prank, a character is buried in a coffin in remote woodland, before the pranksters are wiped out in a car crash. I wanted to know what it would feel like to be shut in a coffin. A funeral director was happy tooblige when I asked him to screw the lid down and leave me for    thirty minutes. A coroner had advised me it was possible to survive for at least three hours in a   closed coffin, unless you hyperventilate. Did I tell you I’m claustrophobic? That was the worst thirty minutes of my life!  There are many highlights. I love going on police raids. The police love it too, driving on blues and twos and getting in what they call a bundle” – a euphemism for a fight. I’m a petrol head so some of my best moments with the police are travelling in a traffic police car late at night. I was recently in the lead car in an hour and a half chaseinvolving seven cars, dog handlers and a helicopter. The sheer adrenaline rush was fantastic. One of the officers said, ‘I can’t believe they’re paying me to do this.’

Q Religion plays a diminishing role in many people’s lives. Is part of the appeal of crime fiction that it offers us some kind of moral compass?

A Yes, part of the appeal of crime fiction is the adventure, usually seen through the eyes of a heroic detective, that takes the reader to a place where everything is all right in the end. In addition. Intelligent people read books to get not just a story, but also to learn something about human life. Look at any bestseller list and half the names on the list will be North of sixty in all genres, on both sides of the Atlantic. We authors (hopefully!) get wiser as we get older.   Good crime fiction understands the world. No one sees more of human life in a thirty year career than a police officer. In good crime fiction the reader learns something new each time about the human condition. That’s why I get angry when people ask why I write ‘genre fiction’.

Q What do you find challenging about having the same protagonist in each book?
A If someone picks up my ninth book, and they haven’t read any of the series, I have to describe my main ccharacters.  At the same time, I don’t want to bore people who have read the previous eight books. What to say or not to say about characters and location is a challenge. But I really like having the same main characters. Each time I start a new Roy Grace book, I feel like I’m going back to my family.

Q You touched on this earlier, but do you think your experience working in film and television has influenced your writing, and if so, in what ways?

A Yes, I do. I think we tend to read books in a different way than people did a hundred years ago. We are influenced by television and movies, where there are frequent changes of scene and character perspective. The biggest lesson I learned was years ago when I worked on a sit com in the US. We were told we needed to have a gag every 14 seconds. Fifty per cent of the potential audience channel hop. If we didn’t give them a joke every 14 seconds, they wouldn’t stay. I don’t have a joke every 14 seconds in my books! But I learned the importants of giving the reader something on every page to keep them hooked. 

Q Do you think groups like Mystery People and the CWA, which you chair, are important, and if so, why?

A Yes, I think they are incredibly important to readers who like a particular genre. The crime genre is such a broad canvas, I am constantly coming across writers I have never heard of, who are big selling authors. These groups are the best way of learning about authors in an area of fiction we love.

Superintendent Roy Grace series
Dead Simple (2005) Looking Good Dead (2006) Not Dead Enough (2007)
Dead Mans Footsteps (2008) Dead Tomorrow (2009) Dead Like You (2010)

Dead Man’s Grip (2011) Not Dead Yet (2012)

http://www.peterjames.com

Under the chairmanship of Peter James, the CWA is introducing a new Manuscript Assessment Service for aspiring crime writers. Peter says,
“The Crime Writers Association is inundated with requests for guidance on manuscripts in the genre, so we think this service is going to be very popular.”

Details will shortly be appearing on the CWA website.  

Leigh Russell is the author of four books Cut Short, Road Closed, Dead End, and her latest book Death Bed, published May 2012.
Cut Short (2009) was shortlisted for the CWA New Blood Dagger Award for Best First Novel. Leigh Russell studied at the University of Kent gaining a Masters degree in English and American literature. A secondary school teacher, specializing in supporting pupils with Specific Learning Difficulties as well as teaching English, Leigh Russell is married with two daughters and lives in Middlesex.

www.leighrussell.co.uk 

‘Face of the Enemy’ by Joanne Dobson & Beverle Graves Myers

Published by Poisoned Pen Press,
4 Septmeber 2012.
ISBN: 978-1-4642-0031-3

The story opens in November 1941, when Japanese born Masako Oakley is dressing to attend the opening of her first solo art exhibition in  New York. Aware of the importance of this evening to his beloved wife, Professor Robert Oakley endeavours to hide from her his sickness. With the war raging in Europe, hatred and fear have spilled over to the USA, and the exhibition is picketed by an anti Japanese group. When Robert Oakley collapses, Louise Hunter is engaged to nurse him in his New York apartment.

One week later the Japanese attack the US fleet at Pearl Harbor, and rumours and fear grip the country.  Within 24 hours the lives of the Oakleys, take a dramatic turn when the FBI swoop on their apartment, arrest Masako and confiscate her paintings.  Lousie is outraged, and seeks to help the Oakleys.  She attempts to enlist the aid of Cabby Ward her boarding house roommate, but Cabby is trying to make it as a journalist and in her desire to succeed sees the situation of the Oakleys as the chance of a good story. And Louise as an excellent source that may help her career.

Meanwhile to further Masako’s troubles, the gallery owner Arthur Shelton who hosted Masako’s exhibition is found murdered, and FBI Agent Bagwell is intent on pinning the killing on Masako.  But NYPD Lieutenant McKenna is the investigating officer and doesn’t take kindly to interference by Louise, or Agent Bagwell. 

The book brings home the terror of those who have lived in America the greater part of their lives, consider themselves American and have loyalty to their adopted country, but suddenly they are aliens, and live in fear of being rounded up and interned.  Two such people now living in terror are German born Helda Schroeder, and her son Howie.

As Agent Bagwell stacks up the evidence against Masako, and Robert Oakley’s health deteriorates, Louise struggles to find someone to take Masako’s case but few lawyers in the current climate want to stand up to defend a Jap!

As with all such stories, we meet with social racism, intrigue and good old-fashioned paranoia which breeds fear and brings out the worst in people.  But there are always those who are fair-minded and believe passionately in justice. So this is a story of the worst and the best of human nature.  A gripping story, which is highly recommended.

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Reviewer: Lizzie Hayes

Joanne Dobson was an English professor, having taught for many years at Fordham University, also at Amherst College and at Tufts University. Unlike Karen, she was never faced with an on-campus homicide, nor was she ever called in as a consultant to the Bureau of Criminal Investigation. But she has occasionally asked herself, "what if . . . ?"

Beverle Graves Myers made a mid-life career switch from psychiatry to full-time writing. A graduate of the University of Louisville with a BA in History and an MD, she worked at a public mental health clinic before her first Tito Amato novel was published in 2004.  Bev also writes short stories set in a variety of times and places. Her stories have appeared in Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine, Woman's World, and numerous anthologies. She has earned nominations for the Macavity Award, Kentucky Literary Award, and Derringer Award.  Bev and husband Lawrence live in Louisville and share their home with a rascal beagle-basset hound

‘Say You’re Sorry’ by Michael Robotham

Published by Sphere,
27 September 2012.
ISBN: 978-1-84744-524-7 (HB)

Piper Hadley and Tash McBain disappeared from their homes in Bingham on the last Saturday of the summer holidays. Despite exhaustive searches by local people, police helicopters, and sniffer dogs, no trace of either girls has been found.

We pick up the story three years after the girls disappearance.  Clinical psychologist and profiler, Joe O'Loughlin is in Oxford to give a talk at a mental health symposium. Whilst in Oxford he is contacted by DCI Stephen Drury who is investigating a husband and wife killing. Reluctantly Joe agrees to visit the crime scene.   DCI Drury has a suspect, twenty-five year-old Augie Shaw, a local boy who is only 9 pence to the shilling.  When Joe realises that the killings took place at the former home of Tash McBain he suspects a link to Tash’a abduction – or as was suspected at the time, did Tash just runaway with her friend Piper?

The story is told in the first person from the diary of Piper Hadley; And by Joe O’Loughlin, who suspects a connection between the recent killings and the Tash and Piper.  Follwoing his hunch, he attempts to piece together just what happened to Tash and Piper. We learn from Piper’s diary the circumstances in which the two girls are imprisoned, the abuse inflicted on them, their constant fear, and the background to the lives of the two girls.  Tash has managed to escape and promised to come back to release Piper, but as the days past and no rescue materialises, Piper realises she is now on her own.

The first person narrative makes this story very powerful as it gives an immediacy to the abuse and suffering of Piper. Even as I read I was waiting for the trapdoor to open and ……

For Joe O’Loughlin time is also of the essence but for a different reason. As more information comes to light, the story of Tash and Piper’s last hours of freedom produce many suspects, but they don’t tell the whole story because the abductor is devious, clever, and very dangerous. The story builds to a stunning climax.  Highly recommended.
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Lizzie Hayes
Michael Robotham was born in Australia in November 1960, he grew up in small country towns that had more dogs than people and more flies than dogs. He escaped in 1979 and became a cadet journalist on an afternoon newspaper in Sydney. For the next fourteen years he wrote for newspapers and magazines in Australia, Britain and America. As a senior feature writer for the UK’s Mail on Sunday he was among the first people to view the letters and diaries of Czar Nicholas II and his wife Empress Alexandra, unearthed in the Moscow State Archives in 1991. He also gained access to Stalin’s Hitler files, which had been missing for nearly fifty years until a cleaner stumbled upon a cardboard box that had been misplaced and misfiled.
In 1993 he quit journalism to become a ghostwriter, collaborating with politicians, pop stars, psychologists, adventurers and show business personalities to write their autobiographies. Twelve of these non-fiction titles were bestsellers with combined sales of more than 2 million copies.
His first novel The Suspect a psychological thriller, was chosen by the world’s largest consortium of book clubs as only the fifth “International Book of the Month”, making it the top recommendation to 28 million book club members in fifteen countries. It has been translated into twenty-two languages, including some he's barely heard of. His second novel Lost' won the Ned Kelly Award for the Crime Book of the Year in 2005, given by the Australian Crime Writers Association. It was also shortlisted for the 2006 Barry Award for the BEST BRITISH NOVEL published in the US in 2005. Michael's subsequent novels The Night Ferry and Shatter were both shortlisted for UK Crime Writers Association Steel Dagger in 2007 and 2008. 'Shatter' was also shortlisted in the inaugural ITV3 Thriller Awards in the UK and for South Africa's Boeke Prize. Michael can most often be found working in his 'pit of despair' (basement office) on Sydney's northern beaches where he funds the extravagant lifestyles of a wife and three daughters.

I discovered Michelle Spring's Laura Principal series in 1995 and Michelle became immediately became one of my favourite authors.  So I was thrilled when Michelle agreed to talk to me about her new book.

Photograph courtesy of Catarina Clifford

Michelle Spring grew up in British Columbia, and has lived in Cambridge, where many of her novels are set, for over thirty years. She has enjoyed two very different careers. She was first an academic, teaching at Anglia Polytechnic University where she was eventually appointed Professor of Sociology. During this time, she also lectured in the Social and Political Sciences Faculty at the University of Cambridge, did research, and published four volumes of non-fiction, including, with co-authors Anthony Bilton et al, the textbook Introductory Sociology. Michelle's fiction writing career was triggered by a confrontation with a violent stalker. Every Breath You Take, which drew on this experience, was short-listed for two major crime fiction awards. Four more novels featuring private investigator Laura Principal followed. In the Midnight Hour won the Arthur Ellis award (given by the Crime Writers of Canada) for Best Novel of the Year.

  

Q Michelle, your new book The ARVON Book of Crime and Thriller Writing which you have written with Laurie R King, is to be published September 6^th. Could you tell us how this came about?

A I’d been aware for some time that there were a number of good primers for crime writing on the market, but none that are structured in such a way as to appeal both to aspiring writers of crime, and to the substantial readership who adore crime fiction and are eager to know more about how it is done. The format of the Arvon series fits the bill perfectly, and so when the commission was offered, I leapt at it. When Laurie R. King, author of the Sherlock Holmes/Mary Russell series of books, winner of just about every mystery award going, and all-round lovely person, agreed to join me, I knew we were on to a winner.

The book Laurie and I have written provides a detailed and practical guide to writing; we do our best to de-mystify the mystery (so to speak) by explaining (for example) how to turn a sketchy initial draft into a powerful second one, or how to create a gripping plot in which events and character development go hand in hand.  But the book also offers an in-depth discussion between Laurie and I about the nature and particular demands of crime fiction, its history and sub-genres, and about what it means to be a crime or thriller writer in the contemporary world. This section is very personal. Laurie and I were keen to gobeyond the obvious, and to offer our candid (and sometimes conflicting) reflections on the genre. This conflict, or rather difference, is key to the book. Laurie and I share many views about the process of writing, but we also have distinct positions on issues such as plotting: one of us plans carefully and meticulously before diving into the writing; the other plunges in without much forethought, and sorts out plot, consistency, character development and so on after the first draft has been fired into being. Airing these divergent approaches helps (we hope) to make it crystal clear that there is no one sure-fire formula for writing a crime novel or thriller. On the contrary, there are a number of approaches that can generate a good or even excellent book, and the job of the writer is to figure out what will work for her or him.

Q I understand that the book features fascinating insights from twenty-six top crime-writing guests.

A        Yes, indeed. Twenty-six terrific writers of crime novels and thrillers – from Sara Paretsky to Lee Child – agreed to share with us (and with you, the readers) their writing secrets. Many of their essays delve in depth into specific and tricky areas of writing: how to create (and sustain) suspense, how to write sizzling action scenes, how to incorporate vital background information without sending readers to sleep, and so forth. Others write with passion and conviction about the place of stories in the real world, and of the importance of writing your own type of truth. As a writer myself, I found these essays both instructive and inspiring.

Q          Did you and Laurie split the work and how long did the book take from conception to completion?

A          From planning to execution, the Arvon book took, perhaps, a year and a half. Tracking down and corresponding with guest authors was a lengthy, if rewarding, process. Laurie and I worked out a rough table of contents, based on what we’d like to see in a book of this kind, and what we thought would be useful to others. We didn’t split up the job of writing in any very clear-cut way; rather, we each drafted Sections or wrote about issues as they caught our imagination, and then gradually melded the resultstogether into a coherent whole. As a result, some sections are clearly Laurie’s work, and others mine, but here are just as many places where our voices are intertwined – and indistinguishable.  We found this to be the best way of drawing effectively on both of our experience as writers, while not submerging our differences.
      

Q           Did you and Laurie select the crime-writing guests? And if so what criteria did you use?

A           We did select the guests, and, believe me, this was no easy task. We wanted a range of writers that  would highlight the impressive diversity of crime fiction, including writers of high-octane thrillers and of psychological thrillers, historical crime novels and police procedurals, novels with a domestic focus and those that opened up a wider world of intrigue. We wanted a good mix of women and men, andwriters of traditional-style mysteries as well as those whose work takes a darker and grittier bent. Laurie lives in California and I in Cambridge, UK, so we were determined to include the best from both sides of the Atlantic.  Inevitably, given restrictions on space, there are many terrific writers who didn’t make the final cut. (Arvon no. 2, anyone?)

Q Although you are renowned for your many non-fiction books, you are known in the crime fiction world for your five-book series featuring Private Investigator Laura Principal. Where did Laura Principal come from?

A Laura Principal entered my life just after I’d been freed from the attentions of a stalker, who’d threatened my family and me for eighteen months.  Needing a distraction, I decided to have a go atfiction writing. It wasn’t an immediate success. I sat for weeks at the keyboard without writing a single interesting paragraph. And then – just when she was most needed – Laura Principal burst into life. She arrived on the page fully formed, a complete and engaging character  -  laidback, confident, with a wry sense of humour and clear views about the world – and it felt as if she, not I, wrote the initial draft of the first book in the series,  Every Breath You Take. (After that, I had to step in and actually do some work, which is when I began to learn the fiction writer’s craft.)

Q In 2006 you published a standalone suspense novel, The Night Lawyer.  Can you tell us a little about the decision at this time to move from your series? Particularly as ‘In the Midnight Hour’ won the Arthur Ellis award (given by the Crime Writers of Canada) for Best Novel of the Year.

A         I didn’t intend by any means to abandon the series. But I became interested in a story  about the criss- crossing lives of a woman and her stalker, both of whom were trapped by aspects of their past, and after a while it became clear that this story needed a fresh setting (the Isle of Dogs, as it happened) and fresh characters. Hence the standalone.

Q Is there a chance of any further Laura Principal books in the future? Or have you something else in mind?

A          I haven’t ruled out returning to Laura Principal at some time in the future, but for now I have a new and exciting project. I have begun research for my first historical novel, exploring the world of the bold pioneers who left the Ukraine in the 1890s and opened up the Canadian prairies. My grandmother was such a pioneer, and working on this book feels like a labour of love.

Q When embarking on a new book be it fiction or non-fiction what area of the book challenges you the most? 

A I’m a planner by nature, and put enormous effort into research and into creating the perfect framework for a novel in advance. But I am always frustrated at not being able to leap straight into writing.  It’s the writing itself that I adore.

Q Do you have a favourite part of the writing process?

A That’s a hard one. As I say above, I adore writing; the crash and hum and tinkle of words is thrilling to me. But now that I think about it, I suppose for a sedentary person like me, there is a special pleasure in writing action scenes; when I imagine a fight, say, and put it into words, I feel afterwards the kind of high that friends tell me they get from a workout. (And it’s cheaper than joining a gym.)

Q As you know I am keen to promote new writers, so have you any golden tips for budding authors?

A          Read widely. Write every day, whether you feel inspired or not. Produce the very best

  

Books in the Laura Principal series are:

Every Breath You Take.      Running For Shelter

Standing in the Shadows.     Nights in White Satin

In the Midnight Hour

 The official launch of Michelle's new book
'The Arvon Book of Crime and Thriller Writing
is at Heffers Bookshop, Trinity St. Cambridge on
Thursday 6th September at 6.30pm.
Do join us.

‘Nowhere Man’ by Sheila Quigley

Published by Burgess Books,
May 2012.
ISBN: 978-0-5665-464-9

Nowhere Man picks up where Thorn in My Side ended. Aunt May is still in a coma. And although DI Mike York has managed to break up the drugs factory on Holy Island and the monastery returned to the monks, the perpetrators have to a large extent gone underground.  The threat to humanity from the families who have been in control for centuries is still very real.

Smiler, the young boy befriended by Mike York continues to experience premonitions of danger to Mike, but where is Mike? And where is Shelley Monroe?  The girl who had uncovered the horror that has been hidden for centuries, had managed to escape when the monastery was stormed, but in the resultant melee has still not conveyed her knowledge to Mike Yoke, and so is still being hunted.

How can Mike York a single policeman pit himself against the might, power and money of this worldwide organisation.  His only way of dealing with it, and to distance himself from those he loves in a hope of protecting them, is to go solo. Mike’s childhood friend Brother David and Smiler continue to keep a vigil at Aunt May’s bedside, as Mike ploughs his own furrow, which puts him in considerable danger.

This is the second in the series, set on Holy Island, and the story continues to twist and turn as Mike uncovers yet more secrets, and more horror.  This is a gripping entry in this enthralling series.  I cannot even envisage where this story will take us next, but I eagerly await the next book.  Highly recommended.

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Reviewer: Lizzie Hayes

Sheila Quigley started work at 15 as a presser in Hepworths, a tailoring factory. She married at 18 and had three daughters: Dawn, Janine and Diane and a younger son, Michael. Recently divorced, she now has eight grandchildren, five boys and three girls, and every Saturday and Sunday can be found at a football match for the under tens and under fifteens. Sheila has lived on the Homelands Estate (at present with her son and two dogs) at Houghton-le-Spring near Sunderland for 30 years.

For more information on Sheila visit her website www.theseahills.co.uk