Today in my feature series – three word book reviews – I’m reviewing THE OLD YOU, a psychological thriller from crime writer Louise Voss. The Old You will be published in May 2018 by Orenda Books.
My verdict: INGENIOUS. TWISTY. SECRETS.
To find out more and pre-order the book in ebook and paperback click this link to AMAZON
THE SLICE GIRLS at the HOUSE OF BLUES [L-R: Alexandra Sokoloff, CTG, AK Benedict, Louise Voss, SJI Holliday, Harley Jane Kozak]
Firstly, Bouchercon is a massive festival – almost 2000 writers, readers, bloggers and industry folks all poured in from across the world for the mystery convention that ran from Thursday September 15th to Sunday September 18th. The atmosphere was electric!
Plus, it was held in New Orleans this year – a city unlike any other that I’ve visited – loud, bright, dirty, magical, shiny. A place of many contradictions!
It’s super hard to pick just ten cool things as in truth it was a whole week of cool, but I’ve had a go at picking out just a few highlights in words and pictures …
Next year Bouchercon is being held in TORONTO. I’m pretty sure you’re going to want to be there!
Visit the website to find out more www.bouchercon2017.com/registration/
And check out the fantastic article written in The Independent by Andy Martin on the Bouchercon experience here
Slice Girling it up at Crime in the Coo! [L-R: Louise Voss, CTG, AK Benedict]
It’s a super friendly and dynamic festival with a brilliant team of organisers and volunteers.
It’s hard to pick just ten things, but I’ve done my best and cheated slightly by adding an additional thing (so technically it’s now eleven cool things!!) – and added a bunch of photos to show the rest …
Find out more about this brilliant festival at www.bloodyscotland.com and be sure to book your ticket for next year – I just know that it’s going to be fantastic.
You can buy Daniel Pembrey’s THE HARBOUR MASTER here
You can buy Craig Robertson’s MURDERABILIA here
Check out the GRAB THIS BOOK blog here
Check out THE SLICE GIRLS on Facebook here
The annual Theakstons Old Peculier Crime Writing Festival in Harrogate happened last weekend and, as always, it was an amazing weekend of crime fiction, bookish antics, parties, and awards. It was a time to rub shoulders with like-minded types who write and read crime fiction, and to catch up with friends and meet new ones.
Over the next few days I’ll be blogging all about it, and today I thought I’d share four things I did over the weekend for the first time …
1. Got a photo of the iconic ‘chalk outline’ at the front of the Old Swan Hotel
Okay, so I had to word this one very carefully. I couldn’t use the words ‘Took a photo’ as technically that isn’t true. I did see the chalk outline – it’s one of the iconic features of the ‘scene setting’ for the fabulous Theakston Old Peculier Crime Writing Festival. I just didn’t photo it! Big thanks to crime writer Caroline Mitchell (@Caroline_writes) for taking the picture!
2. Sat in one of the Green Chairs
Another of the iconic fixtures at Harrogate is always the fabulous green chairs. They’re huge. High also (as I discovered). And almost impossible to get into in a ladylike fashion when wearing a long dress. I say ‘almost’ impossible, as with a bit of improvisation using a white plastic garden chair, and a few well timed instructions from the helpful chap already sitting in the other green chair, I was able to scale the chair-face in a relatively elegant way. I have the picture to prove it – here’s me and crime writer Susi Holliday (@SJIHolliday), sitting proudly in the chair. Photo curtesy of crime writer Rosie Claverton (@rosieclaverton) – who also provided the garden chair and removed the evidence!
CTG (looking a bit grumpy – it was hot!) and Susi Holliday (looking much cheerier!)
3. Watched a panel from the front row reserved seating
The first two rows of the massive festival room are VIPs only. The room (well, two rooms joined together) that’s used for all panels and interviews is so huge that there are big screens halfway down it – same as at the O2 arena, or Wembley and the like – just so everyone has a good view of the action on the stage. Anyway, as I was looking for some seats to watch my mates on the New Blood panel (having arrived just moments before the planned start), a very lovely man from Theakstons said he had space up the front and I was welcome to sit there. So I got to view the panel from the front row (and what a brilliantly fun and interesting panel it was – more to come on that in my next post). Fabulous.
4. Sang live in a gym
Technically this happened in The Cairn Hotel rather than at the festival, but it’s in Harrogate so I’m counting it! On Friday and Saturday morning, The Slice Girls had band practice. We don’t get to practice together in the same place that often, and with performances coming up in September at both the Bloody Scotland Crime Festival, Stirling, and Bouchercon, New Orleans, we needed to try out some new songs and practice our routines. The best place for this was the gym at The Cairn Hotel. It has great acoustics and (as it used to be a lounge bar) it still has the bar in place – so we could get up on it and practice our moves. It was a lot of fun practising with my fellow Slice Girls – Susi Holliday, AK Benedict (@ak_benedict), and Louise Voss (@louisevoss1) and our dynamic maestro Alexandra Sokoloff (@AlexSokoloff). But it might have been less fun for the poor male crime writer (who will remain nameless) who had to run on the treadmill for over an hour to the sound of us singing our new number for Bloody Scotland!
Pop back tomorrow for the next instalment in my confessions from Harrogate …
Going to the crime festival at Harrogate is a bit like entering another world – a world populated entirely by crime writers and crime readers. A perfect place for a crime fiction addict like me to hang out!
The Irish Noir panel
So I arrived on Thursday afternoon in time for the opening party (of course!) and the announcement of the Theakston Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year. This year the highly coveted barrel trophy was won by the fabulous Sarah Hilary for her brilliant novel Someone Else’s Skin. [FYI: the partying went on well into the night/morning]
On Friday I managed to make it to breakfast (just before the food was cleared away) and after a few strong coffees was ready to skip along to the Irish Noir panel. This lively event, with Steve Cavanagh, Stuart Neville, Brian McGilloway, Eoin McNamee and Adrian McKinty, saw the authors discussing why they’d chosen to set their books where they had (in Ireland or not, and in the far past, recent past or present), what their writing influences had been, how the troubles had shaped them as writers, the challenges of research – including the danger of being sucked down the rabbit hole by Google and Wikipedia – and many other topics.
Killer Women
Then it was time for lunch and drinks on the lawn where I caught up with some of the wonderful Killer Women (pictured) Anya Lipska, Helen Giltrow, Louise Voss, and Helen Smith.
Then it was time for the Yorkshire Pride panel with moderator Nick Quantrill posing the questions to Lee Child, Steve Mosby, Frances Brody and Peter Robinson around the central topic of Yorkshire. Lee Child spoke of his fond memories buying sweets with his grandma in Harrogate, Steve Mosby spoke of creating a Leeds-like place to set his novels in, and Peter Robinson and Frances Brody spoke about the Yorkshire settings – both present and past – of their novels.
As soon as the panel ended it was a quick sprint along the corridor to the Dead Good Reader Awards – luckily not arriving too late for one of the special ‘The Widow’ themed cocktails (pictured) of blood orange and bubbly!
‘The Widow’ cocktails
From the thousands of votes, the winners of the first ever Dead Good Reader Awards were announced as …
Award winner Marnie Riches with her agent
And there was still much to come. The next event was Mark Billingham in conversation with Eddie Izzard. This session, to a packed out audience, was one of the major highlights of the festival. With great banter, packed full of anecdotes and laughs, they talked about some of the stranger venues they’d played on the comedy circuit, what it’s like to die on stage, how to deal with hecklers, through to the need to continuously challenge yourself, and how everyone can keep learning – even if they’re 90. The hour seemed to pass in a flash, and I for one could have continued to listen to them all night.
The final session of the day (starting at 10pm) was The Black Art of Criticism panel with moderator N.J. Cooper posing the questions to panellists Jake Kerridge (the Telegraph’s book reviewer), and authors S.J. Parris, Stav Sherez and Ann Widdecombe. It was a playful panel who debated how they approached reviewing, and how they took being reviewed, with plenty of entertaining discussion.
The Black Art of Criticism panel
And so, at 11pm as the events of the day drew to a close, I headed to the bar – where I stayed until the early hours of the next morning.
To be continued …
BritCrime organiser and author, Helen Smith
BritCrime 2015 is a brand new sparkly crime fiction festival that will run for the first time from 11 – 13 July 2015. Instigated by author Helen Smith, the festival will feature more than forty crime authors taking part over the three-day festival.
The free festival – yes, that’s right – FREE – will take place entirely online. There’ll be live Q&A panel discussions on the BritCrime Facebook page as well as ‘Meet us in the (virtual) Bar’ sessions for late night chat and japes.
In the run up to the festival there’ll be lots of exciting things going on – giveaways, video sessions and interactive Google Hangouts. You can also sign up to get the festival email updates – and be entered into the draw to win a Kindle Paperwhite.
Participating authors include Quentin Bates, Jenny Blackhurst, Rebecca Bradley, Graeme Cameron, Steve Cavanagh, Tammy Cohen, Mason Cross, Julia Crouch, Eva Dolan, Steven Dunne, Mark Edwards, Chris Ewan, Paul Finch, Helen Giltrow, Sarah Hilary, Susi Holliday, Jane Isaac, Amanda Jennings, Emma Kavanagh, Anya Lipska, Colette McBeth, M J McGrath, Fergus McNeill, Clare Mackintosh, Michael J Malone, Ava Marsh, Alex Marwood, K T Medina, Daniel Pembrey, J F Penn, Nick Quantrill, Marnie Riches, Craig Robertson, Mel Sherratt, Alexandra Sokoloff, Helen Smith, C L Taylor, Simon Toyne, Luca Veste, Louise Voss, Sarah Ward – that’s A LOT of authors!!
Author, Mason Cross
And you can ask them anything! Want to know what sparked the idea for a book? – you can ask them; want to learn how to pick locks or how to turn your teenage diary into a murder story? – there’ll be tips for that too; wondering what it’s like to go from real life detective to crime fiction writer? – that’s something you can ask as well.
On Saturday 11th and Sunday 12th July the live Q&A sessions will run from midday to 10pm (UK time) with the ‘Meet us in the Bar’ sessions live after the panels from 10pm to midnight.
On Monday 13th July there’ll be highlights from the BritCrime Festival, a report from ThrillerFest (New York), BritCrime authors on tour: looking forward to Harrogate, Bloody Scotland and Bouchercon, and ‘What’s next for BritCrime? – more exciting stuff to come.’
Author, Eva Dolan
So whether you love murder mysteries, police procedurals, private investigators, thrillers, romantic suspense or domestic noir (or all of them!) by getting online and involved, you’ll be able to take part in this fantastic new festival wherever you live – and FOR FREE!
So be sure to follow @BritCrime on Twitter, and then hop on over to the festival website at www.britcrime.com to find out more, register, and start thinking of all the questions you’d like to ask the authors …
See you at BritCrime!
Killer Women logo
Last night I was thrilled to attend the launch event for the fabulous new Killer Women group. Held at the lovely Collyer Bristow Gallery, with a plentiful supply of gorgeously yummy wine from Naked Wines, it was a brilliant evening.
Set up by Melanie McGrath and Louise Millar, Killer Women is a group of fifteen established female crime writers: Jane Casey, Tammy Cohen, Helen Giltrow, Paula Hawkins, Alison Joseph, Erin Kelly, Anya Lipska, Colette McBeth, Melanie McGrath, Kate Medina, Louise Millar, Kate Rhodes, Helen Smith, Louise Voss, and Laura Wilson.
Between them they write in many sub-genres of crime writing from psychological thrillers to procedurals, to political thrillers and more – just look at the fantastic range of books on display last night (pictured). And as a group they’re looking to connect with readers through a range of fabulous sounding activities from talks at festivals to events at libraries and bookshops, to debates around women and violence, interviews with crime writers and criminal justice experts, and much more.
books by the Killer Women
It sounds like a great idea to me, and I can’t wait to see the Killer Women in action at their next event.
To find out more about Killer Women and their upcoming events, talks, debates, workshops and giveaways hop on over to their website at www.killerwomen.org and follow them on Twitter @killerwomenorg
Steph Broadribb 