Heffers Cambridge - Forthcoming Crime Fiction Events

An Evening with Louise Penny
Thursday, November 21st at 18:30 

Louise Penny is a Canadian author of mystery novels set in the Canadian province of Quebec centred on the work of Chief Inspector Armand Gamache of the Sûreté du Québec. Louise Penny's first career was as a radio broadcaster for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. After she turned to writing, she won numerous awards for her work, including the Agatha Award for best mystery novel of the year for four consecutive years (2007–2010) and the Anthony Award for two novels. Her novels have been published in 23 languages.

 

When the Light Gets In: Christmas is approaching, and in Québec it’s a time of dazzling snowfalls, bright lights, and gatherings with friends in front of blazing hearths. But shadows are falling on the usually festive season for Chief Inspector Armand Gamache. Most of his best agents have left the Homicide Department, his old friend and lieutenant Jean-Guy Beauvoir hasn’t spoken to him in months, and hostile forces are lining up against him. When Gamache receives a message from Myrna Landers that a longtime friend has failed to arrive for Christmas in the village of Three Pines, he welcomes the chance to get away from the city. Mystified by Myrna's reluctance to reveal her friend's name, Gamache soon discovers the missing woman was once one of the most famous people not just in North America, but in the world, and now goes unrecognized by virtually everyone except the mad, brilliant poet Ruth Zardo. Tickets must be booked in advance from https://louise-penny.eventbrite.co.uk

 

An Evening with Rowan Williams, Ray Tallis & Alison Joseph: Faith & Science
Wednesday, December 4th at 18:30 

An Evening of conversation about Faith & Science, Chaired by Alison Joseph ROWAN WILLIAMS, Baron Williams of Oystermouth PC FBA FRSL FLSW is an Anglican bishop, poet and theologian. He was the 104th Archbishop of Canterbury, Metropolitan of the Province of Canterbury and Primate of All England, offices he held from December 2002 to December 2012.Williams was previously Bishop of Monmouth and Archbishop of Wales, making him the first Archbishop of Canterbury in modern times not to be appointed from within the Church of England. He spent much of his earlier career as an academic at the Universities of Cambridge and Oxford successively. Apart from Welsh, he speaks or reads nine other languages. RAYMOND TALLIS F.Med.Sci., F.R.C.P., F.R.S.A.is a polymath. He is a philosopher, poet, novelist, cultural critic and a retired medical physician and clinical neuroscientist. Specializing in geriatrics, Tallis served on several UK commissions on medical care of the aged and was an editor or major contributor to two key textbooks in the field, The Clinical Neurology of Old Age and Textbook of Geriatric Medicine and Gerontology. In a 2010 Interview with author Jesse Horn, Tallis expressed that he is a optimistic humanist and an atheist. “Given that I was born a few months after Auschwitz was liberated, it is hardly surprising that I have a strong sense of the evil that humans – individually and collectively – do. My position is that of cautious and chastened optimism, a belief that, if we are ourselves well-treated by others, we will usually treat others reasonably well.” ALISON JOSEPH was born in North London and educated at Leeds University. After graduating she worked as a presenter on a local radio station then, moving back to London, for Channel 4. She later became a partner in an independent production company and one of its commissions was a series about women and religion. She has since worked as a reader for BBC Radio Drama. Alison, who now has three children, lives in London. Alison is the author of the crime fiction novels featuring the nun Sister Agnes. Tickets from: https://faith-science.eventbrite.co.uk

An Evening with Charles Palliser
Thursday, December 5th at 18:30 

Charles Palliser is a best-selling novelist, American-born but British-based. His most well-known novel, "The Quincunx", has sold over a million copies internationally. With his new novel, Rustication, he returns to the town of Thurchester, which he evoked so hauntingly in The Unburied. It is winter 1863, and Richard Shenstone, aged seventeen, has been sent down—“rusticated”—from Cambridge under a cloud of suspicion. Addicted to opium and tormented by sexual desire, he finds temporary refuge in a dilapidated old mansion on the southern English coast inhabited by his newly impoverished mother and his sister, Effie. Soon, graphic and threatening letters begin to circulate among his neighbors, and Richard finds himself the leading suspect in a series of crimes and misdemeanors ranging from vivisection to murder. Tickets from: https://charles-palliser.eventbrite.co.uk

Ian Rankin in conversation with Alison Bruce
Tuesday, December 10th at 19:00 

Ian Rankin returns to East Anglia before taking a year off from writing! Ian will not be carrying out any events until 2015, so this is your last chance to hear him for a while. This evening he is being interviewed by popular local crime writer Alison Bruce. They will cover a wide range of topics including Ian's new book.

Rebus is back on the force, albeit with a demotion and a chip on his shoulder. A 30-year-old case is being reopened, and Rebus’s team from back then is suspected of foul play. With Malcolm Fox as the investigating officer is the past and present about to collide in a shocking and murderous fashion? And does Rebus have anything to hide? His colleagues back then called themselves ‘The Saints’, and swore a bond on something called ‘the Shadow Bible’. But times have changed and the crimes of the past may not stay hidden much longer, especially with a referendum on Scottish independence just around the corner. Who are the saints and who the sinners? And can the one ever become the other?

Venue: St Andrews Baptist Church, St Andrews St Cambridge
Tickets from https://ian-rankin.eventbrite.co.uk

 An Evening with Jill Paton Walsh

Tuesday, December 17th at 18:30 

Jill Paton Walsh is an English novelist and children's writer. She is best known for the Peter Wimsey–Harriet Vane mysteries that have completed or continued the work of Dorothy L. Sayers. Her latest book ‘The Late Scholar’ is a new murder mystery featuring Lord Peter Wimsey - now a Duke - and his wife Harriet Vane, set in an Oxford college in the 1950s. Peter Wimsey is pleased to discover that along with a Dukedom he has inherited the duties of 'visitor' at an Oxford college. When the fellows appeal to him to resolve a dispute, he and Harriet set off happily to spend some time in Oxford. But the dispute turns out to be embittered. The voting is evenly balanced between two passionate parties - evenly balanced, that is, until several of the fellows unexpectedly die. The Warden has a casting vote, but the Warden has disappeared. And the causes of death of the deceased fellows bear an uncanny resemblance to the murder methods in Peter's past cases - methods that Harriet has used in her published novels. Tickets from: https://jill-paton-walsh.eventbrite.co.uk