Tickets are now on sale for the first ever live version of Whose Crime Is It Anyway? Seven crime writers from the NCS make up a best-selling story in one hour with the help of the audience. Fresh from a hugely successful zoom run the NCS are going live! It's at the Lit and Phil in Newcastle on Saturday November 26th at 2pm.
Tickets are availablehere but you have to scroll down to the date and time to find them - persevere, you know it's worth it. The bigger the audience the more fun so please come along if you can The Northern Crime (Writing) Syndicate.
This topic of research is one I often get asked about, and one I throw myself at with a bit too much gusto. So much of the time, way more often than you’d imagine, the truth is so much wilder and more unbelievable than the fiction I end up writing. Many times my editors have said ‘this is too much’ or ‘this is ridiculous’ and it has been something that has been hijacked from real life.
The North West is where I grew up, my home town being Warrington, which, for the uninitiated, is between Liverpool and Manchester; two powerhouse cities that have their own industries, histories, identities – and crime. And here, in Warrington, we have a hotchpotch mixture of all these things that has been distilled so finely through time that it is an identity all our own. I’ve always found this completely fascinating. I’m a citizen of these areas, and for want of a better word, I get stuck in.
So much of the information and inspiration I come across is thanks to me being a creature of habit and a ‘yes’ person. I am who I am. I like to pop down the pub and chat with people. I like working in the pub, as I find the setting somehow soothing and inspiring. I’m writing this piece in The Horseshoe in Croft, a Guinness by my elbow. It just works for me.
It’s not just on home turf either. When I travel anywhere, I always search out the local pub or bar, because it’s a bit like a barometer. You can find out so much about the vibe and themes of a place by hanging out in one of its bars for just an hour. The side effect of this is that you see things, hear stuff, and get talked to, while alcohol allows the truth to drift out a little easier.
And people like to talk! When they find out that the guy in the corner with the daft grin, a laptop and a pint of Guinness is a writer, so many make a beeline to offer stories up in a heartbeat. Contacts develop and blossom, and opportunities emerge. This comes back to me being a ‘yes’ person, because if someone asks me whether I’d like to do something, or try something (within reason!), I always try to say yes – because regardless of whether I enjoy it or hate it, I’ll come away enriched in some way, have more experience and more to say. And this helps my writing hugely.
This is how I ended up in a Puerto Rican biker bar, 500 yards from a prison, chatting with a gang celebrating the release of one of their own. This is how I ended up hanging out with (name redacted) who has the doors in (town name redacted), who invited me to his upcoming birthday party, we’d got on that well. And this is how I ended up sparring a guy who’d done a double digit prison stint for something very bad indeed, only to find we weren’t that different after all. I find if I say yes to stuff, go into situations accepting who they are and who I am, and smile, I end up in some wonderfully odd and enlightening predicaments – most of which find their way into my books, and And Your Enemies Closer is no different.
Another thing I make clear, is my confidentiality. I never name names, and this allows conversations to flow. This in turn has given me an understanding of certain mindsets and activities that I ordinarily would have no chance of getting near, and the hope is that this gives my work a degree of authenticity. If you’re ever reading my crime books and think I’ve gone too far, know that there were lots of other very real details that were deemed too outlandish to even put in the book. And some things I get told, or find out, are put in a special box in my head – where the ideas for my next book sit. Forgive me, but, like all ideas, I’m going to leave them to percolate for a while, before I try to find a way to make these astonishing truths work in fiction.
And Your Enemies Closer by Rob Parker is out now exclusively by Audible.
And Your Enemies Closer is a serpentine race against time as retired detective Brendan Foley and DI Iona Madison must stay one step ahead of criminals at every corner, while trying to bring justice - in whatever form it takes, and whatever loyalties it might burn. In the North West criminal underworld, a deal goes tragically wrong, resulting in war between the two main organised crime factions in the region. Shockwaves rock the thirty-mile gap between Liverpool and Manchester - with retired detective Brendan Foley right in the middle of it all. For Brendan, six months after his resignation, life is all different. His marriage is a mess, he’s working as a nightclub bouncer, his brother is still missing, and just he can’t stop searching for the crime family that destroyed his life. And at last, he’s found them - and he’s got them bang to rights. Iona Madison, his one-time partner and now successor as a DI in Warrington Police, is tasked with a body pulled from the River Mersey - a teen-age boy that went missing the previous year, which might bring her own conduct into question. Not only that, Brendan is feeding her information whether she likes it or not - and his unsanctioned activities are causing her headaches. And now, there’s a price on his head. A million pounds, dead or alive.
More information about Rob Parker can be found on his website. You can also follow him on Twitter @robparkerauthor. He can also be found on Facebook and on Instagram.
As big fans of audio
thrillers, Shots Magazine were excited to read that crime writer Rob Parker is penning an intriguing
trilogy commissioned by Audible Studios.
The first title, Far from
the Tree, will be released exclusively in audio on 2nd
July 2020. Publication dates for the next two titles will follow in due course.
Set in Warrington, Far from
the Tree follows DI Foley, who finds himself in charge
of one of the largest murder cases the country has ever seen. Twenty-seven
bodies are found buried in a woodland trench, as the discoveries unfold, DI
Foley must decide whether to solve the crime if it risks his family.
Parker commented: "To be able to write
a crime trilogy set in the area I grew up in — an area which doesn’t receive
much limelight or exposure — is a real delight, and I’m supremely thankful to
Audible for giving me this opportunity. I’m taking this chance with both hands
and aim to repay their faith in spades and I’m determined to show you ain’t
seen nothing yet."
After listening to the start
of this trilogy by Rob Parker, it came as no surprise to discover that Far
from the Tree is July’s Audible thriller of the month.
So, what’s in store?
Brendan Foley
has worked to balance the responsibilities of a demanding job and a troublesome
family. He’s managed to keep these two worlds separate, until the discovery of
a mass grave sends them into a headlong collision. When one of the dead turns
out to be a familiar face, he’s taken off the case.
Iona Madison
keeps everything under control. She works hard as a detective sergeant and
trains harder as a boxer. But when her superior, DI Foley, is removed from the
case, her certainties are tested like never before.
With stories
of the Warrington 27 plastered over the news, they set out to solve the crime
before anyone else. The local constabulary is small and under-funded – Brendan
knows they can’t crack this case alone, and he’s not letting a rival force take
over. Not with the secrets he fears are lurking. Their investigations lead them
into the murky underworlds of Manchester and Liverpool, where one more murder
means little to drug-dealing gangs, desperate to control their power bases.
But as Madison
steps into the ring for the fight of her life, the criminals come to them. It’s
no coincidence that the corpses have been buried in Foley’s hometown. The
question is, why? Foley might not like the answer....
Not to be confused with the legendary creator of the Boston
based Spenser
and Hawk series, penned by the legendary Robert
B Parker; the British Robert Parker, better known as “Rob” to his growing
band of readers [and now listeners] hails from the British North West, where his
acclaimed Ben Bracken thrillers are set - A Wanted Man, Morte
Point, The Penny Black, Till Morning Is Nigh
and the standalone post-Brexit country-noir Crook’s Hollow. A
member of the Northern Crime Syndicate and a co-host of the For Your
Reconsideration film podcast, Rob is also a regular voice on the Blood Brothers
Crime Podcast. A champion of encouraging literacy and creative writing, Rob
spends a lot of time travelling to schools giving talks across the country. Rob
Parker lives in Warrington with his family.
Far from the Tree is
the first in a trilogy, and narrated by actor Warren Brown. Currently he can be
seen as 'Sergeant Thomas 'Mac' McAllister' in the highly anticipated reboot of
the Emmy-nominated action series, Strike Back, for Sky/HBO Cinemax. Other
television credits include Doctor Who, Liar, X Company and RTS Best Drama
winning, Good Cop. Film credits include Cargo, Captain Webb and The Dark Knight
Rises. Audio drama for Big Finish include multiple series of Doctor Who,
U.N.I.T. and the standalone Audible series Transference. Through this former
Thai-Boxer, is probably best known for his role of “DS Ripley”, in the BBC
series Luther, co-starring with Idris Elba who plays the eponymous [and troubled]
detective.
For the crime-fiction geeks a little digression
–
Luther is written by Neil Cross, and when I interviewed him
several years ago [for Jeff
Peirce’s THE RAP SHEET] about his own writing, I indicated that I felt he
had read the works of Patricia
Highsmith..………
AK: I’m guessing you must have read Patricia
Highsmith, then.
NC: I’m obsessed by Patricia Highsmith.
AK: [Laughing] So am I. I am totally obsessed
with her Tom Ripley books. In fact, I have what my wife terms my white “Tom
Ripley suit.” Coincidentally, a number of critics have described your first
novel, Burial, as being distinctly Hitchcockian. And it was Hitchcock, of
course, who made a movie from Highsmith’s 1950 debut novel, Strangers on a
Train.
NC: Yes, there’s a psychological marriage
between Hitchcock and Highsmith; they suit each other very well.
AK: So, going back to Highsmith, is it just her
Tom Ripley novels that you enjoy, or do you find pleasure in her other amoral
tales?
NC: I’ve read many of her books and short
stories, though not all of her canon, and of course there are a few that are
just not up to her best work. But one non-Ripley novel that sticks to my mind
is Cry of the Owl [1962], which features a woman who falls in love with her own
stalker. It would barely be publishable today, but in Highsmith’s world it
makes perfect sense.
AK: The weird thing about Patricia Highsmith
was that she was highly acclaimed in Europe, but rather less so in her native
America; in fact, she lived for many years in the UK before making Switzerland
her home. Maybe
Tom Ripley was the precursor to Dr. Hannibal Lecter, the amoral, but
charming psychopath/sociopath--the sort of figure who doesn’t settle as well in
the American psyche as he does in the European one.
NC: That links to my theme of “free will
exercised as sin,” [something that] must be punished. And Highsmith just
doesn’t punish, she observes; in fact, she was known to sign books as Tom
Ripley from time to time.
Read the full interview at THE RAP SHEET, from Theakstons
Crime Writing Festival 2010 HERE
Neil Cross told me that he named DS Ripley, Idris Elba /
Luther’s sidekick as played by Warren Brown as a personal homage to Patricia
Highsmith’s amoral character, The
Talented Mr Ripley.
End of digression
So with Warren Brown narrating Rob Parker’s FAR FROM THE
TREE, what’s not to like? If like me, you are an Audible Member [on the
£7.99 / month deal, which allows you one audio credit per month], you can have the
start of the trilogy for just one credit – or for non-members it’s £21.41 –
More information CLICK HERE
We’ll leave the last word to the author and his peers –
‘Working with Audible has been both a joy and a
game-changer. I’m honoured and thrilled to have their faith with this canvas on
which to tell a much larger, more complete story than I could ever have dreamed
previously. Not only this, but to be able to write a crime trilogy set in the
area I grew up in - an area which doesn’t receive much limelight or exposure -
is a real delight, and I’m supremely thankful to Audible for giving me this
opportunity. I’m taking this chance with both hands, aim to repay their faith
in spades and I’m determined to show you ain’t seen nothing yet.’
"...A big departure from Rob’s previous
work, I hope he won’t mind when I say it exceeds his already sky high
standards. A dark, powerful & utterly compelling tale of Northern gangsters
tied together by blood, it just drips with real life."
"Rob Parker doesn’t mess around. Far from
the Tree is a gritty, propulsive [listen]. Drawn in shades of grey, DI Brendan
Foley is a complex, morally ambiguous character I couldn’t stop rooting for. A
punchy, powerful tale well told."
