It’s been a busy week for the London based book reviewers,
journalists and critics that trawl the darkest edges of literature, namely
crime mystery and thriller fiction; as publishers are preparing their 2016 work
for market. Last week we attended the Hodder
& Stoughton, Headline and Quercus Publishing Party, held alongside the
Embankment of London’s Thames. All three publishers form a significant segment
of the Hachette Publishing group, and fitting within the Hodder & Stoughton
imprint is the UK division of Mulholland Books, which showcases some of the
more unusual offerings, such as David
Morrell’s award-winning historical series featuring Thomas De Quincey and the DS McAvoy series from Hull
based journalist David Mark, to name just two of their authors.
Just out from Mulholland is Mark’s
fifth novel DEAD
PRETTY, and what a dark ride it is indeed, as our reviewer discovered. So
it was a delight to attend the launch party that Hodder and Stoughton had
organised in-conjunction with London’s Goldsboro
Books, in Covent Garden. The Hodder Team were out in force with Nick
Sayers, Kerry Hood and David’s editor Ruth Tross.
The wine flowed like water, as did the
conversation. It was great to bump into colleagues in the reviewing world such
as Mike Carlson, Jon
Coates, Jake
Kerridge, as well as Bloggers such as Milo
Rambles, and “Steph” aka the
mysterious crime thriller girl. It was also great fun to bump into various
writers who had come to support David, such as Mari Hannah, who writes the Kate Daniels
series. It was a few years ago at a Crimefest
Convention in Bristol where Mari and I found ourselves seated together for
the Gala Dinner with her publishers Pan Macmillan. I took
the opportunity to congratulate her on publishing her first standalone The
Silent Room, and the acclaim it had gathered was extraordinary. Barry
Forshaw commented in The Independent –
There are two kinds of crime writer. There are the
high-profile, starry figures, routinely called upon to be pundits for the genre
– and whose prestige allows them to get away (almost scot-free) with the odd
misfiring book. And then there are the others: the quiet, hard-working
professionals who simply get on with the job, delivering reliable, readable
fiction that may not have any truck with innovation or experiment, but delivers
the kind of reader-pleasing product (misfires discouraged) that ensures their
contracts are renewed regularly. Mari Hannah is in the latter group, and over a
solid series of books has built up a faithful following.
With her pithily drawn Northumbrian settings, Hannah has
produced a compellingly readable series featuring gay copper DCI Kate Daniels,
which has maintained a satisfyingly dark and tense atmosphere, the pungent
characterisation matched by persuasive detail of forensic and policing methods.
Read More Here
I was also delighted to have a chat
with writers Susi
S J Hollliday and Alexandra A K Benedict.
Susi and I had been in communication prior to Bouchercon
Raleigh on the panel planning, and the curious thing was during the event
in North Carolina, due to my frantic programming tasks, I actually hadn’t seen
her at the event, but then again attendance was over 1,400 people, and I was
never in one place for more than a minute or two, as I wondered around checking
panels, sorting last minute problems, and basically ensuring the event ran as
smoothly as our team could manage.
I was looking forward to Alexandra Benedict’s
follow-up to her debut novel The
Beauty of Murder – which was titled Jonathan
Dark or The Evidence of Ghosts due for release in February from Orion
Publishing, as her work is in a favourite subgenre / hybrid of mine, one that
merges crime and mystery with horror and the weird.
Anyway, with much mingling, and Kerry
Hood ensuring our glasses of wine were kept topped up; Ruth Tross, took to the
front to introduce David Mark and his new work, DEAD PRETTY followed by David
himself giving his usual self-deprecating welcome to all the guests who came to
celebrate his latest DS McAvoy thriller.
His speech was very amusing, in fact I have noticed that the writers that write
the toughest narratives tend to be the nicest of people, and David is no
exception.
David is gaining
traction in the US and I was delighted to hear that he and his wife Nicola are
planning attending Bouchercon “Blood on the Bayou” in New
Orleans later this year. This will be David and Nicola’s first Bouchercon so
they were keen to listen to the experiences of Mike Stotter and I, and we were
delighted to hear that Ruth Tross of Hodder / Mulholland was also going to
attend, so the British Contingent was taking shape. The event is being chaired
by the best-selling author and musician Heather Graham, so click
here for a free eBook on why Heather
loves New Orleans.
More Information on the work of David
Mark is available Here
from Crimefiles and Here from Shots,
while the Shots
review is available Here and we have discounted copies available from the Shots
Bookstore Here and if you are planning to attend Bouchercon this year in
New Orleans, here’s the link
So after the party, we thanked David
Headley of Goldsboro Books, and the team from Hodder and Stoughton / Mulholland
Books for their hospitality, and headed for some dinner, where Mike and I
discussed plans for our trip to New Orleans, as well as priorities on reviewing
and upcoming Shots features. We were both very encouraged at the exclusive
telephone call with David McCallum which though concise [due to his busy schedule]
revealed details on his engaging debut
crime novel, “Once a Crooked Man”.
As we left the restaurant, by sheer serendipity,
we noticed Ruth Tross, David Mark and Nicola East with some others standing
outside a bar and of course David’s booming laughter – so we joined them for a
night cap, and toasted the success of Journalist David Mark, turned
best-selling crime-writer, a man with a pitch-black imagination, but with a
sense of humour and wit that makes his work, dare I say unique.
If you haven’t discovered the world of
DS McAvoy, then you are in for a treat, but be warned these are very gritty and
tough detective novels, but are striated with a knowing eye, and with a social conscience.
This link explains more,
because Detective McAvoy takes his readers to Hull and Back……
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