St Hilda's 2017

So, this morning I have left a rather wet but bright London on my way to one of my favourite Crime and Mystery Conferences. St Hilda's weekend.

This time last year I drove and had the delightful company of the wonderful Sarah Weinman (who was giving her first ever paper) and my friend Kirstie Long.

This year I have reverted back to what I normally do and that is catch the coach.  Specifically the Oxford Tube!  It is in my opinion one of the most convenient ways to get to Oxford from London and to St Hilda's specifically as the coach drops you less than 10 minutes walk (by my calculations anyway) from St Hilda's.

View from my room

St Hilda's (as it is fondly known) is one of the few crime and mystery conferences that I try and not miss. It is also the oldest.  I have forgotten when I started attending but I can say it must be at least 15 years ago and I don't think I have missed one.  The closest I came to missing St Hilda's was the year there was a significant birthday in the family and I ended up doing a mad dash back to London from Oxford and returning again so that I could take part in the family festivities.  It is also the only conference that I organise my leave around.  That is the power of St Hilda's.

This year there is so much to look forward to.  The theme is Another Crime, Another Place: the role of location in crime fiction. Lots of new authors giving papers such as Stella Duffy who is presently finishing a Ngaio Marsh novel,  Yrsa Sigurðardóttir who will be giving the main Conference lecture, Abir Mukerjee whose novels are set in India, Lin Anderson, Mark Billingham (to name a few) and a mystery themed play/ quiz as well. 

It is going to be lots of fun and I shall be tweeting, taking photographs and hopefully blogging as much as possible over the weekend.  So do come long for the ride. The only thing you may wish is that you were here in person.

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