The Michael Joseph Penguin Crime Party 2026

An annual highlight for the UK Crime Fiction community is PenguinRandomHouse imprint Michael Joseph’s Party.

During the proceedings, we are treated to a preview of the upcoming offerings from this important imprint. Invited guests include Booksellers, Authors, Reviewers, Bloggers, Journalists and Literary Champions. Last year, the party was held in The Crypt in St Martins-in-the Field – Click Here for the Shots 2025 Report.

Last Year’s startling discovery [thanks to Rowland White] was debut author Travis Kennedy and his novel THE WHYTE PYTHON WORLD TOUR, which is released in Paperback this summer [11^TH June 2026]. I would urge pre-ordering.

This novel was one of my top ten reads for 2025 when released in Hardcover. I wrote at the time “This novel gripped me like the snake it eponymously references, preventing me from doing anything apart from purely reading the story. During the times I was away from the book – I was thinking about it, even dreaming about the characters and the narrative in my sleep. It is clever, thought-provoking and witty, which at times becomes ‘laugh-out-loud’ as the absurd plot unravels at a fevered pace.” Read my full review HERE

Following that frenzied read, I spoke with the author and our exchange is archived HERE and as I love reading books, during our chat, Travis mentioned the novel The Savage, Noble Death of Babs Dionne by Ron Currie which I purchased on his recommendation and that too became one of my favourite novels of last year.

This year, the venue was Browns Court Rooms in Covent Garden. It was surreal seeing Steve Mosby – as his debut novel was launched here over twenty years ago as part of Orion Publishing’s NEW BLOOD. Steve Mosby publishes under his Alex North penname crime novels that stray into the horror genre. We’re all looking forward to the NETFLIX adaptation of his first Alex North thriller THE WHISPER MAN.

Thanks to Publisher Rowland White, I learned of two British espionage thrillers that appear to be VERY interesting – and WELL worth pre-ordering - namely OCTAGON by CJ Merritt [Hardcover: 28 May 2026] and Simon Conway’s THE BRITISH AGENT [Hardcover: 20 Aug 2026].

I was joined by Ayo Onatade and Mike Stotter, where we mingled with many of Michael Joseph authors, fellow reviewers and the MJ Team. It was great to spend time with our literary friends, writers and colleagues Jon Coates, Barry Forshaw, Laura Wilson, Chris Simmons, John Williams [aka John Lincoln], Jake Kerridge, Diedre O’ Brien, and Literary Renaissance Man David Headley.

Publisher Joel Richardson gave a rousing welcome to the party. He stressed that the Michael Joseph imprint prides itself in the diversity of its crime list subgenres, from espionage, thrillers, domestic noir, cozy, historical et al.

More Information HERE

We present photographs of the event below.

Shots Magazine wish to pass our thanks to the Michael Joseph Team for managing a wonderful event, with special thanks to Sriya and Rowland for our invitations.

Penguin Michael Joseph organised an Official Photographer so the event has been recorded HERE

And for more information on 2026 books from Penguin Michael Joseph click HERE

Capital Crime 2026 - Headliners Announced

CAPITAL CRIME ANNOUNCES 2026 HEADLINERS, INCLUDING GLOBAL SENSATIONS LEE AND ANDREW CHILD, JANE HARPER, CLAIRE DOUGLAS, ANDREA MARA AND COMEDY WRITING TALENTS ARDAL O’HANLON AND ANDI OSHO

Capital Crime Festival 2025

The 2026 festival to return to the Leonardo Royal Hotel, St Paul’s, on 18th-20th June.

Partnership with The Reading Agency announced, in the National Year of Reading

Founder David Headley heralds crime as ‘one of the most engaging and accessible genres, and the perfect way to help people rediscover a love of reading’

Fingerprint Awards to return on 18th June, presented by radio and TV broadcaster, and host of The Bookshelf Podcast Ryan Tubridy

Capital Crime, the celebrated crime and thriller festival led by Goldsboro Books’ co-founder and managing director David Headley, has announced its first confirmed headlining authors, attending in June 2026. The programme features authors at all stages of their careers, from much anticipated debut novelists to global sensations from around the world.

Capital Crime will also be Going All In on the National Year of Reading, a nationwide campaign designed to help people rediscover the joy of reading, and the biggest reading initiative the UK has ever seen. The festival has agreed a partnership with The Reading Agency, a UK charity that inspires social and personal change through the proven power of reading, and the organisation behind Quick Reads. This partnership will be a step change for Capital Crime’s Social Outreach initiative, a cornerstone of the festival since it launched in 2019, which has seen schoolchildren from all around London invited to meet, hear and engage with publishing representatives and authors, in order to demystify the industry; encourage a diverse range of people to consider a future career in books; and grow its community of readers by inspiring a lifelong love of reading. As part of the partnership, Capital Crime will host a panel with Quick Reads authors from 2026 and previous years, chaired by Debbie Hicks MBE, a founding member of The Reading Agency. Goldsboro Books and Capital Crime have been committed to creating reader communities since the bookshop’s inception, and the team firmly believes that crime fiction can be the most brilliantly accessible route into a lifelong love of reading.

The festival returns to the Leonardo Royal Hotel in St Paul’s, and confirmed authors and speakers so far include: 

• Lee Child, creator of the globally famous Jack Reacher novels, and his brother Andrew, who has taken up the baton, will be in conversation with author and journalist Stig Abell
• Jane Harper, the international #1 bestselling Australian author of The Dry
• Andrea Mara, million copy bestselling author of All Her Fault
• Actor, comedian and novelist Ardal O’Hanlon
• Bestselling creator of Maeve Kerrigan Jane Casey
• Award-winning psychological suspense writer Liz Nugent

Also confirmed to be taking part are Sunday Times bestselling thriller writer Claire Douglas; Andi Osho, stand-up comedian and thriller writer; multi-award-winning bestseller Clare Mackintosh; creator of Roy Grace Peter James; bestselling creator of The Guest List and The Paris Apartment Lucy Foley; and the author of Reece’s Book Club selected Broken Countries, Clare Leslie Hall.

Audiences will also hear from CWA Gold Dagger-winning author of Wyndham and Bannerjee novels Abir Mukherjee; Sunday Times bestselling Anatomy of a Scandal writer Sarah Vaughan; Sophie Hannah, #1 bestselling author of Poirot continuations; former barrister and Traitors star Harriet Tyce; and Lucy Rose, author of 2025’s debut sensation The Lamb.

The festival will also be welcoming some of the most critically acclaimed and eagerly anticipated debut novelists of 2026, including Yemi Dipeolu, launching psychological thriller Kiss Marry Kill; Ellie Levenson, author of the heart-stopping suspense Room 706; and renowned wine writer Olly Smith, launching the first in The Bottle Bank Mysteries series.

Also returning are the Fingerprint Awards, this year to be presented on Thursday 18th by Ryan Tubridy, and sponsored by the festival’s official international cultural partner, the Sharjah International Book Fair. This year the shortlist in each category will be chosen by the Capital Crime Tastemakers – an independent committee of bloggers, journalists and readers. The award winners will, as always, be voted for by the readers and fans who make this genre the best in the world.

Last year the eagerly anticipated awards received over 6,000 votes from the public and winners included bestsellers Vaseem Khan and M.W. Craven, for the Historical Book of the Year and the Overall Best Crime Book of the Year respectively.

Finally, on Thursday 18th, Capital Crime is thrilled to open its doors to aspiring, unpublished writers ready to take the next step towards securing literary representation. Agents from DHH Literary Agency who are actively searching for the next standout voice in crime fiction will be available for an open afternoon with all ticketholders. If you’ve written a gripping thriller, a twist-filled mystery, or a page-turning police procedural, this could be your opportunity to get your work in front of top industry talent. Festival ticketholders will be invited to submit ahead of the festival, and will be given a meeting slot with their agent of choice.

Capital Crime co-founder and Goldsboro Books managing director David Headley, said:

“I set up Capital Crime because I wanted to create a festival that brought together crime writers, readers, and industry professionals in a way that was welcoming to both established and emerging authors. It has been a joy to see the festival go from strength to strength, and our community of crime fans and writers grow. In this, the National Year of Reading, I’m delighted to announce our partnership with The Reading Agency. Crime is one of the most engaging and accessible genres of writing, and the perfect way to help people rediscover a love of reading. As well as our Quick Reads panel, we have panels for every reader, from discussions about AI to ‘property noir’, and courtroom dramas to comedy in crime.”

Capital Crime Festival Director Lizzie Curle, said:

“I’m thrilled with how our programme is shaping up, with some of the best crime writers in the world joining us, such as international sensations Lee Child, Jane Harper and comedy legend Ardal O’Hanlon and fan favourites like Lisa Jewell and Peter James. As always, I’m also delighted by the extremely exciting new voices we’ll be welcoming this year, including Lucy Rose, Olly Smith, Yemi Dipeolu and Ellie Levenson.”

The full line-up will be announced at the end of March.

Headley and his team at Goldsboro Books have helped launch the careers of so many authors since it opened over 25 years ago, by uniting incredible writing with their loyal, ever-growing community of passionate readers. Capital Crime is a brilliant extension of that vision, having become an unmissable fixture in the literary calendar, one of the largest crime fiction festivals in the UK, and the only one to be owned by an independent bookshop. With a line-up which fully reflects the vibrant and culturally diverse city that it calls home, Capital Crime’s goal is to create a year-round home for crime and thriller readers and authors, celebrating books and stories, and nurturing the next generation of talent and book enthusiasts. The festival attracts authors from around the world, to create a unique, innovative and entertaining programme, pairing debuts with household names. The festival welcomes more than 1,000 attendees, the majority purchasing full weekend passes, and previous attendees have included Ian Rankin, Irvine Welsh, Dorothy Koomson, Abir Mukherjee and Kate Atkinson.

 

Quentin Bates talks to Shots Magazine

 

We were delighted to recently bump into the Renaissance Man of Mystery Quentin Bates at both Crimefest Bristol as well as Capital Crime.

Quentin is a prolific author, a Publisher, Translator, Fisherman, and generally an all-round interesting bloke, with an interesting life. He recently founded a publishing company called Corylus Books.

Their first acquisition ‘Broken’ by Jón Atli Jónasson caught our eye.

From the publisher -

Two broken cops.

One irretrievably damaged and the other an outcast.

Dóra struggles to cope with life after taking a bullet to the head. Rado is the child of refugees, his career shunted off the tracks due to his family connections to an organised crime gang. But they’re the only ones available when a troubled teenager vanishes from a school trip, and the trail gets darker the further they pursue it.

Broken takes place in a side of Reykjavík no visitor would ever want to see, as the mismatched pair tread on all the wrong toes in the search for the missing youngster. This takes place against the backdrop of a vicious vendetta and price on Dóra’s head. A brutal turf war embroils Rado’s family as he and Dóra follow the threads of corruption higher and higher, to the top of the exclusive apartment block on the outskirts of the city.

The first novel by award-winning screenwriter Jón Atli Jónasson to appear in English, Broken is the first of a razor-edged crime trilogy shot through with black humour and characters who leap off the page.

We reviewed Broken on its Hardcover release earlier this month, writing at the time -

This extraordinary crime novel debuted 2022 in the authors’ native Iceland, but is now finally available in an English Language translation.  Broken is a deeply thought-provoking narrative, written in an urgent present-tense style making the reader pause to collate and evaluate the proceedings as well as to take a breath. Written from multiple viewpoints, terse dialogue with deftly placed social commentary - its narrative pace is measured, but zings along with the velocity of the bullet that impacts Dora’s head in Broken’s opening chapter.

Dora works for the police in Reykjavík, shielded from ‘real’ police work by her boss Ellioi, instead she’s left to manage administration / office work, though she longs to return to working on the street. Ellioi hides his guilt [from the assignment they shared and which left fragments of a bullet lodged in Dora’s skull], by keeping her in the office, deskbound on minor cases - and away from further danger. The cranial injury still causes Dora physical pain, constant operations, and strict regime of medication - affecting her cognition and distorting her personality.

Read the Full Review HERE

So on the eve of Broken’s Paperback release in August, we decided to have a chat with Quentin for our readers.

A Karim: Could you tell us a little about yourself and where the fascination for Iceland and Icelandic culture / literature stemmed [and stems] from?

Q Bates: It’s a long story… I had the opportunity for a gap year, and a friend of my Dad’s said I could come and work in his net loft in Iceland for a few months. The 17-year-old me couldn’t shake off English suburbia fast enough. It didn’t quite work out as planned, as my A level results were pretty poor. So I just stayed in Iceland and the gap year became a gap decade. During that time I did several different jobs, went to college and started a family, so some very deep roots were put down there. We relocated to England after a while, for a variety of reasons. These days my wife and I try to split our time between the south of England and the north of Iceland, as we have children and grandchildren on each side of the ocean.

It was while I was at college that I started reading Icelandic properly, and the book scene was very different back then. There was practically no crime fiction other than translated mostly from English, and Icelandic literature was mostly very literary, plus there were loads of worthy biographies of captains of industry, political figures and whatnot, as well as nautical stuff – I’ll come back to that further on.

AK: And reading, did you come from a bookish family or was it your schooling?

QB: There were always books at home and my parents didn’t push us in particular directions, at least, we were never discouraged from reading anything. We were just encouraged to read whatever we wanted. Dad gave me two Asterix books for my (I think) eighth birthday, and that was probably a pivotal moment. I just fell in love with the village of Indomitable Gauls. One of those two books was Asterix in Britain, and I still think it’s the best one, gently and affectionately skewering the foibles of the Rosbifs across the Channel with their warm beer and terrible weather. It was much, much later that I figured out that the translator was the brilliant Anthea Bell.

Of course I pillaged the parental book shelves. Dad liked weighty 19th century literature (heavy going!) but that left me with an appreciation of Hardy and others. He also loved Norse mythology, the ancient sagas and Tolkien, and I inherited that. Although I read the Lord of the Rings pretty much every year for a long time, it must be 20 years since I last read it and I’m not sure I dare pick it up now. No, I haven’t seen the movies and don’t want to… Mum’s tastes were broader, and ranged from Ruth Rendell and Ed McBain at one end to Trollope and Maugham at the other. My first brush with Nordic crime fiction was picking Sjöwall & Wahlöö from Mum’s shelf, intrigued by the weird name, and I must have been 13 or 14 then. But there was no more! There was no other Nordic crime fiction in English for another couple of decades! By late teens I was reading George Orwell, Jack Kerouac, Douglas Adams (loved HHGTTG!), Solzhenitsyn, Anthony Burgess, Evelyn Waugh, Robert Graves. After S&W came Maigret, and fortunately there was no shortage of Simenon in English.

I’ve always been the oddball who scours the shelves of a library or bookshop for odd foreign names. So as a teen I was reading writers such as Jerome Weidman and Hans Helmut Kirst, who seem to be pretty much forgotten today. I still have this habit, and given the choice of a safe pair of familiar hands, or the first in a series featuring a crime-busting retired Olympic lady hammer-thrower by an unknown Bulgarian author, I know which way I’ll jump.

AK: And pivotal books that influenced your desire to write your own work?

QB: Maybe it’s more about the breadth than any particular author…? But, while I was living in Iceland, English books weren’t always easy to get hold of. I think I was at sea one time and had a few books with me, including a major bestseller by an author whose name I’ll keep to myself. It was terrible, a truly dreadful book. That brought home to me then than if that’s the kind of stuff that could get published, then I might be in with a chance after all.

Much later on… it was the books of the brilliant French author Dominique Manotti that showed me just how sharp, incisive, smart and politically aware crime fiction can be at its best. I don’t think she’s writing now, as she must be quite elderly. I got to meet her and shared a panel with her at a festival, and I was like a star-struck schoolboy.

AK: I read your first published book was a nonfiction work about fishing in the North Sea?

QB: That was fun! I was working as a journalist, writing about maritime stuff, and mainly to do with fishing – as that’s my professional background. I did trips on five different boats and that book contains those accounts. One was supposed to be four days on a Scottish mackerel boat that turned into twelve, another was a four-day trip from Newlyn and the others were easier, just one-day trips to sea. It was great fun, but the small publisher went out of business about half an hour after the book appeared. So it was never going to be a bestseller! I also wrote a book with the skipper of the Gaul – a trawler that disappeared off the Norwegian coast in 1974. He had been on a trip off when the ship sank – and I got to know him well. There had been all kinds of rumours of the Gaul having been a spy ship, none of which held water. That was a labour of love… The book took ten years, during which the wreck of the Gaul was located, surveyed and an inquiry was held, so all that had to be built into the narrative. That was quite an adventure. That book is now virtually impossible to find and second-hand copies go for 100+ quid!

AK: And what made you write fiction? And why Crime thrillers?

QB: It had always been at the back of my mind, along with the thought that fiction was a mug’s game, the chances of being published so slim that it was hardly worth trying. So I had to give it a go. That first book came out of a creative writing course I took as a way of getting a weekly afternoon off work… I later on found out that the deputy editor and the advertising manager were also working on novels of their own, but that’s another story. I expected to come out of the course working on non-fiction. But one of the tutors was a serious Noir aficionado, and so Sam North was very encouraging, and bears much responsibility for the decision to give crime fiction a try – and it was obvious that it would be nuts to not make use of all that knowledge of Iceland. Gunnhildur grew out of that – seven novels and two novellas.

AK: And how did you start working in translating Icelandic work into English?

QB: I had translated a book while I was at college in Iceland – one of the set texts. That was a seafaring tale, and the author (Guðlaugur Arason) became a very dear friend. Working on a nautical trade magazine, I worked a lot with material from other languages in one way or another, so I found myself translating a lot of technical and news material. It was at one of the first Iceland Noir festivals that Karen Sullivan of the then-brand-new Orenda Books was considering the unknown Ragnar Jónasson and asked if I could translate Snowblind. So I did… And then others came along looking for translation, so I’ve been pretty busy with that over the last few years.

AK: Please tell us about how you discovered Jon Atli Jonasson and deciding to not only translate his debut novel BROKEN, but also to venture into publishing?

QB: Corylus is me, translator Marina Sofia and Romanian publisher and author Bogdan Hrib. We wanted to publish some new voices, authors we could see who weren’t getting translation and publishing deals. It has been quite a learning curve! Some of our authors – Sólveig Pálsdóttir, Óskar Guðmundsson and Stella Blómkvist – have done well, while others have unfortunately done less well. We have published a couple of absolute crackers, fantastic books that have sold just a few dozen copies… All the same, I’m intensely proud of publishing Jérôme Leroy and Elsa Drucaroff in English. Their books are amazing, even if we may have caught a bit of a financial cold there!

I knew about Jón Atli’s book, and had translated an excerpt for the Icelandic publisher, and I think that was even before it had appeared in Icelandic. It was a real surprise when Jón Atli’s agent David Headley offered us the book – as Corylus is a publishing midget. So I got to work. I have to say, David is very shrewd and his faith in Corylus to do well for his author feels like a seal of approval that we’re doing the right things.

AK: Did Jon Atli Jonasson’s screenplay for THE DEEP and your own background in North Sea fishing resonate?

QB: I haven’t seen The Deep. I was working as a fisherman in 1984 in Iceland when Hellisey was lost and Guðlaugur Friðthórsson performed that astonishing feat of endurance to swim to land. When a boat is lost, especially when there’s a loss of life, the whole fleet (and the whole country) feels it, takes it personally, as it could have been any one of us in the water. I think every fisherman has a brown-trouser moment or two – I know I do…  At that time we all hung on the radio. It was the first question when you came on watch – ‘any news?’ So I’ve never been able to bring myself to watch it.

I’ll tell you something that does resonate – Among the books I picked up when I was starting to read Icelandic were seafaring tales by Ásgeir Jakobsson and by Jónas Guðmundsson. Today Ásgeir Jak’s son Jakob publishes my books in Icelandic – and Jónas Guðmundsson’s son is Jón Atli. So I had read practically everything by Jón Atli’s Dad, and didn’t realise the connection until we first met, by which time I had finished the first draft of the Broken translation. His father’s books were so pivotal for me 40 or so years ago that it genuinely made me shiver when I realised who he was.

AK: And what’s next for [a] Quentin Bates and [b] Jon Atli Jonasson [c] Corylus Books

QB: Well to answer sequentially -

[a] Translation has tailed off a bit. There are a few more translators at work now, and it seems that larger publishers are becoming more reluctant to commission translations, especially for new authors. Then there’s the whole AI thing, but let’s not go into that here… The upshot is that I’ve had some much-needed elbow room to get back to my own stuff, and I have a new lead character and a cast of supporting characters in something new that’s now coming to completion, plus draft outlines for what could become a series. I don’t want to jinx it by saying too much, except that the setting is Nordic and the lead character was once a cop...

[b] There’s a sequel to Broken, Venom, which I’m reading at the moment, and it’s every bit as meaty as Broken. From what Jón Atli has told me, this is a trilogy and he’s at work on the third novel now – although I’ve a feeling this could turn into a trilogy in four, five or more parts. This is powerful stuff with such strong characters, so I hope it does. We have UK & Commonwealth (excluding Canada) rights to Broken, so it’s sadly not available to readers in North America. We’ve tried to find a partner publisher on the other side of the Atlantic, but none of the ones we’ve approached has bitten. So if there’s an interested publisher in the US or Canada, please step this way…!

[c] We have a third novel (Murder Tide) by the mysterious Stella Blómkvist coming out this summer, and the translation of the fourth (title not yet finalised) is complete, so that’ll be out next year. And we need to have a chat with David Headley about Venom for next year! Sólveig Pálsdóttir is hard at work, so her next one could be for next year. We also have a second novel by Catalan author Teresa Solana for next year. We’re weighing up options for authors from other countries… We see so many proposals for what look to be fabulous books from around the world and it genuinely hurts to have to turn them away. But Corylus is a tiny, tiny publisher and there’s only so much we can do.

BTW, Corylus believes very firmly in artisanal translation by human translators with passion for language, nuance and idiom. We’ll shut the shop before we resort to AI translation.

AK Good for you - let’s keep literature human not AI Technology - and thank you for your time.

More information about Quentin’s publishing venture – Click HERE and about his writing Click HERE

Capital Crime Full Lineup Revealed

The wait is over! The full Capital Crime 2025 programme has landed, and it’s our biggest, boldest lineup yet.

Join us in London on 12th-13th June for an unforgettable festival packed with thrilling conversations, exclusive events, and the chance to meet your literary heroes.

Expect bestselling authors, award-winning storytellers, and crime fiction’s biggest names, including:

Michael Connelly, Steph McGovern, Jeremy Vine, Vaseem Khan, Linwood Barclay, Karin Slaughter, Richard Armitage, Ruth Ware, Lisa Jewell, Clare Mackintosh, Andrew Child and many many more.

Plus, we’ve just announced the Fingerprint Awards shortlists - will your favourite take the prize?

Whether you’re a fan of psychological thrillers, gripping spy fiction, or classic crime stories, there’s something for everyone. 

Weekend & day tickets are selling fast - secure yours now to avoid disappointment.

With an electrifying mix of bestselling authors, expert panels, and thrilling discussions, this year’s festival is set to be truly unforgettable.

Here’s just a taste of what’s in store over two packed days:

FRIDAY:

Thrillers That Go Bump in the Night with Linwood Barclay and Andrew Child & Nadine Matheson

Criminal Minds Throughout History with Conn Iggulden, Kate Williams & Hallie Rubenhold

Espionage for the Modern Reader: Ava Glass, Charles Cumming and Nick Harkaway & Vaseem Khan

The One You Least Suspect: Dilemmas and Decisions with David Goodman, S. M. Govett and Remi Kone & Brian McGilloway

Deception in Crime Fiction - Mark Edwards, Nicci French, Erin Kelly & Claire McGowan 

Found in Translation: Jón Atli Jónasson, Lex Noteboom, Johana Gustawsson, Thomas Enger & Quentin Bates

Terror on and off the page: social injustices in horror and high concept thrillers:  Chris Carter, Erin E. Adams, Jessie Elland & Andrea Carter

Masters of Mystery: a panel of crime writing experts: Dr Duncan Harding (forensic psychologist), Graham Bartlett (police) and Nicola Williams (practising Judge)  in conversation with criminal defence lawyer Ruth Mancini 

Crime to cool you down this summer: Will Dean, Heidi Amsinck, R. O. Thorp & Ed James

SATURDAY: 

Crime Writing Masters discussing craft and creativity: Michael Connelly in conversation with M. W. Craven 

The Appeal of Unlikeable Characters with Richard Armitage, Lisa Jewell and Steph McGovern & Jon Coates

25 Years in the Making: Mark Billingham and Karin Slaughter in conversation with Louise Minchin

Exploring the Human Mind One Thriller at a Time: with Dorothy Koomson, Ruth Ware & Anna Sharpe

From Page to Screen: Bringing crime thrillers to life: with Jane Casey, Michael Connelly andRagnar Jonasson, interviewed by Lisa Howells

Agatha Christie for the ‘Knives Out’ Generation: Kelly Mullen, Ram Murali, Jeremy Vine & Rob Rinder

Silver Anniversary Stories: celebrate 25 books with Adele Parks in conversation with David Headley

Not-so Domestic Bliss: toxic families and friendships with Andrea Mara, Asia Mackay, Claire Douglas, Caz Frear & Heidi Perks 

‘C’ is for creating communities in Crime Fiction: Suk Pannu, Rev Richard Coles, Blake Mara & Tim Sullivan

Making your mark: the different routes to telling your thriller: Barnaby Martin, Jo Callaghan and Dominic Nolan & C. B. Everett

And so much more! With over 30 incredible events, the Fingerprint Awards, surprises throughout the weekend, and the chance to meet your favourite authors, this is one festival you don’t want to miss.

The full schedule can be found here and tickets can be found here.

First Blood. Writing your debut crime novel.

 

In-person, at our home in Goldsboro Books 

22b Ship Street Brighton. BN1.

Writers on this intensive course will develop their ideas and their writing craft, hand-in-hand with an understanding of the market and industry trends today. Throughout the course, you’ll learn to stress-test your ideas by pitching them to writers and industry professionals.

The Course

Eight evening sessions (Mondays, 18:30–21:30) in person. April 15th – June 3rd 
Two hour-long, one-to-one sessions with course director P. D. Viner. The first will be scheduled before Monday April 15th to build a personal plan, based upon your experience, and where you are in your writing process

Monday evening sessions will include:

• Crime writing and its subgenres—developing an understanding of the marketplace and where you want to position your novel — with GWA founder P. D. Viner.

• How to develop the hook of your novel, giving it a story structure and a plot that thrills and excites — with top thriller writer Simon Toyne.

• Character development and relationship-building, for creating suspense and incredible twists and turns — with bestselling psych thriller writer Araminta Hall.

• Insight into police procedures and how law enforcement works. Ideas and strategies for developing contemporary crime stories with real-world characters and issue-led storylines — with retired Chief Superintendent and best-seller Graham Bartlett.

• Creating multi-level story-worlds with recurring characters and ensemble casts. From TV writing to gangland thrillers and edgy police procedurals — with hybrid author Susan Wilkins.

• Understanding the agent-author relationship. Considering the wider rights possibilities of your novel (TV, Film, Games etc). How to pitch your idea (and get immediate feedback) — with top agent, and founder of the Capital Crime festival, David Headley.

  For all ability levels. Only 10 spaces available.

£399 (£349 early bird if booked by March 15th)

Application form at our website: https://goldsborowritingacademy.co.uk/courses/

For more information email: phil@goldsborowritingacademy.co.uk

Capital Crime Launched!

CAPITAL CRIME RETURNS END OF AUGUST WITH RICHARD OSMAN, KATE ATKINSON, RICHARD ARMITAGE, DOROTHY KOOMSON AND HAPPY VALLEY CREATOR SALLY WAINWRIGHT TO HEADLINE

Richard Armitage, Peter James, Richard Osman, Yomi Adegoke, Joanne Harris, Imran Mahmood, Liz Nugent and Nicola Williams are amongst the authors confirmed for Capital Crime, London’s largest celebration of crime and thriller writing, which returns 31st August – 2nd September.

In the Leonardo Royal London, the festival’s exciting new home, over 140 leading voices from crime fiction will be speaking about everything from horror and history in crime to the legacies of Marple, Chandler and Bond, alongside Capital Crime’s social outreach programme which has been in place since 2019, and the second year of the Fingerprint Awards, voted for by readers. Taking place in the shadow of St Paul’s Cathedral and with a Goldsboro Books pop-up bookshop, it promises to be a brilliantly entertaining and insightful weekend for crime fiction enthusiasts.

 Now in its third year, Capital Crime is proud to be a part of and contributor to the vibrant culture scene with the city, and has quickly established itself as one of the biggest festivals in the UK, with a reputation for originality, innovation, and a focus on creating an incredible reader experience with creatively curated and inclusive panels. Co-founded by Goldsboro Books MD David Headley, it has welcomed readers from around the country to see British authors such as Robert Harris, Anthony Horowitz and Paula Hawkins appearing alongside international talent including Icelandic Prime Minister Katrin Jakobsdottir and US bestsellers Jeffrey Deaver and Chris Carter.

 Headley and his team at Goldsboro Books have helped launch the careers of so many authors since it opened almost 25 years ago, by uniting incredible writing with their loyal, ever-growing community of passionate readers. Renowned for their thoughtful and impactful new initiatives to engage communities of readers, Capital Crime is a brilliant extension of this vision with an outstanding programme of over 40 entertaining, accessible events that explore all corners of the genre, and the opportunity to meet your literary heroes. 

 On the first day of the festival (Thursday 31st August), the afternoon will start with the Future Generations Afternoon Takeover, a series of events dedicated to Capital Crime’s social outreach programme. This sees sixth form students and their teachers from schools in South London invited to meet authors and publishing professionals, with the aim of demystifying the industry and opening it up to attract new and diverse young voices into publishing. There will also be an industry panel, with Amy Baxter, Christina Demosthenous and Leodora Darlington talking to Manpreet Grewal about their journey in publishing and their goals for future.

The afternoon will also see a discussion on the moral dilemmas of crime writing with Yomi Adegoke, Jack Jordan, Lia Middleton, Nicola Williams and Nadine Matheson; and a panel on the legacy of Miss Marple with Elly Griffiths, Dreda Say Mitchell, Ruth Ware and Lucy Foley. Moderated by Ayo Onatade, Charlie Higson, Bonnie McBird, Katherine Bradley will what it’s like to continue the legacies of James Bond, Sherlock Holmes and 1984, and writing their iconic characters for a modern audience.

The evening will conclude with The Fingerprint Awards, the Capital Crime awards ceremony which allows crime and thriller lovers to select the winner of five categories, including Crime Novel of the Year; Thriller Novel of the Year; and Historical Crime Novel of the Year. 

Friday will see international bestseller Kate Atkinson interviewed by festival co-founder David Headley; top ten bestsellers Lisa Jewell and Adele Parks in conversation with Sarah Shaffi; Louise Candlish and Dorothy Koomson speaking with Lisa Howells and Happy Valley creator Sally Wainwright interviewed by Amy Raphael. 

 Panel highlights from the day include C J Taylor, Olivia Kiernan and Susi Holliday revealing the locations and relationships that create the perfect home for crime fiction with Sam Brownley; and S J Parris, A J West, K J Maitland and Anna Mazzola debating historical inspiration in crime writing with Vaseem Khan, whilst Rob Scragg, Judith O’Reilly, Chris McGeorge and Fiona Erskine of the Northern Crime Writing Syndicate will be challenged to create a bestseller in one hour. In addition, Liz Nugent, Catherine Ryan Howard and Andrea Carter will be speaking to Jane Casey about Irish crime writing, and Anna Motz, Matt Johnson and Donna Freed will discuss society’s obsession with true crime and its influence on crime fiction with Victoria Selman. 

 The first two rounds of Capital Crime’s fun-filled quiz, ‘Whose Crime Is It Anyway’, will also be taking place, featuring teams of debut authors.                                                                          

Saturday will see Fiona Cummins, Mark Edwards and Kia Abdullah speak to Araminta Hall about fictional good characters who end up doing terrible things; J P Delaney, Leye Adenle and Louise Hare in conversation with H B Lyle to talk about crime fiction across the world; and Will Dean, Louise Swanson and Gillian McAllister speak to S J Watson about high concept ideas in the world of crime-fiction. Bestsellers Joanne Harris and Sarah Pinborough will discuss the role of women and gender in thriller-writing; Gareth Rubin, Janice Hallett and Cara Hunter will dissect the importance of structure and form in crime writing; and Laura Shepherd-Robinson, Jeremy Dyson and Andy Nyman will talk about misdirection and illusion in crime fiction. 

The day will finish with Peter James speaking about his famous creation Roy Grace; actor Richard Armitage speaking about his debut crime novel Geneva, and Richard Osman in conversation with Miles Jupp. 

There will also be exciting public events throughout the weekend, including proof parties and launch events forVictoria Selman’s exciting new thriller All the Little Liars and David Fennell’s new serial killer thriller The Silent Man, and dancing until the early hours of Sunday morning at Capital Crime’s closing party Murder on the Dance Floor. 

The full programme can be found here from 10am today (Tuesday 27th June):https://www.capitalcrime.org/capital-crime-schedule

 

 

Ragnar Jonasson and Katrin Jakobsdóttir, Prime Minister of Iceland jointly write crime novel to be published by Penguin Michael Joseph

 

Penguin Michael Joseph acquires REYKJAVIK by Ragnar Jonasson and Katrin Jakobsdóttir, Prime Minister of Iceland

Penguin Michael Joseph has acquired Reykjavik by Ragnar Jonasson and Katrin Jakobsdóttir, Prime Minister of Iceland.

Publisher Maxine Hitchcock and senior commissioning editor Rebecca Hilsdon acquired UK and Commonwealth rights from David Headley at DHH Literary Agency. PMJ have previously published Outside, The Girl Who Died, and the Hidden Iceland trilogy, all authored by Jonasson alone.

Ragnar Jonasson is the first Icelandic author to become a Sunday Times bestseller and has been described as ‘a world-class crime writer’ by The Sunday Times and ‘a landmark in modern crime fiction’ by The Times. Worldwide, he has sold over 3m copies, and is a number one bestseller in France, Germany, Australia, and his native Iceland. 

Katrin Jakobsdóttir has been Prime Minster of Iceland since 2017. Hailing from a family of prominent Icelandic poets and academics, she wrote her Master’s dissertation on Icelandic crime writing. She and Jonasson are longtime friends, who first worked together nearly ten years ago as part of the jury for an award for best crime fiction in translation in Iceland.

Reykjavik is a dual-narrative crime novel, following two strands of a mystery 30 years apart. In August 1956, a 14-year-old girl called Lara disappears from the island of Vidney,  just off the coast of Reykjavik – and becomes Iceland’s most infamous unsolved case. In 1986, as Reykjavik celebrates its 200^th anniversary tabloid journalist Valur digs into her death.

Ragnar Jonasson said: ‘In early 2020 I had lunch with Katrin Jakobsdóttir, Iceland's Prime Minister, and suggested that it might be fun writing a crime novel together. We have really enjoyed working on this story, set in Iceland in the 1950s and 1980s, and are looking forward to sharing it with readers. It's been a dream come true to work with Penguin in recent years, and I am so excited that they will be bringing this story to a wider audience, with the help of our wonderful translator Vicky Cribb.’

Katrin Jakobsdóttir said: ‘It was a real pleasure and a thrill to write this crime novel set in Iceland in the year 1986 with my friend Ragnar Jónasson. When the world is full of extreme challenges it can be quite beneficial for the soul to stay for a moment in a fictional world belonging to another era and write about sordid crimes.’

Maxine Hitchcock said: ‘We are so delighted to have another incredibly atmospheric and thrilling novel from Ragnar Jonasson -who is fast becoming one of the world’s most acclaimed crime novelists - and to welcome Katrin Jakobsdóttir to Penguin Michael Joseph. Both Ragnar and Katrin are devoted aficionados of the crime genre and combining their voices has added up to a novel that will enthral readers across the globe. The publication of REYKJAVIK will be a true event.’

Reykjavik will be published in the UK in August 2023.

For publicity enquiries please contact -

 Sriya Varadharajan at svaradharajan@penguinrandomhouse.co.uk.