Books from Bloomsbury

 January 2023

Home is by Callean Steed. Someone has broken into Zoe's flat. A man she thought she'd never have to see again. They call him the Hand of God. He knows about her job in the cafe, her life in Dublin, her ex-girlfriend, even the knife she's hidden under the mattress. She thought she'd left him far behind, along with the cult of the Children and their isolated compound Home - but now he's found her, and Zoe realises she must go back with him if she's to rescue the sister who helped her escape originally. But returning to Home means going back to the enforced worship and strict gender roles Zoe has long since moved beyond. Back to the abuse and indoctrination she's fought desperately to overcome... Going back will make her question everything she believed about her past - and risk her hard-won freedom. Can she break free a second time?

February 2023

Love Me Fierce In Danger: The Life of James Ellroy uncovers the life-story of one of the most fascinating authors of contemporary American literature his biography is the untold story of how Ellroy created a literary persona for himself as the Demon Dog of American Crime Fiction, giving him a celebrity status and notoriety that few authors can match. To his admirers Ellroy is a literary genius who has reinvented crime fiction. To his detractors he is a reactionary, overrated figure. Love Me Fierce In Danger examines the enigma of an author who has striven for critical acclaim and often courted controversy with equal zealotry. Love Me in Fierce Danger is by Steven Powell.

April 2023

Sometimes work can be murder... The Consultant is very good at his job. He creates simple, elegant, effective solutions for... restructuring. Nothing obvious or messy. Certainly nothing anyone would ever suspect as murder. The 'natural deaths' he plans have always gone well: a medicine replaced here, a mechanism jammed there. His performance reviews are excellent. And it's not as though he knows these people. Until his next 'customer' turns out to be someone he not only knows but cares about, and for the first time, he begins to question the role he plays in the vast, anonymous Company. And as he slowly begins to understand the real scope of their work, he realises just how easy it would be for the Company to arrange one more perfect murder... But how far will he go to escape The Company? And how far will they go to stop him? The electrifying first novel from award-winning Korean thriller-writer Im Seong-Sun - now in English for the first time - combines the tension of the best crime fiction with searing social criticism to present a searing take-down of global corporate life. 

May 2023

When match fixing leads to murder, only journalist Casey Benedict can expose the truth - and risk her own life doing so. Casey Benedict is the globe-trotting star reporter at London paper the Post. Casey is tenacious, fearless, inventive and still in recovery after her last major story jeopardised her life, and all of those she held most dear. Invited to spend the day at the races at the invitation of a former colleague, it is meant to be a chance to relax and recover. But when she sees a man being hunted across the racecourse, a horrified Casey intervenes to save his life - and in doing so finds herself face to face with her next major investigation. Match fixing. Gambling. And murder. From London to Budapest, from snowy mountain retreats to glitzy Mediterranean coastal resorts, Casey is on a desperate hunt to find the person behind the shadowy organisations responsible and expose them to the public before anyone else's lives are lost. The End of the Game is by Holly Watt.

June 2023

Ex journalist Tash has been searching for a story to launch her freelance career. But she has also been searching for something else. New friends to help her navigate motherhood. She sees them at her son's new playgroup. The other mothers. The sleek, the sophisticated, the successful mothers... the women she wants to be. And then one day they welcome her into their circle and Tash discovers the kind of life she has always dreamt of; their elegant London townhouses a far cry from her cramped basement flat and endless bills. These families seem to have everything. But they also have their secrets. And it's soon clear that not everyone at the playgroup can be trusted. The Other Mothers is by Katherine Faulkner.

Spies Like Us Event

 

If you love reading spy fiction then join Oliver Harris, Charlotte Philby and Holly Watt on 29 April at Waterstones Norwich.

Tickets can be bough here.

2020 CrimeFest Awards

Lee Child, Holly Watt, and Laura Shepherd-Robinson have received a 2020 CRIMEFEST Award in a virtual presentation hosted by actor Matt McCooey, who plays Inspector Bill Wong in the hit series Agatha Raisin.

The CRIMEFEST awards, hosted by one of Europe’s leading crime writing conventions, are in their 13th year and celebrate the best crime books released in 2019 in the UK.

Laura Shepherd-Robinson receives £1,000 for the inaugural Specsavers Debut Crime Novel Award for Blood & Sugar in a new category in association with the convention’s headline sponsor, Specsavers.

Laura worked in politics for nearly 20 years before completing an MA in Creative Writing at City University. Her first novel, a vivid evocation of the slave trade in Georgian England, has received widespread critical acclaim. The Financial Times said she has ‘set the bar high for historical crime fiction.’

Laura Shepherd-Robinson said: “I’m so thrilled to have won this prize, I can’t really believe it. Thank you so much to CRIMEFEST and to Specsavers, and also to my amazing editor Maria Rejt and my agent Antony Topping, but most of all thank you to all the people who have read Blood & Sugar.”

Dame Mary Perkins, Specsavers’ founder who was born in Bristol, her ‘favourite city’, congratulated Laura for a ‘very topical book’. She said: “I’m so glad that CRIMEFEST is still happening, albeit online. We’re proud to sponsor the debut crime novel award. Reading and the importance of good vision makes for a very close connection for Specsavers.”

Lee Child and Jeff Harding - the reader on Child’s audio book Blue Moon - also receive £1,000 for winning the Audible Sounds of Crime Award, sponsored by Audible UK.  Lee Child said: “Thank you so much for this, to CRIMEFEST obviously, but also to Jeff Harding most of all, my amazing narrator. He won this for me, thanks Jeff. I hope to see everyone soon in person and at a proper convention.”

All category winners, aside from Audible Sounds of Crime, which is established by Audible UK listeners, were judged by panels of leading British crime fiction reviewers. All the winners receive an engraved, hand-made Bristol Blue Glass Award.

In other categories, Holly Watt received the eDunnit Award for To the Lions, which won the CWA Ian Fleming Steel Dagger in 2019. Featuring a female journalist who stumbles upon a dark conspiracy, it was praised as a ‘first-rate Fleet Street novel’ by the Sunday Times. Watt, an investigative journalist, has worked on MP’s Expenses and the Panama Papers and written for major broadsheets in the UK.

Helen FitzGerald received the Last Laugh Award for Worst Case Scenario, a deliciously dark, unapologetically funny and nail-biting tense psychological thriller from the international bestselling author of The Cry, which was dramatized by BBC TV.

The H.R.F Keating Award for the best biographical or critical book related to crime fiction went to John Curran for The Hooded Gunman, a celebration of the 2000 books published by the iconic imprint Collins’ Crime Club.

Best Crime Novel for Young Adults went to Kathryn Evans for Beauty Sleep. Evans is no stranger to awards as her debut More of Me won the Edinburgh International Book Festival First Book Award – the first Young Adult novel to do so. Her latest, Beauty Sleep, is a dark thriller that plunges a pre-tech girl into a futuristic world.

The winner of the award for Best Crime Fiction Novel for Children was Thomas Taylor for Malamander, a quirky fantasy with a cast of characters in pursuit of a sea monster. An illustrator and writer, Taylor’s first job was the cover for Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone.

The 2020 CRIMEFEST Awards were due to be presented at a Gala Dinner during the convention at the Mercure Bristol Grand Hotel this June. In light of Covid-19, the winners were announced online at www.crimefest.com and via its social media pages on Tuesday 7 July.

Adrian Muller, Co-host of CRIMEFEST, said: “Nothing can beat authors, readers and the crime writing industry gathering in person to celebrate the best of the genre. However, having appeared with Agatha Raisin co-star Ashley Jensen at last year’s CRIMEFEST, we were delighted that Matt McCooey returned to host our virtual ceremony. I’d like to thank our partners and sponsors, Free@Last TV, the production company behind the hit television series for producing our online awards presentation and congratulate all worthy winners.”

CRIMEFEST was created following the hugely successful one-off visit to Bristol in 2006 of the American Left Coast Crime convention. It was established over ten years ago in 2008. It follows the egalitarian format of most US conventions, making it open to all authors and readers alike.

The convention has grown to become not only one of the biggest crime fiction events in Europe, but also one of the most popular dates in the international crime fiction calendar, with circa 60 panel events and 150 authors over four days.

2020 CRIMEFEST Awards (as a list)

SPECSAVERS DEBUT CRIME NOVEL AWARD:

Laura Shepherd-Robinson for Blood & Sugar (Mantle)

AUDIBLE SOUND OF CRIME AWARD:

Lee Child and Jeff Harding for Blue Moon (Penguin Random House Audio)

eDUNNIT AWARD:

Holly Watt for To the Lions (Raven Books)

LAST LAUGH AWARD:

Helen FitzGerald for Worst Case Scenario (Orenda Books)

H.R.F. KEATING AWARD:

John Curran for The Hooded Gunman (Harper Collins Crime Club)

BEST CRIME NOVEL FOR YOUNG ADULTS:

Kathryn Evans for Beauty Sleep (Usborne Publishing)

BEST CRIME FICTION NOVEL FOR CHILDREN:

Thomas Taylor for Malamander (Walker Books)

National Crime Reading Month Goes Digital for May Lockdown

The month of May sees the return of National Crime Reading Month (NCRM), a unique, UK-wide literary festival, designed to connect authors and readers and promote the crime genre.

The festival, which is a major annual initiative co-ordinated by the Crime Writers’ Association and Crime Readers’ Association, normally promotes live author events up and down the country. During lockdown, the initiative has moved online with crime authors posting vlogs and blogs on the website crimereadingmonth.co.uk.

Linda Stratmann, Chair of the CWA, explained: “We’ve – quite literally – created Crime Writers in Residence by asking authors to post films from their homes while in lockdown. It’s a kind of criminally-good Through the Keyhole! Readers love the personal insights from meeting authors in person, and most crime authors love to connect to their readers. With all the major crime writing festivals, as well as author events in libraries and bookshops, cancelled for spring and summer, we felt it was important to step in and offer a digital alternative.”

Festivals allow readers to meet established writers and discover new authors to widen and enrich their reading life. They also play an important role for aspiring authors, as well as help forge new friendships.

Linda said: “Reading and writing are of course solitary acts but you’re never alone with a book. There’s a real connection on the page that is passionately celebrated in our festivals and author events. The crime genre is perhaps the most accessible and democratic of all, which makes our community a very sociable and inclusive one. We understand how important those connections are, so we’re encouraging CWA members to join in and submit videos from their homes to reach out to readers in lockdown.”

Although May is the official month for mayhem and murder with NCRM, the CWA began collating vlogs in April in response to lockdown.

Featured authors include AJ Waines, a former psychotherapist who has gone on the write ten thrillers selling half a million copies, with her latest psychological thriller Cut You Dead released this April.

Fiona Veitch Smith, author of the Poppy Denby Investigates series, shortlisted for the CWA Historical Dagger in 2016, also joins the video series to talk about her life under lockdown during the Covid-19 crisis, alongside Holly Watt, who won the CWA Ian Fleming Steel Dagger last year for To The Lions.

Holly Watt said: “One thing I am finding weird about writing at the moment is that my characters are meeting up with friends! And having dinner together! And getting on planes! And all these things suddenly seem completely alien. It’s quite hard to write several paragraphs without interjecting ‘and then he washed his hands while singing Happy Birthday’.”

NCRM will also see the launch of short stories that will be free to read on the Crime Readers’ Association website, to provide a public platform for CWA authors wishing to showcase their work.

Readers and authors can join in #CrimeReadingMonth online and subscribe to the Crime Readers’ Association for free to receive the CRA Newsletter and bi-monthly e-zine, Case Files.

Join in #CrimeReadingMonth on Facebook and Twitter @The_CWA or find out more on the Crime Reading Month website.