Unsung Heroes by Kate Rhodes

Behind most authors stands at least one unsung hero. In my case, it’s my husband Dave Pescod. While I write this piece, he’s sitting across the kitchen table from me, reading a draft of my latest crime novel, with a deep frown on his face. I have come to realise during our thirty-year marriage that the frown doesn’t always signal displeasure. Often, it’s just concentration. He’s thinking of ways to help my story to run more smoothly, or a fresh detail to deepen the plot. I guess you could call him the equivalent of a chatbot, with the added value that comes from being a real human being!

I doubt that I would ever have found the confidence to write a book, without Dave’s help. I was thirty when we met, and working as an English teacher, while he taught art. Until then my writing was like a guilty secret. I just stole odd moments to write occasional poems or short stories, convinced that they weren’t good enough to publish. I discovered that Dave was a writer, too, selling jokes to radio and TV shows, as well as short stories. He had this big, flamboyant talent, which I found daunting. It took me ages to gather the courage to show him my work, and I’ll never forget his reaction. He just looked at me and said with absolute conviction that I had talent. By then I knew that he was never inclined to bullshit, so his words made me glow.

My unsung hero gave me the confidence to write my first crime novel, and since then many more have followed, and it’s been a joyous ride. I’ve enjoyed the pleasure that comes from a fruitful creative relationship. We still often pass each other manuscripts to edit, fragments to fine tune, and spend hours mulling over potential plots and characters together.

Dave has never been keen on the spotlight, but it felt right to shine it on him for once, as he patiently edits my twentieth book for me. I wonder how many other authors have partners/friends/siblings that play a similar huge role in their creative lives? Writing can be a lonely profession at times, so all these unsung heroes deserve huge thanks for their invisible, but invaluable, support.

The Mermaid’s Cry, by Kate Rhodes published by Orenda Books on 16th July 2026.

DI Ben Kitto returns…. A coast in celebration. When DI Ben Kitto sees a baby thrown into Penzance harbour, he prays it’s a trick of the light. But the threat is real. The child survives – barely – and soon a chilling pattern emerges. As the Dark Sky Festival brings dancers, dreamers and stargazers to Cornwall’s coast, children begin to vanish. A killer in the crowd. A small mermaid figurine is found beside each scene, echoing the legend of the Mermaid of Zennor, who lured a man to his death beneath the waves. Still reeling from a devastating bereavement and determined to protect his young son, Ben is pulled back into the field and into a deadly investigation. When the killer’s messages begin arriving at his home, the threat becomes terrifyingly personal. A final reckoning. Suspicions fall on familiar faces. When the summer solstice approaches, Ben must confront the boundaries of love, loss and obsession. In a final, desperate chase along the headland, only his bond with Noah – and the loyalty of his dog, Shadow – can prevent tragedy from repeating itself.

More information about Kate Rhodes and her books can be found on her website. On Twitter @k_Rhodeswriter and on Instagram @katerhodeswriter.

 

The Venetian Redemption by Philip Gwynne Jones

This year’s a Venice year. By which I mean, I have a Venice novel out instead of a Sicilian novel. And so, welcome to The Venetian Redemption a title which, I think, works in a number of ways.

This is the ninth novel to feature Nathan Sutherland, British Honorary Consul in Venice and occasional and accidental crime fighter. The usual cast are back as well – Federica brings the smarts, Dario brings his encyclopaedic knowledge of Progressive Rock, and Gramsci – the stroppy Marxist cat – is there to bring his bad attitude. I’m not quite sure how we got to nine novels – it doesn’t seem all that long ago since The Venetian Game came out, but it seems that’s almost ten years ago. And, along the way, Nathan’s adventures kind of became my job, which I’m very grateful for.

But, back to the current novel. In some ways, this is a tying together of a number of themes from the previous two – The Venetian Candidate and The Venetian Sanctuary. I’m not going to say they form a trilogy, but there’s a kind of a consistent theme throughout. 

Back in The Venetian Candidate, I introduced Giuseppe Meneghini as a recurring nemesis for Nathan. A shady businessman with designs on politics, but someone who hasn’t quite crossed the line into downright serious criminality. Or, at least, nothing that could be proved. I enjoyed writing the scenes between him and Nathan so much, I brought him back for The Venetian Sanctuary. 

Now, I like a good Bond/Blofeld confrontation as much as anyone, but this, I thought, was as far as I could go with the character. And that was a shame. I enjoyed writing him, but I wasn’t sure there was anywhere left to develop. 

Unless – what if there was something that would force the two of them to work together? I kept thinking (warning : the Cloister Bell is about to sound a geek alert!) about the cliffhanger to the third episode of the Doctor Who episode Logopolis, where the Doctor and the Master shake hands. Now that was something I really wanted to try my hand at. 

I also needed to develop Meneghini’s back story. I gave him a little romance which I never expected to happen - it was just a story that came about during the writing and I enjoyed it so much I started to wonder if I’d missed my calling as a romance author. (As a side note, my previous editor once suggested I make a side track into romantasy. “You’re Welsh, aren’t you? Stick a dragon in it!”. I’m still not quite sure if she was serious).

There were also things I had to dig into from personal experience. Serious things. About getting older. And about loss. I lost both my mum and dad within the space of eighteen months. Quite simply, this wasn’t something I could ignore. Of course, all those feelings about loss and about rootlessness were going to come out on the page.

Redemption, then? Sympathy for the Devil, if you like? Perhaps, but the title also alludes to the great Venetian festival of Redentore, or, if you prefer, the Feast of the Most Holy Redeemer. It was originally established in thanksgiving for Venice’s deliverance from the great plague of 1576, a plague which killed perhaps a third of the city’s population. Today, it remains – obstinately, and against the odds – as perhaps the most Venetian of festivals. People line the Giudecca canal on both sides, a pontoon bridge is built across the canal linking the area of the Zattere with Andrea Palladio’s great church of Redentore, much eating and drinking is done and fireworks light up the sky (following which everyone will shake their heads sadly, and comment that they were better last year).

But there’s more than that. Redentore was also the occasion of Pink Floyd’s famous – or, rather, infamous – Night of Wonders concert. Two hundred thousand spectators crammed alongside the side of the San Marco Basin to watch the Floyd performing on a floating platform in the lagoon. The amount of rubbish left behind required the intervention of the Italian army to clean up. This, surely, was something I couldn’t ignore and also gave me an opportunity to bring back Nathan’s friend Lucia Frigo, guitarist with the greatest (and possibly only) Black Metal band in Venice.

So, there we are – we have a mixture of the usual nonsense and, I think, something just a little bit more serious in the mix as well. Venice is there in all its beauty and shadowy mystery, there’s a quick visit to the Dolomites and to the cemetery of San Michele, and there might just be a bit of eating and drinking as well.

I hope you enjoy it!

The Venetian Redemption by Philip Gwynne Jones Out now in hardback, eBook and Audio, £22 (Constable). 

The city of Venice is alive with celebrations for Redentore, the most spectacular festival of the year. The streets are lined with revellers eating and drinking, and boats travel along the canals into the bacino of San Marco in anticipation of the firework display. It's going to be a night to remember, and all the more so for Nathan Sutherland and his wife Federica, who have been invited to an exclusive party in the company of the British Ambassador. The festivities take a turn, however, when Nathan suddenly finds himself struggling for breath and is rushed to hospital. Tests show he has all the symptoms of aconite poisoning, a toxin derived from the deadly wolfsbane plant. An unfortunate accident? Or a deliberate attempt to poison him? As Nathan investigates, he discovers many guests might just have had a motive for murder . . .

More information about Phillip Gwynne Jones and his books can be found on his website. He can also be found on Facebook, On X @PGJonesVenice on Instagram @Philipgwynnejones

The Japanese Bond by Ros Pearl

When Shots asked for a piece on writing The Japanese Bond, I was rather flummoxed. There is only one James Bond. The enormous impact of Ian Fleming’s character has proved to be an enduring and phenomenal legacy, which has inspired countless books and films and has revolutionised the spy genre for over 70 years. Yes, our protagonist is half Japanese, and he is also a spy. If anyone mentions him in the Bond context, I feel extremely flattered!

Background to writing A Strange Way to Die (The first book in the Hiroshi Suzuki Files)

When my son-in-law George Bamford asked if I might be interested in collaborating with him to write an action-adventure spy thriller, I was intrigued. For years, George had had ideas revolving in his head and wanted to do something positive with these daydreams. 

At the time, my experience of published pieces was confined mostly to player-profiles of famous sportsmen and women for various magazines. George recognised that I had no background as an author, but he liked my style of writing. He’s very positive, enthusiastic and persuasive, so I agreed to try my hand at writing a few chapters based on his ideas. 

We agreed that we’d only go ahead if a) he liked what I’d written, and b) if I enjoyed the process. The answer was ‘yes’ from both of us, so I bought a book on how to write a novel! The first sentence to catch my eye stressed the importance of writing about what you know. This posed an immediate problem. As a sixty-year-old wife, mother and grandmother, the world of espionage was not on my radar. I’ve always enjoyed action adventure and spy books and films, but that certainly wouldn’t be enough.

What plusses did I have on my side? I’m a daydreamer with a vivid imagination and a love of the written word and have always enjoyed creating stories. I’ve travelled widely and have a working knowledge of many aspects of the background information needed for the plot, including polo, golf, luxury cars, helicopters, glamorous locations, business dealings and the corridors of power. George has in depthexpertise in fields ranging from luxury watches and classic cars to yachts, private jets and global culture and much more. Together we’ve tried to infuse these stories with texture, authenticity, and style. The result is an ongoing series of books rich in detail and momentum: one which we hope will pull readers in and keep them turning pages.

To write a convincing story I realised that I’d need specialist help with the technical details, so I set about looking for the right people. A few of them George and I already knew, but the majority were strangers. I was delighted to find that there were generous experts out there, who loved their subject and were willing to help. This was before the advent of AI and my initial research was spent trawling through the internet. I then wrote what I wanted to happen, asked my experts to read the text and see if what I’d written was a) credible, b) factually correct and c) that if I’d made any howlers, please would they let me know. Any technical jargon they provided was a major bonus to writing accurate and plausible parts to a story, on subjects of which I had zero experience.

The inspiration behind The Hiroshi Suzuki Files - George first visited Japan as a child and fell in love with the country and the people. He was fascinated by the blend of the high-tech modern world combined with Japan’s ancient history, traditions and cultural identity. As he puts it, “It’s a land of constant discovery.”

He envisaged a character with an English father and a Japanese mother, who’d been brought up in both countries, embraced both cultures and felt equally at home both in the West and the East. He said that he wanted to know the answer to a single compelling question: what kind of hero emerges from mystery, legacy, and untold stories? We set out to create a character who stands entirely on his own: bold, intelligent, and credible.

Hiroshi Suzuki (27) steps onto the pages as an experienced covert operative working for CIRO, the Japanese Secret Service. I really like and admire our hero. We’ve endowed him with many qualities and values to help him on his missions. He’s intelligent, skilled and highly trained. He’s well educated, cosmopolitan, with a keen sense of right and wrong. He has a sense of humour and is popular with his friends and colleagues. While some may consider his traditional values somewhat dated, he is honourable, intensely loyal and has a sense of duty. Failure is not a word in his vocabulary. Does he have any weaknesses and failings? Yes, of course he has, which are for the readers to discover.

How our collaboration works - George discussed his ideas in depth. As I finished the first draft of each chapter, I sent them to him for his comments and thoughts. We spoke often, refining the way the story was progressing and working-in various new ideas as they occurred to us. George has been incredibly flexible in allowing me to diverge from some of his original ideas and positively encouraged me to include new ones, and a sub-plot or two.

This is the way we collaborate, and it works well for us.

We hope readers will enjoy this first book as a few hours of escapist fun, and find it an entertaining, fast-paced thriller, with glamorous characters, set in exotic locations.

I’ve been overwhelmed by the initial feedback and positive comments made by book reviewers. Thanks to you all.

Dying for Power, the second book in the series will be available in October, the third, Dead Men’s Moneywill be published next April.

A Strange Way to Die by R Pearl and G Bamford (Arlingham Press)

An emperor marked for death. A killer wave that shouldn't exist. One agent caught in the crossfire. When Hiroshi "H" Suzuki, a deadly Anglo-Japanese operative, is sent to track a phantom assassin in Paris, he uncovers a chilling link to a billionaire genius with a secret agenda. As the clock ticks toward a global catastrophe, H is drawn into a high-stakes game of deception, desire, and ruthless ambition, where nothing is what it seems and failure isn't an option.

Dying for Power by R Pearl and G Bamford (Arlingham Press)

A shattered Bullet Train. Rising tensions between superpowers One agent to stop a bloody war. When a high-speed Japanese train is destroyed in a devastating explosion, Hiroshi "H" Suzuki is plunged into a deadly plot to trigger a war between China and Japan. From the neon streets of Tokyo to the windswept coast of Ireland and the glittering lure of Monte-Carlo, H must outwit ruthless enemies and unravel a global conspiracy before time runs out and history is rewritten in blood.

The Haunting of Minnie Ward by Bridget Walsh

Since the publication of my third novel, I’ve been asked a few times whether or not I believe in ghosts. Once you know the plot of that novel, the question won’t come as that much of a surprise. ‘The Spirit Guide’ is the third in the Variety Palace Mysteries, following on from ‘The Tumbling Girl’ and ‘The Innocents’. The novel opens in London, 1879, where my crime-detecting duo, Minnie Ward and Albert Easterbrook, areinvestigating two mysterious deaths. The trail leads Minnie to a grand country house in the Suffolk countryside, home of a spiritualist group. Once there, she finds herself isolated from everyone she loves and is confronted by some decidedly unsettling events that defy rational explanation. Mysterious visitations in the night, unexplained odours, screams in the darkness. Your classic ghost story fodder.

So, back to the question of whether or not I believe in ghosts. The short answer is ‘no’, simply because I’ve never seen any evidence to support their existence. But, strangely, I’ve lived in a house that other, perhaps more receptive, friends insisted was haunted. And I taught for several years in a school that was apparently inhabited by a spectral ‘Grey Lady’, a nun who broke her vows for a romantic relationship. In both instances, if I was living or working alongside supernatural beings, they were decidedly uninterested in me and never made their presence known.

But whilst I have no personal investment in spiritualism, the same can’t be said of the Victorians. The second half of the nineteenth century in particular saw intense interest in the paranormal, the strange, the unexplainable. The Victorians were fascinated by the idea of communicating with the dead, perhaps as a result of high infant mortality rates, perhaps as a reaction to the attacks on more conventional religious belief triggered by Darwinian thinking. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle was famously a firm believer in the ability to communicate with the dead. Harry Houdini thought it was all a load of hokum. Houdini’s theatrical background might have been what triggered his scepticism. Victorian seances had a distinctly performative air about them, with a series of set pieces and a high level of trickery and illusion, something Minnie is quick to spot when she attends one with Albert.

My focus in ‘The Spirit Guide’, though, was not so much on whether or not ghosts existed, but more on why people would want to believe they do. Having lost both my parents, and other loved ones, I would give a great deal to have just one more day with them. An hour, even. So, I understand why people want to believe in the possibility of talking to the dead.

That desire for communion is, however, ripe for exploitation. In ‘The Spirit Guide’ Minnie insinuates herself into The Spirit Sisterhood, a spiritualist group targetting wealthy young women. The Sisterhood is a cult in all but name, a group of young women who believe themselves specially chosen, but who are actually being hideously manipulated. As someone once said ‘no-one sets out to join a cult’, and yet so many people find themselves part of one, often when it’s too late to extract themselves without great personal cost. Cults, initially at least, often offer something profoundly attractive to those they are targeting. The Spirit Sisterhood positions itself as a kind of proto-feminist organisation, empowering young women to abandon their corsets in favour of what was termed Rational Dress, to spend their money as they see fit, and lead a life not dictated by the expectation of marriage and motherhood. 

And Minnie can see the appeal. Despite having her head firmly screwed onto her shoulders, a street-wise young women who grew up in one of the poorest districts of London and learned to survive — indeed, flourish — within a society aimed at suppressing working-class women, even Minnie isn’t immune to the initial allure of the Sisterhood. Although the delights of a bucolic existence in the wilds of Suffolk are entirely lost on her. She’s decidedly uncomfortable outside of London, distrusting the existence of cows and finding the quiet and immersive darkness as oppressive as the noise and bustle of London might be to others. 

While undercover within the Sisterhood, Minnie is forced to confront events from her past, most notably the murder of Rose Watkins. Rose was Minnie’s best friend, whose murder in ‘The Tumbling Girl’ was the catalyst for Minnie’s alternative career as a private investigator. In the intervening years, Minnie has never fully come to terms with this loss. It’s in ‘The Spirit Guide’ that she finally reaches a resolution which enables her to move forward. And that resolution is only reached by coming face-to-face with her own particular ghosts and laying them to rest.

 The Spirit Guide by Bridget Walsh (Pushkin Press) Out Now

Tragedy strikes Minnie Ward's beloved Variety Palace Theatre when a man is found dead in suspicious circumstances. Along with private detective Albert Easterbrook, she investigates. The trail leads them from the streets of London to a grand country house in the Suffolk countryside, home of the shadowy Spirit Sisterhood, who promise their clients an audience with the deceased. Minnie isn't buying it. She goes undercover within the Sisterhood and enters an eerie world of seances and mediums. But unravelling their secrets will bring Minnie face-to-face with ghosts from her own past. Can she get to the truth before the murderer kills again?

More information about Bridget Walsh and her books can be found on her website.

Photo © Trevor Watson

We All Want Our Just Desserts by Suk Pannu

We’ve all got an Indian Aunty - whether you’re Indian or not. These are the women who helped bring you up, who fed you and nurtured you and sent you off to school on the days your mum was at work. They also have an uncanny knack for getting into your business, unravelling your deepest secrets and generally interfering with every corner of your life. 

Bertie Wooster was plagued by strong minded aunts and it’s not a stretch to imagine that Wodehouse was similarly plagued. However, we never got to hear about it from the aunt’s point of view. Growing up, and being bought up, by a rich tapestry of Indian Aunties, and in parallel developing a growing love of genre fiction - especially crime - is where the idea for Mrs Sidhu began to crystallise. The aunty skillset: a sharp eye for detail, a good instinct for human behaviour, doggedness, a strong moral compass and quite simply nosiness seemed like offered itself up as a great fit for an updated amateur sleuth. She’s since been described as Slough’s answer to Miss Marple.

Let’s tackle that location. I grew up in the area and Slough hits a resonance for most British people. Or maybe that’s an anti-resonance. On the musical scale of British towns it seems to strike a bum note. I feel like it gets a bum rap. It’s an industrial town, full of industrious people. Its biggest crime is that it’s not an architectural gem. Then again, aesthetics were not the first priority for a generation of immigrants arriving in the 60’s and 70’s.

The interesting thing about Slough is what’s around it. This concrete dog poop is laid on the gentle pastures that house Windsor Castle, Eton College, Cookham and the Chiltern hills. So, an Indian Aunty from Slough, nosing around in the business of the rich and well heeled of Berkshire. You can see how it all came together from the world around me.

“Mrs Sidhu’s Just Desserts” is the second novel in the series. The first “Mrs Sidhu’s Dead and Scone” plunges her into the world of occult activities at a Wellness retreat in a quaint Berkshire village. This second novel brings a new challenge; an art heist.

Art heists have always fascinated us. Witness the global intrigue around the recent theft from the Louvre in Paris. And the shock caused by the raid that deprived the Oslo art museum of ‘The Scream’. The criminals there simply walked in and took it off the wall!

In fiction, art heists usually have a bit more finesse. Acrobatic thieves dangle from cables to circumvent laser beams, thermal sensors and pressure pads. In “Just Desserts” Mrs Sidhu caters a swish gallery opening where a painting is stolen in an impossible heist and her favourite waitress is murdered in the process. No aunty worth her salted samosas is going to stand for that, and our hero sets out seeking the just desserts of the title.

This of course brings her deeper into the world of art. It’s an area that’s a particular challenge for a humble, Slough bred woman. Art, for the uninitiated is a daunting world. Mrs Sidhu is overawed from the start. The other wonderful thing about the art world, is that it’s divisive, entertaining and dramatic. Most of all it has larger than life characters doing wild things. Van Gogh slashing at his ear, Tracey Emin unmaking her bed, Damien Hirst bottling up dead animals. Then there are the waspish art critics, the sly dealers and the moneyed collectors. It’s also got the reverse - bound up amateurs daubing out watercolours.That’s great material for a murder mystery thriller and it’s the cast of suspects.

The entertainment value of the suspect ensemble has always felt important to me, almost as entertaining as a great sleuth. “Just Desserts” plunges Mrs Sidhu into the tensions and rivalries of that world. While she is daunted by all this new and unfamiliar world, an Indian aunty is never cowed and in Mrs Sidhu’s case curiosity always wins over fear and her search for justice is too strong to be denied.

I’ve had the somewhat unique pleasure (and privilege) of writing Mrs Sidhu for three different media. She started life on BBC Radio 4’s “Mrs Sidhu Investigates” and moved across to TV with the brilliant Meera Syal playing the lead in both. Now, she’s available in print too. Each medium has its own challenges and opportunities, but in the novels I relished developing her inner voice. It’s been a huge amount of fun. I hope you will agree.

Mrs Sidhu's Just Desserts by Suk Pannu (HarperCollins Publisher) Out Now

It's the most glamorous event of the year. Mrs Sidhu has snagged the contract of her life: the chance to cater the grand opening of Berkshire's new art gallery. But there's horror among the hors d'oeuvres. Then the gallery's star painting is stolen, and Mrs Sidhu's favourite waitress is left dead on the floor. Mrs Sidhu is back for a second helping. Can a widowed, Slough-based caterer take down a ruthless, murderous art thief? She's determined to crack the strangest case of her career and serve up her signature dish: just desserts.

Suk Pannu can be found on Instagram @suk.pannu

Death Watch Cottage: 'A murdered tourist and a community tearing itself apart was too good to pass up'

Death Watch Cottage is the fourth novel in the CSI Ally Dymond series which is set in North Devon. When I began writing the CSI Ally Dymond series, I always knew I wanted to set it in North Devon.

Having grown up there, I returned to live there a few years ago and I know the area extremely well. I have always felt that North Devon’s blend of coastal communities, market towns, isolated farms and desolate moorlands would give me ample locations for my crime novel and so it has proved to be the case.

When called upon in my stories, North Devon has certainly done its fair share of the heavy lifting. It has provided an authentic backdrop for poor mobile signals, easy getaways down narrow roads that are barely mapped, slow police responses from an emergency service stretched thinly over a huge area and communities that sometimes know a little too much about each other.

But it isn’t just North Devon’s landscape that has provided me with inspiration for my novels. I am also interested in the issues facing the place I call home. 

First and foremost, I write crime novels which means there is a certain contract that I must fulfil with my reader but, beyond that, I also like to play with themes pertinent to the area. 

With my first novel, Breakneck Point, I wanted to look beyond the breath-taking landscape and that classic image of a thatched cottage and roses growing around the door which is why I set it in fictional Bidecombe, a struggling coastal town beset with problems relating to social deprivation. 

My latest novel Death Watch Cottage tackles the other end of the scale. It is set in a former fishing village a little further down the coast called Maidcombe, but, unlike Bidecombe, most of the properties in Maidcombe are holiday homes. 

Second homes and holiday lets are a live issue in North Devon. There are approximately 4,770 holiday rentals listed in the area, according to Airbnb. This has placed the permanent rental market under considerable pressure with local people finding it difficult to find a place that they can afford to live in. 

On the flipside, visitors generate around £600 million for the local economy, supporting in the region of 11,000 jobs. It’s against this backdrop that I wanted to write Death Watch Cottage.

The novel opens with a public meeting where tempers flare over the closure of the local school due to a fall in numbers. 

There are those who believe the fault lies with the increasing proliferation in holiday homes which are pushing up house prices and driving local families out of the area. Others at the meeting argue that many of the restaurants and pubs would not exist without tourists.

The meeting is interrupted by a teenage boy who, on seeing a light on in his father’s holiday, went to check, only to discover the body of a tourist in the shower. The only problem Leo Hawkins is meant to be staying at a different holiday let in the village. Is his death the result of a faulty CO alarm or is something more sinister at play.

As the investigation begins, it becomes clear that some locals resent outsiders enough to wage a campaign against them in an attempt to drive them away. Would they go as far as to murder a tourist?

Alongside the issues surrounding second homes, I am also taken with the idea of community. In North Devon, there are many close-knit communities, similar to the one I grew up in, where families have lived side by side for generations. But what exactly does it mean to belong to a community and what is the best way of protecting these communities? Those were the questions I wanted to try and answer in Death Watch Cottage.

It is often this sense of community that attracts visitors to the area, but there are those in my novel that feel their community is being eroded by the presence of holiday homes that remain empty for large parts of the year. 

On the other hand, there are those who believe communities must adapt to survive and that includes accepting villages can only remain viable if they offer holiday lets.

In reality, North Devon is as welcoming to visitors as it always has been but for a crime writer such as myself, a murdered tourist, along with a community tearing itself apart felt like a potent mix that was just too good to pass up.

Death Watch Cottage by T. Orr Munro (HarperCollins Publishers) Out Now

Assume nothing. The body of Leo Hawkins is found in a Devon holiday cottage, the cause of death carbon monoxide poisoning. Was this a tragic accident or something more sinister? CSI Ally Dymond will follow the evidence wherever it leads. Believe no-one. Leo’s wife gives an account of his final hours, but something isn’t adding up. Graffiti left by an anti-tourist group is discovered nearby. The only consistent thread in the investigation is that no one is telling the truth. Challenge everything When a second body turns up, Ally and the murder team must examine everything they thought they knew, untangling a web of suspects to get to the truth. Is there a single killer? Are there more deaths to come? Ally will need to uncover local loyalties to catch any killer before they strike again…

 T. Orr Munro can be found on Instagram @ t_orr_munro

Simon Mason on The Dangerous Man

The Dangerous Stranger is the fifth story in a series featuring a pair of mis-matched detectives in Oxford, both called Wilkins. Ryan Wilkins is Oxford born and bred, white, a chav who grew up on what the Americans would call a ‘trailer park,’ badly dressed, badly behaved, semi-feral in fact, with a chip on his shoulder and anger-management issues generally brought into play by encounters with privileged elites. Ray Wilkins is a member of the privileged elites, London-Nigerian, privately educated with a double first in PPE from Balliol College, Oxford, handsome, nattily dressed, articulate and suave, the golden boy of Thames Valley Police – until, much against his will, he was paired with Ryan. They are not related. They do not get on.

Oddly, what they get are results.

This new story is a thought-experiment. What if Oxford – gentle city of poets and scholars – had experienced a riot, as so many cities in the UK did, after the Southport murders? An out-of-control crowd lobbing Molotov cocktails at a hotel housing asylum seekers. And also: what if a young refugee was actually burned to death? (It’s an Oxford tradition, after all, if in abeyance for many centuries and formerly restricted to Jews and archbishops.) And furthermore: what if the victim then turned out not to be a refugee at all?

Perhaps it sounds very political. But the impulse wasn’t to discuss politics; the story seemed to arise naturally out of the anger and fear. There is action, for sure, but as Chandler said, what counts is emotion; and it seemed to me that there were unusual amounts of this arising, unstoppably, chaotically, from the basic situation I imagined.

This emotion affects all the characters, in different ways. Because it’s the fifth book in a series, some of the characters have naturally been around for a while. Little Ryan, for instance, Ryan’s four-year-old son. And his father, Ryan Senior, released early from prison (overcrowding issues) and now resident, to his disgust, in a hostel for rehabilitating prisoners. The Wilkins’s Superintendent is familiar too, fresh, steely and blonde as ever, but having to cope with a disciplinary enquiry, which tests her considerable reserves to the limit, and the Chief Constable, a massive, battered, malevolent presence, who openly hopes to get rid of those Wilkins ‘clowns’.

But there are new characters too. A sly criminal from Rotherhithe who hates Oxford even as his job keeps him there. An eager new DC, William, who simply won’t shut up and is a little too naïve for his own good. ‘Milky’ Nolan, twelve years old, excited to find himself at his first riot. Yemi Kosoko, world food grocery shopkeeper in Oxford’s ethnic Cowley Road and his friend, the chess-playing eccentric academic Nicholas Kinghorn, who dyes his beard lilac to remind him of weddings in Ghana. And finally, most important of all, Jallo (other names unknown, age unknown, country of origin unknown) who finds himself sleeping rough in Oxford’s nooks and crannies, and knows himself to be in horrible danger.

I like Oxford’s nooks and crannies, I must admit. I like the city’s double nature. Its deep Englishness (dons and quadrangles, meadows and river), and simultaneous air of foreignness (all those foreign post-grads, language students and care workers). I like its strange blend of permanence (we who live here) and transience (those who arrive and go, students, tourists). And I like its rooted elderly and great waves of youth. It seems to me excitingly unstable. Perhaps it’s that quality that gives rise to stories, not all of which it wants to tell.

The Dangerous Man by Simon Mason (Quercus Publishing) £16.99 Out Now

On a warm and pleasant evening in Oxford, gentle city of poets and scholars, rioters outside a hotel full of asylum seekers set a young refugee on fire. The city - the country - convulses in shock. Is this who we are? It's international news of the very worst kind, and the Chief Constable demands immediate and exemplary action in bringing the perpetrators to justice. The detectives leading the investigation fill him with misgivings, however: DIs Ryan and Ray Wilkins (no relation), Thames Valley's detective pantomime horse, one Oxford-educated, the other Oxford-trailer park. He doesn't understand why they work together. 'Do they even get on?' 'Somehow that doesn't seem necessary,' their Superintendent replies. Who burned the boy alive? Was it a far-right extremist? Was it an ordinary person who had simply gone along to watch and got caught up in the emotion? Could it even be one of the children who were there? Deploying a range of investigative skills, some standard, some unconventional and some frankly nuts, the Wilkinses do what they do: results with chaos. But when they discover that the victim was not an asylum seeker after all, or even a resident of the hotel, the whole investigation kicks into a completely different configuration.

The Shots review of The Dangerous Man can be found here.

Useful Idiots by Neil Lancaster

Writers are generally divided into two camps in how they deal with the difficult task of coming up with an idea for a book and then how to attack the job of getting the words down. 

We are either known as “plotters,” which is kind of self-explanatory, as in you plot all the story out, you know the story beats, and you know how it ends. 

Or.. we can be what is known in the trade as “pantsers,” which of course isn’t a word. However, it basically means you write by the “seat of your pants.” Sounds great, right?

So, as a dedicated “pantser,” mind I decided when planning the 7th Max Craigie novel I would change how I work, and come up with a cogent plot before I started typing onto the blank word document. 

But what? I’ve written about, drug runners, corrupt cops, long-term missing people, and even a psychotic serial killer stalking the Scottish Highlands. Then it hit me. Espionage. I’m a huge fan of spy novels, but really, as an ex-cop, police procedurals are where my expertise lies. Could I mix the two? 

You bet I could, but what’s the angle that links the words of counter-espionage, and modern policing in Scotland? So, I did what I always do. I stared into space, and hoped. It’s not that proactive, but it’s a thing, and so far, I’ve been lucky. Something would show up. 

And it did! 

Real life came to the rescue, with a shocking and high-profile case that hit the news right when I needed it. On the 20th March 2024 a large fire was set using an accelerant at a warehouse in East London. Eight fire appliances were required along with 60 firefighters to quell the blaze, which caused in excess of £1.4 million in damage.

But this was a factory with a difference. This premises was storing property and aid that was bound for Ukrainian forces engaged in the blood-soaked war that was still raging on that continent.

Not an insurance job. Not revenge. Not even wanton damage for damage’s sake, which we see plenty of. This was an attack commissioned by the proscribed Russian state proxy Wagner Group but carried out by a group of petty London criminals in exchange for comparatively modest sums of cash. 

The ringleader Dylan Earl, a petty criminal from London made contact with the Wagner group by joining a broadcast channel on the social messaging application Telegram.

He began chatting with two account handles called ‘Privet Bot’ and ‘Lucky Strike.’ Earl knew that these accounts were supportive of Russia, and he accepted an offer of money to undertake operations, the first of which as the East London factory attack.

His Co-conspirator Jake Reeves had helped Earl recruit a group of men, all petty criminals involved in drug supply to carry out the arson. 

After the group’s arrests, the whole plot was essentially uncovered by their communications on secure messaging sites where they openly talked of working for Wagner, and the sums they were being paid. None of the group had ever received training, nor travelled to Russia. They were just useful idiots. Petty criminals willing to be exploited in exchange for cash, who are now all serving long prison sentences.

This is hardly Le Carre, is it? I mean, where are the gadgets? Where are the double-agents? 

So what had changed?

The reality is that operational nature of Russian intelligence operations has changed. The world has changed, and it was two distinct events which propagated this. 

The poisoning of Sergei, and Yulia Skripal by deploying the weapons grade nerve-agent Novichok on British soil in Salisbury in 2018. This caused a massive response from the UK by the expulsion of 153 Russian “diplomats,” by the end of 2018. 

The next incident was a little more explosive. 

Russia invaded Ukraine.

Russia’s ability to propagate operational activity was severely compromised firstly by the lack of agents working undercover in Embassies, and secondly because of how the world has changing. Everyone now has a digital footprint. It’s harder to work covertly in a hostile foreign state in a perpetually online world.

So, the use of the criminal proxy model is attractive for a number of reasons. 

Firstly, a low-level petty criminal is cheap. The sums in the Dylan Earl case were comparatively modest. £2-3, 000 to torch a factory. 

Russia no doubt could carry out these acts with agents of the GRU, as they did in Salisbury. Or, for less money, and less risk, they could deploy useful idiots, who they never even have to meet. 

As a writer, this is manna from heaven, serious though it is. Espionage is no longer the preserve of a suave guy in a dinner suit, driving an Aston Martin. It could be the 17-year-old hoodie-wearing yob from a rough estate in inner London.

So, the sixth in the DS Max Craigie series, The Dark Heart was born. It’s a story that opens with a car bomb in York, when a renowned is killed in a devastating explosion in York, authorities quickly attribute the attack to Islamic extremists. But as the investigation unfolds, it becomes clear that all is not as it seems. Are dark forces really trying to sow division in the UK, and if so, why? 

The Dark Heart by Neil Lancaster. (HarperCollins Publishers) Out Now

A deadly bombing. When renowned author Dr. Daniel Solomon is killed in a devastating explosion in York, authorities quickly attribute the attack to Islamic extremists. But as the investigation unfolds, it becomes clear that all is not as it seems. A dark conspiracy. DS Max Craigie uncovers a chilling connection between a series of brutal murders, each victim linked by a secret that someone is determined to protect. A dangerous game. With the number of victims growing and an elusive figure known as The Cashier operating in the shadows, Max must navigate a web of corruption and hatred. Can he unravel the truth before more lives are lost?

More information can be found on his website.  He can also be found on Facebook @NeilLancasterCrime. On Instagram @neil_lancaster_crime and on X @neillancaster66 

 

Clare Mackay’s starter for ten

Seven years ago, I found myself on submission, the phrase that strikes fear into every writer’s heart. I had written a crime novel with a detective called Clare Mackay and had managed to secure an agent who was busy sending my book to prospective publishers. It was an exciting but anxious time as I waited for news, so I distracted myself by writing a second book with the same detective, handy to have if a publisher asked, ‘have you written anything else?’ At the time I hoped these books might become a two, or even a three-book series. 

Fast forward seven years and the tenth book, Watch Them Fall, is about to be published. How on earth did that happen? If I’d hoped for overnight success, I would be disappointed. I’d read stories of writers who’d had enthusiastic replies from publishers within an hour of reading their submission, making me believe it could happen to me. (Reader: it did not!) But I was thrilled to be offered a contract with digital first publisher, Canelo and my first book, See Them Run, came out in October 2019. There were no fireworks, no best seller chart appearances but slowly it gained traction.

As the months went on, I dreamed of bookshop and library appearances, of signing events and of, one day, seeing people read my book on trains and planes (still waiting for that one!) In February 2020 I made a trip to London to meet with my agent and publisher where I signed copies of my soon-to-be- published second book. Little did I know that was the last time I’d be promoting my books in person for quite some time. One month later we were in lockdown. Being shortlisted for the Bloody Scotland Scottish Crime Debut of the Year 2020 was both a thrill and a let-down. I was so happy that See Them Run had been shortlisted for a major prize but sad that the festival was unlikely to take place, in person, at least. I would miss the awards ceremony and the chance to meet so many writers who, over the years, had inspired me. The festival team did everything they could to make up for this with online activities, a short story jointly written by the shortlisted authors and festival appearances the following year, by which stage my third book, Lies to Tell, had also been published.

More contracts followed and this week I finished the first draft of book 11, to be published in 2027. It’s a privilege and a joy to be able to write what is becoming a long-running series. But let’s be honest here. There are days when the joy can be in short supply. Let me explain.

St Andrews, the setting for my books, is a beautiful university town that plays host to some ten thousand students, plus a large influx of tourists and golfers all year round. It’s a diverse population with the potential for a variety of crimes. So far, so good. But it’s also a fairly small town, geographically. Putting it frankly, I’m running out of places to leave bodies!

For the planned three-book series, this wouldn’t have been a problem. But as I wrap up book eleven and my thoughts turn to book twelve, I start to wonder where the next lot of crimes could take place. Where will my victims live? Where will the clues be found? And then there's the murders themselves. When you’ve shot, stabbed, garrotted, poisoned and bludgeoned victims to death, there’s little left in a murderer’s armoury.

The starting point is usually what do I want to write about? When I was planning Watch Them Fall, I knew I wanted to explore the problem of housing in an expensive town like St Andrews. Sound riveting, eh?! But throw in a body floating in the harbour, a protest march that threatens to get out of hand and a burglary where nothing is taken, and Clare is pushed to the very limit of her powers. 

And what of Clare? And Chris, her Wagon Wheel-loving sergeant? Over the course of ten books, they’ve become old friends to me as they progress in their personal and professional lives. Clare has acquired one dog, given two boyfriends the boot and (so far) has settled happily with the third. She continues to drink too much red wine, is domestically challenged (putting it politely) but remains fiercely loyal to her team and to the town that has become her adopted home. My affection for the detectives is undimmed but my favourite character – the only one I guarantee never to kill – is Clare’s badly-behaved dog, Benjy. He even has his own page on my website where you can see what he’s been up to. For the record, many of Benjy’s exploits are based on those of our family dog who takes ‘interesting behaviour’ to a whole new level.

What I love most of all is the way readers have taken Clare & co to their hearts. Last week a lady told me she’d made a traybake mentioned in one of the books and it’s now her favourite thing to bake. Some tell me they know exactly where Clare lives, what she looks like while others speculate about her having a baby. For readers to be so engaged, ten books on, is all the thanks I need to keep writing the series, and I hope to keep Clare busy with murder and mayhem for many years to come.

Watch Them Fall by Marion Todd (Canelo) Out Now

DI Clare Mackay is looking for danger in the wrong places. A body is hauled out of St Andrews harbour. This was no accident – DI Clare Mackay and her team have a murder investigation on their hands. Superintendent Penny Meakin is more focused on a break in at the salubrious home of local property developers. Many residents of the town oppose their plans for a new housing estate, and Penny insists that this controversy was a motive for the crime. Clare sees no evidence of this, but what is she overlooking? When another death occurs and links are found to the first victim, the intensity on all sides ramps up. Stretched to the absolute limit, how much strain can Clare’s officers take before something breaks, never to be repaired…

More information on Marion Todd and her books can e found on her website. She can be found on Facebook, Instagram, Threads and TikTok @mariontoddwriter and on X @MarionETodd

Sounds LIke Trouble Q & A with Pamela Samuels Young and Dwayne Alexander Smith

 Introduction:

Dwayne Alexander Smith is the author of Forty Acres, which is in development at Netflix, with Jay-Z attached to produce. Pamela Samuels Young has been widely published across genres, and Netflix is also developing her work, having optioned the first two books in her Vernette Henderson series. Both authors received NAACP Image Awards, for Forty Acres and Anybody’s Daughter respectively.

AO:     What brought the two of you together?  

PSY & DAS:   We’d known each other for a few years after becoming familiar with each other’s work. We’d see each other at book events from time to time and eventually became friends. Our writing styles are pretty similar, and we had discussed the idea of collaborating on a novel. Dwayne came up with the idea for the first book in the series, Sounds Lika a Plan. He shared it with Pamela and suggested they write it together, and she was all in.

AO:     Not only are you both novelists but you also have other jobs. How do you balance this with your writing.

PSY & DAS:   Pamela retired from the practice of law a few years ago and has been writing full time since then. Dwyane is still a full-time writer, focusing primarily on screenwriting. We both love writing and are luckily enough to be able to do it full time.

AO:     A lot of trust is needed for authors who collaborate, how do the two of you work together not only on the plot but the characters?

PSY & DAS:   We work from a pretty detailed outline. So once the writing process begins, we know exactly where the story is headed. Dwayne wrote the first chapter from Jackson’s POV and sent it to Pamela, who wrote the next chapter from Mackenzie’s POV. We went back and forth with that process until the book was completed. We pretty much stuck to the outline. It was a relatively smooth process, with very few hiccups. Because our writing style is pretty similar and because we both like each other’s solo work, it was a relatively smooth process.

AO:     When I read  Sounds Like Trouble, it brought back memories of other detecting duos for example Dashiell Hammet’s Nick and Nora Charles, Laurie R. King's Mary Russell and Sherlock Holmes, Jeffery Deaver’s Lincoln Rhyme and Amelia Sachs to name a few. What makes them work so well as a duo and was it intentional that they had to be a male and a female when for example you have duos such as Sherlock Holmes and Watson, Poirot and Hastings.

PSY & DAS:   Thanks for that amazing compliment. From the start we felt that the dynamic between Jackson and Mackenzie would click. Actually, we saw our two protagonists more like Bruce Willis and Cybill Shepherd in the TV show Moonlighting.  We wanted the same kind of humorous love / hate chemistry.

AO:     Are there any elements of yourselves in your main characters.

PSY & DAS:   We don’t like to admit it, but there are elements of Jackson that are very much like Dwyane and the same for Pamela and Mackenzie. Dwyane can be a little prima donna-like, and Pamela does have her uptight moments.

AO:     What sparked the idea for the current storyline featuring mobsters?

PSY & DAS:   Dwyane has a folder full of story ideas. He came up with the mobster’s storyline and when Pamela heard it, she was hooked. Dwyane is definitely the part of the duo who comes up with the outrageous car chases and action scenes.

AO:     How important is research and do you do a lot of research? In Sounds Like Trouble did you get to hang out with mobsters?

PSY & DAS:   Fortunately, we didn’t have to hang out with mobsters, LOL! We are both long-time fans of crime fiction. We just put our imaginations to work and went for it. We, of course, do research when there’s something we don’t have a lot of familiarity with. For instance, we researched what’s involved in picking a lock. We’ll also make sure the settings for our stories make sense. If we describe a building on a particular street, we make sure the architecture fits.

AO:     How difficult is it then to have storylines to ensure that they are realistic without going overboard.

PSY & DAS:   We work hard to present a realistic story, but as fiction writers, we do take some liberties when it’s necessary. For example, could the two PIs really sneak into a well-guarded cemetery where tons of famous people are buried? Maybe? We try to present each scenario in a way that the reader can at least accept it as a possibility.

AO:     How important is LA as a location in this series and did you consider setting it elsewhere.

PSY & DAS:   Location is very important for us. Local readers love reading about places they recognize. Hence, we give a great deal of thought to where the scenes take place. We want to make sure our LA-based readers can visualize the scene as they’re reading because they’ve visited that exact location. We’re both from L.A. and know the city well, so we never considered another location. That’s not to say we won’t take the story to another location at some point.

AO:     The book touches on themes of justice, loyalty, and morality when working for criminals. Was there a deliberate message that you were trying to convey about the characters' moral compasses, especially given the "offer they can't refuse”?

PSY & DAS:   We weren’t necessarily trying to make a moral statement. Instead, we wanted to create a story with lots of drama, action and conflict, where the stakes our main characters faced were constantly being raised. If that also encompasses a moral or social issue, so be it.

AO:     There is a lot of banter between your two main characters. How easy or difficult has it been to make sure that their relationship does not overwhelm the story.

PSY & DAS:   The banter was both easy and fun to write. That’s because if you eavesdropped on a conversation between Dwayne and Pamela, it might be much the same as the banter between Jackson and Mackenzie. We never feared their relationship would take over the story. Our major focus was always on the plot and making sure it engaged the reader from chapter to chapter.

AO:     Now that you have written two books in the series is there anything in hindsight you wish you could change about both your characters?

PSY & DAS:   No, not really. We were pretty happy with how we crafted our characters.

 AO:     A lot of action takes place.  Which is more important to you character or plot?

PSY & DAS:   Definitely plot! We both write commercial fiction and love a fast-paced, engaging mystery. That doesn’t mean we don’t want well-developed characters. But our primary focus is on our plot.

AO:     There are two types of crime writers those who meticulously plan before writing and those who jump straight in and find the story along the way. Which do you do?

PSY & DAS:   We are definitely meticulous plotters. Dwayne prepared a very detailed chapter-by-chapter outline of Sounds Like Trouble. Then we discussed it and made a few changes. Along the way, the story changed, but because we wrote this book together, it was crucial to have a well-developed outline from the start.

AO:     One could call this series a cross-genre book as it has not only elements of a thriller but that of a mystery and humour.  Was this intentional?

PSY & DAS:   Yes, all of that was intentional. The interplay between Jackson and Mackenzie was intended to be funny, since they have such different personalities. We had a lot of fun with those chapters. We also wanted to keep the reader guessing. If there’s one thing we both equally hate, it’s a predictable ending.

AO:     I believe that if you would like a good grounding in social history and social policy that one should read a crime novel.  How important was it for you to weave important topics into your books?

PSY & DAS:   While we also think that’s important, we didn’t necessarily start out planning to make any social statements. But when the opportunity presents itself, we’ll take it. For example, in the next book in the series, we’ll be delving into AI and the impact of social media on our lives.

AO:     What next for Jackson Jones and Mackenzie Cunningham.

PSY & DAS:   We truly enjoy breathing life into Mackenzie and Jackson and dreaming up adventures for them. We plan to write many more books in this series and are currently drafting the third book in the series.       

Sounds Like Trouble by Pamela Samuels Young and Dwayne Alexander Smith (Faber & Faber) £9.99 (Out Now)

Three mobsters. Two detectives. A deadly race against time. Jackson Jones and Mackenzie Cunningham – two of the best private investigators in the business – are presented with a case they aren’t allowed to refuse. The heads of L.A.’s three major crime families have tasked them with finding sensitive information hidden by a man in critical condition before he flatlines. Or else.  The pair can’t agree on how to furnish the office of their new joint venture, Safe and Sound Investigations, let alone the nature of their feelings for each other. But with a masked man on their tail, they are going to have to stick together if they are going to have any chance of solving the case.

More information about the authors can be found on their websites - www.pamelasamuelsyoung.com and Dwayne Alexander Smith

Dwayne Alexander Smith can also be found on Instagram @theamazin and on Facebook

Pamela Samuels Young can also be found on  X and Instagram @AuthorPSY and on Facebook