Guest post - Paul Cornell

Who Killed Sherlock Holmes? is published by TOR UK on 19/07/2016 TOR.

Paul Cornell has been Hugo-nominated for his work in TV, comics and prose, and is a BSFA award-winner for short fiction. He has also written some of Doctor Who’s best-loved episodes for the BBC, and has more recently written for the Sherlock-inspired TV show Elementary, starring Jonny Lee Miller and Lucy Liu.  He lives in Gloucestershire. Find out more www.paulcornell.com and @paul_cornell.

Paul has dropped by to talk about his new book:

Guest Post - Helen Callaghan

Helen Callaghan was born in California to British parents and her early years were spent in both the US and UK.

After several early jobs as barmaid, drama student, and nurse, she settled into bookselling, and worked as a fiction specialist and buyer for Athena Bookshop, Dillons and Waterstones over the next eight years. Eventually, she studied for her A-levels at night school and achieved a place at Cambridge University, reading Archaeology at Wolfson College.

She has published two local history books: Prestwich In Old Photographs and Cambridge University In Old Photographs for Alan Sutton Publications. She now runs her own business writing technical documentation.

Her interests include medieval cookery, hiking, running, and travel. She is fascinated by the past, and can frequently be found haunting ancient monuments, taking pictures of them with her mobile phone. She blogs about these enthusiasms on www.helencallaghan.co.uk.

Helen lives in Cambridge.  Dear Amy is her first novel. 

Helen has dropped in to talk about her forthcoming novel - Dear Amy

Reviews - Crime triple bill

It's a bit of a coincidence but in the week leading up to Crimefest I read three (very different from each other) crime books:

Fellside by M.R. Carey

Dear Amy by Helen Calleghan

and

I was Dora Suarez by Derek Raymond

Fellside is a book set in a women's prison and has a supernatural bent. Dear Amy is about a missing girl and is a psychological thriller and I was Dora Suarez is a deep black noir - the three books are tonally different from each other. But each very good.

Fellside - The Fellside of the title is a maximum security women's Titan prison in Northern England. Jess Moulson sets a fire to kill her abusive boyfriend and instead kills a little boy and is sent down for murder. When she reaches prison she decides to take her own life, in the only method available, by hunger strike. However the ghost of the little boy she killed will not let her take that easy escape.

Carey is a master of pace with each sentence, each paragraph, each page, each chapter a hook that pulls you through the story. It's really rather marvelous to experience. This is a page-turner and I devoured it.

It reminded me a little of Carey's first Felix Castor book with a ghost seeking resolution and the main character seeking redemption. But it's of a different flavour to that book. Jess is a compelling lead and the cast of characters are well set up and well drawn, and believable.

In Dear Amy, another book with a female protagonist, Margot Lewis, an agony aunt receives a letter from a girl who had gone missing assumed abducted many years ago, which leads her down a very long dark rabbit hole indeed. Callaghan has created a taut thriller full of entertaining turns as Margot follows the clues as to how she could possibly be receiving these letters from someone presumed dead for years.

This is an impressive debut and I suspect that Callaghan is going to be huge. This deserves a large readership and I heartily recommend it to anyone who likes thrillers.

I also am very happy to say that I have a blog piece from the author - coming up next post...

Whilst it doesn't have a female protagonist I was Dora Suarez would be both incomplete without the voice of the victim and poorer. With one of the most brutal, and effective openings to a book I've ever read this immediately alerts you that this is an author that is going to paint with a palette of darkness.

Part of the Factory series, but standalone, this follows the investigation of a brutal axe murder by an unnamed Detective Sergeant who falls in love with the dead girl. The fact that the girl was dying of AIDS before the murder adds a level of poignancy to what could otherwise be a salacious crime novel.

As a dark reflection of Thatcher-era Britain, in a filth-encrusted mirror, it is a deeply disturbing read. It is also a darkly compelling tale.

I don't often read crime, but my foray into the genre has been interesting. I highly commend all three books.

Now I'm off to read E M Forster's  A Room with a View to take a break...

Guest Post - Steven Guscott

Steven J. Guscott is twenty-eight and has been writing stories since 2010. His first fantasy novel, The Book of Prophecy was published by Kristell-Ink in 2014 and he has had a selection of shorter pieces published too. His short story The Diary of the Frankensteins was featured in the charity anthology, Strange Tales from the Scriptorian Vaults.

   Due to the interest in this story Steven decided to expand the ideas and with the help of Sammy HK Smith this novella, The Diary of V. Frankenstein was created.

  When not writing Steven enjoys reading and listening to audiobooks, spending time with his family and friends, and being way too obsessed with Frank Herbert’s Sci-Fi classic, Dune. 

Steven has dropped in to talk about re-imagining the gothic

Interview with Jack Strange

The reclusive author Jack Strange is an unusual fellow. His exact age is unknown. Those who've dared to ask him have never survived long enough to divulge the answer.

His writing is dark and comedic. He has a biting wit, an acid tongue, and some say hoofed feet. With his leaning towards the undead, he's a natural for the world of horror and gore.

Jack signed for Kensington Gore publishing in early 2016 in blood, no-one is sure whose.

We asked Jack a bunch of questions - 

Guest Post - Andrew Joyce

Andrew Joyce left high school at seventeen to hitchhike throughout the US, Canada, and Mexico.

He wouldn’t return from his journey until decades later when he decided to become a writer. Joyce

has written four books, including a two-volume collection of one hundred and forty short stories

comprised of his hitching adventures called BEDTIME STORIES FOR GROWN-UPS (as yet

unpublished), and his latest novel, RESOLUTION. He now lives aboard a boat in Fort Lauderdale,

Florida, with his dog, Danny, where he is busy working on his next book, YELLOW HAIR.

In his own words - My name is Andrew Joyce, and I write books for a living. Pete has been kind enough to allow me a little space on his blog to promote my new book, RESOLUTION: Huck Finn’s Greatest Adventure, so I thought I’d tell you how it came about. It all started way back in 2011 . . .

Interview - Will Macmillan Jones

Will Macmillan Jones lives in Wales, a lovely green, verdant land with a rich cultural heritage.  He does his best to support this heritage by drinking the local beer and shouting loud encouragement whenever International Rugby is on the TV.  A fifty something lover of blues, rock and jazz he has just fulfilled a lifetime ambition by filling an entire wall of his home office with (full) bookcases.  When not writing, he is usually lost with the help of a satnav on top of a large hill in the middle of nowhere.

His major comic fantasy series, released by Red Kite Publishing, can be found at:

www.thebannedunderground.com

and information on his other work and stuff in general at :

www.willmacmillanjones.com

There’s a blog.  There’s always a blog, isn’t there?

www.willmacmillanjones.wordpress.com