Dancing With Myself: HINKSON on HINKSON

Floodgates opened at A Twist Of Noir last night as the 600 - 700 series got back on the road.

It didn't just limp back either, but shone like a carnival. You'll find Kieran Shea, Matthew C Funk, Paul D Brazill, Katherine Tomlinson and Jim Harrington as well as a little something from myself called 'Breakfast TV'. Enjoy.

And here with some amazingly great news to share is Jake Hinkson. Let's hear all about it.

Let’s start with the obvious, is it weird to interview yourself?

I’m a big believer in conversational masturbation. I talk to myself on a daily basis. I was talking to myself a few minutes before I sat down to do this interview, and I’ll be talking to myself after it’s done. It is odd to do it in writing, though.

Right now is a busy time for you. Tell the roiling masses the big news.

The big news is that I’ve just signed on to publish my first novel, Hell On Church Street, with New Pulp Press. We’re looking at a release in January 2012.

How did that come about?

I like a lot of what they’ve done in the past—The Disassembled Man by Nate Flexer, the Gil Brewer reprints—so I decided to send them something. I had this novel, and it seemed like such a good fit for what they’re doing.

What’s the novel about?

The youth minister at a Baptist church begins an inappropriate relationship with his preacher’s teenaged daughter. When the town’s corrupt local sheriff finds out about it and tries to blackmail him, murder and chaos ensue.

So something light and airy?

It’s noir for sure. As dark as the human soul.

Is it a critique of mainstream religion? A condemnation of professional clergy? A rage-filled attack on the hypocrisy of the self-righteous?

Next question please.

Come on, Hinkson.

Here’s how I think it breaks down: Some clergymen are deeply admirable people. Some are lazy, second-rate conmen hiding behind a title. And some are monsters. I write about the conmen and monsters.

What’s your back story?

I was born and raised in Arkansas, the buckle of the Bible belt. I came from a very religious family, and we lived for a while on a religious campground tucked away deep in the Ozark mountains. So I grew up in an environment where the phrase “Jesus Freak” was a badge of honor. I was like a Flannery O’Connor character. Now, that’s as far as you can get from the mean streets, but at the same time I always had a weird attraction to the hardboiled stuff.

Like what? What was the first hardboiled writing you came across?

Spillane.

What can you remember of those books?

Vengeance is Mine begins, “The guy was dead as hell.” I loved that. Spillane once said, “Your first lines sells the book, and your last line sells the next book.” Eventually, I outgrew Spillane—once I discovered Hammet, and then Chandler, and through them, Parker. For my money, Robert B. Parker was one of the great American entertainers. I don’t write like him—I write noir and he wrote pop adventure-mysteries—but he’s one of my heroes.

How can he be a hero if you don’t want to emulate him?

Parker was, I think, essentially an optimist about human nature. I’m essentially a pessimist. But I love his optimism precisely because I lack it myself. Spenser was Parker’s idea of the perfect man. He’s pretty much my idea of a perfect man, too. But I don’t write about perfect people. I tried, and I can’t.

So how would you describe what you do?

Noir.

Which you would define how?

Transgression and ruination.

I hear the smack of Calvinist theology there.

I think it’s an intrinsic part of noir: crime and punishment. The pleasure of sin and the agony of consequence. I don’t know if that’s exclusively Calvinist or not, because if you look back at the development of noir—both in literature and in film—there was a code that mandated that the criminal be brought to justice. In America, there’s a religious undercurrent to damn near everything, and that applies to crime fiction as well. We dig transgression but we want to see it punished as well.

Which brings us to Thompson and O’Connor.

If Jim Thompson had knocked up Flannery O’Connor in a cheap Ozark motel, I’d be their offspring. Between his godless Oklahoma and her Christ-haunted Georgia sits the tormented terrain of my sweaty little slice of Arkansas.

Do you write rural noir?

Depends on the story. Someone commenting online on one of my stories called it “hillbilly hardboiled.” I love that term, and I’ve certainly written stuff that fits into that genre. But I haven’t lived in Arkansas for ten years now. I was in DC for the last few years, and I’ve spent a lot of time in Chicago, Philadelphia, San Francisco, New York. And now I live, of all places, in suburban Jersey. All that experience goes into the hopper. So I don’t know what it makes me. It’s not that I’ve replaced my rural roots—I couldn’t and I wouldn’t—but I’ve added volumes and variety to my store of material. I’m working on a novel right now that’s set in DC. Nothing rural about it.

And for the last two years or so you’ve been working on a guidebook to film noir. By all means, tell us more about this magnum opus.

It’s a collection of essays, 365 days of film noir. Full length essays on 365 films. Knowledgeable and well researched, but irreverent and fun. There are a lot of guides out there, but this one will be unique in its tone and perspective. One man—one distinct voice—transversing the bullet-riddled corpus of film noir. It’s a guide book so it’ll have the functionality of a guide book (in other words, it’ll help you figure out what to Netflix first), but it’s not a bunch of capsule reviews. It’s a collection of essays, each essay giving you a sense of the film but it also focusing on a different aspect.

So for example…

I talk about Robert Mitchum as a symbolic child molester in The Night of the Hunter. I talk about the post-war fear of disease in The Killer That Stalked New York. I highlight largely forgotten films like Too Late for Tears and Roadblock. I focus on different personalities like the tormented writer Cornell Woolrich, the massively underrated Norman Foster, and the scrappy journeyman director Felix E. Feist. I also make a pretty strong case that Lizabeth Scott is the true Queen of Noir.

How far along are you?

Over halfway. I’ve watched a shitload of films noir. I’ll watch a shitload more. I’m not in a rush. It’s the most fun I’ve ever had on a project. I’ve gone from being a well adjusted man to being someone who can’t stop thinking about Robert Siodmak’s camera angles.

So do you consider yourself primarily a fiction writer or a non-fiction writer?

I’m a writer. Fiction and nonfiction are just different expressions of the same impulse. Both are acts of creation. Both are about looking at the world. Nonfiction is about holding up a subject (a movie, a person, an experience) and examining it, figuring out what it is and how it works. Fiction is about taking a lot of elements from life and art, scrambling them into a mix, and letting your imagination take over. It is, in its way, much like talking to yourself—a dance between your conscious and unconscious.

And that seems to bring us full circle.

So BOOKLESS NO MORE.

Nice one, Jake.

http://thenighteditor.blogspot.com/

Dancing By Myself: SIMON LELIC interviews SIMON LELIC

Anonymous-9 wrote a story a while back called Hard Bite. It's now been turned into a novel which is working its way through the pipeline. Col Bury has offered us a review of the short story, published at Beat To A Pulp a while ago, in order to whet our appetites. It'll be worth adding the site to your favourites as I think there'll be more short story reviews to take a look at in the near future.

I'm also really pleased to be part of Patti Abbott's series How I Came To Write This Story . Finding out where stories come from is fascinating and I hope you find it so if you go for a visit. The story concerned is Into Thin Air which was brought to life on Friday last and it's one of the few whose provenance I can actually explain.

I used to write a lot more poetry than I do now. It was a way of putting down markers for my life as, for some reason, writing something around an experience is the best way for me to keep hold of it even if the actual moment or event only provides the seed. A poem or story is more evocative than a photo or my mind alone every single time. It was nice, therefore, to remember some happy times by writing for Pattinase.

Thanks to Patti for having me; I always feel like I've achieved something when I see something by me at a site like hers and it really helps to boost my writing energy levels when I do.

And for today's visitor at Sea Minor, the very entertaining Simon Lelic.

Welcome Simon.


I know you. You write novels. What was that book? Rapture. No. The Rupture. No. What was it?

Er, Rupture, actually. Just Rupture. I think a lot of people confuse it with The Rapture, by Liz Jensen, which was published around the same time and was actually a really great novel. Quite different from mine but brilliantly written and –

Oh. Maybe I don’t know you. So who are you?

I’m Simon. Simon Lelic. I wrote Rupture. Also, The Facility, which has just been published by –

The what? The Faculty?

No. Ha. You see, that’s another mistake people have been making. It’s my fault really. Rupture, you see, is set largely in a school but The Facility has nothing whatsoever to do with –

So what’s it about?

The Facility? It’s set in the near future. It’s about . . . Let’s see. It’s a dystopian story about a society obsessed with security at any cost. It follows four characters, mainly. There’s Arthur, a dentist, who finds himself imprisoned and isn’t told why. Then there’s Julia, his wife, and a journalist, Tom Clarke, who are trying to find him. And Henry Graves is the government official in charge of the prison: the facility, you see, which is where the book’s title –

Not that one. The other one. Ruptured.

Rupture, you mean.

That’s what I said.

Um, OK. Well, Rupture is about a school shooting. Bullying, too. There’s a teacher, Samuel, and he shoots and kills three children and a colleague, and Detective Inspector Lucia May is the young policewoman who’s trying to get to the bottom of why Samuel did what he –

Policewoman? So it’s crime then. I don’t like crime.

Well it’s not crime as such. I mean, it is, sort of, but –

Is it or isn’t it?

Um, well, it’s difficult to say. I didn’t start out with the intention of writing a crime novel but there is a crime, certainly, and there’s a detective inspector as the main character and if you go to your local bookshop you might actually find it in the crime section. Really, though, it’s more of a whydunnit than a –

It’s crime. It sounds like crime. I told you, I don’t like crime.

No. OK. Fair enough.

What about The Faculty?

The Facility. What about it?

Is that crime too?

No, actually. It’s more of a thriller, if anything. So quite different from Rupture, although the two books do share certain thematic –

A thriller? I like thrillers.

Oh good.

Some of them anyway. Not ones with crime in them. Where’s this booze then?

This what?

The booze. I was told there’d be booze.

I . . . I’m not sure. I could ask, if you like. That chap over there looks like he –

So when’s it out?

When’s what out?

This film or whatever. The Ruptured.

Rupture, you mean? Or The Facility? They’re books, actually, and they’re out now. Although there’s a production company working on an adaptation of The Rupture. I mean, Rupture. It’s quite exciting, really. I would have thought it would be a tricky novel to translate on to screen but they seem quite confident that –

So when’s it out?

When’s what out?

The film!

Oh. Sorry. Um, you never really know with these things. I mean, it could be this year or it could be in five years’ time because until they actually start filming you never really know whether –

He’s got some! Him, look!

Who? Where?

That guy! The guy with the tray. Follow me!

Um, I think I’m actually OK for now. But, no, OK, ow, I’ll come, ow, I’m coming, I said I’m –

Where is he? I saw him. Where’d he go? They said there’d be booze. I’m only here for the booze.

I know. You said. So I take it you’re not particularly interested in –

There! There he is!

I see him. Careful. Mind the –

Hey! You! Scuse me. Scuse me. Hey! You!

Um, sorry. Sorry, um. I’m just following my . . . Sorry. Excuse me. Excuse –

Two! I’ll take two. One for me and one for my friend here. What did you say your name was? Liz something, right?

What? No, my name’s . . . Liz. Yes, that’s right. Call me Liz. But, wow, look at the time, I really should be –

What are you talking about? You’re not going anywhere! Come on, Liz, grab yourself another drink. I’ve got my hands full already.

Yes, I can see that. But really, I –

So. Books, huh. My missus bought be one for Christmas and it’s the funniest thing I’ve ever read. You’d love it, I promise. It’s about this meerkat . . .

Pass me that drink.

Rupture is published by Picador and is available now in paperback. The Facility is out now in Mantle hardback. For more information about Simon Lelic, visit www.simonlelic.com.

The Bastard Hand

The Bastard Hand, huh?

Got me to thinking about hands. I love them.

There's the amazing Nick Cave song Red Right Hand.

How about Cool Hand Luke and those 50 eggs?

The story of Left Hand, Right Hand in The Night Of The Hunter.

Maradona's Hand Of God

Max Bygraves

The Smiths Hand In Glove

The Adams Family have their very own.

JT Ellison's So Close The Hand Of Death

and Dead Man’s Hand

Well soon, very soon, New Pulp Press are putting out Heath Lowrance's Bastard Hand. Here's what's on it's way:

Book Description

Charlie Wesley is not right in the head. He’s escaped from a mental hospital up north and hitchhiked his way south, the voice of his dead brother urging him on. But when Charlie hits Memphis, the fine line between his delusions and reality shift in the form of the Reverend Phineas Childe—a preacher bent on booze and women; a Man of God with a dark agenda. Charlie is the perfect pawn in the Reverend’s game of retribution. And the small North Mississippi town of Cuba Landing will be the setting for the Reverend’s very personal Apocalypse. . . .

Advanced Praise

“In the storied waking-up-into-a-nightmare pulp tradition, Heath Lowrance’s The Bastard Hand reads is a lurid thrill. You will finish it in one frenzied sitting, then feel as if you’re awakening from a red-misted trance.”

—Megan Abbott, author of Bury Me Deep

"A bastard of a good book. If you like Flannery O'Connor and Jim Thompson, you're going to love this."

—Allan Guthrie, author of Slammer

"Reverend Childe is a terrific pulp creation, and this wild, crazy book could've sat next to the Gold-Medal pulps of Charles Williams and Harry Whittington if those two were only popping LSD back then."

—Dave Zeltserman, author of Outsourced


“Mean, tough, lurid, intense, and entirely engaging, this novel is a must read for all fans of the hardboiled genre.”

—Vincent Zandri, author of Moonlight Falls

If that doesn't have you salivating, I guess you're short of a couple of glands. I recommend surgery.

http://nigelpbird.blogspot.com/2010/11/dancing-with-myself-heath-lowrance.html

Dancing with Myself: JOHANNA SINISALO interviews JOHANNA SINISALO

One of the finest short story anthologies to be put out last year was Beat To A Pulp: Round One. I'd recommend it as one of the 'must have' items for your Kindle device.

I've also had a new story released today by the ever-growing Untreedreads. It's a short, existential romance set in Denmark called Into Thin Air.

And today when on the first floor of a building and requiring the lift/elevator to take a trolley down on, I set off down the stairs to go and get it. A colleague pointed out, rather nicely, that all I had to do was press the botton. The things that fox my mind are scary when you think about it.

A Scandinavian theme for today's interview, folks, as I introduce you to Johana Sinisalo, Sin for short.

And who do you think you are?

I’m a Finnish writer.

Q: Oh, another hack from an obscure country with a tongue-twisting language that about a dozen people speak. Ever been translated into any civilized languages?

A: Actually, yes. There are even some titles available in English – my first novel Not Before Sundown, which in the USA was published as Troll – A Love Story, and my latest novel, Birdbrain. There are some translated short stories published here and there in English, too, mostly in anthologies. So far, Not Before Sundown has been translated into 12 languages and at least three more translations are under way. And a novelette of mine, Baby Doll, attracted some nice attention in France and the USA.

Hey, I happen to know that the literary language barrier is almost impossible to cross when you come from some small, exotic country like Finland. In the Anglo book market, fiction and non-fiction translations represent only about 3 % of all titles published. And that 3 % includes ALL other languages but English - biggies like French, Spanish, Chinese, you name it. A Finnish writer shouldn’t have a snowball’s chance in hell.

I agree. I was just lucky enough to win the Finlandia Prize, our national award for novels that is something like the Finnish Booker, and so some foreign publishing
houses got interested in my work. And the language barrier seems to be a bit less sturdy nowadays – some Finnish writers, like Elina Hirvonen and Sofi Oksanen, have been introduced to the English language market with a very good reception.

Did you get any feedback, like that ”nice attention” you mentioned concerning your novelette, whatever that is?

I got some very nice reviews, especially in USA, for Troll. But I was most delighted when Troll – A Love Story got the James Tiptree Jr. Award in the US in 2004. That kind of thing happens to foreign books there, well, almost never. And that particular novelette I mentioned was shortlisted for the Nebula Award in 2009 and was published in the Year’s Best Science Fiction selection. Translated works are rare birds in those circles.

Ahh. I smell a rat. Tiptree, Nebula, those words ring a bell... Another of those skiffy foilhats, aren’t you?

Actually, I do not believe in genre definitions. My goal is to tell a story and make a point with it. The chosen genre is nothing more than a tool. Sometimes it’s most effective to make a point when you choose to build the story with horror genre elements, and sometimes the plain ol’ realism works best. Usually I am a happy genreblender, and I don’t give a damn if the people in bookshops are confused on which shelf the book should be placed. Although my books are not directly aimed to the science fiction and fantasy audience, I sure am glad they embrace them. But you do not have to be a skiffy foilhat to enjoy my books. (BTW, if you are interested in Finnish fantastic or cross-genre works, go and shop for The Dedalus Book of Finnish Fantasy, edited by yours truly.)

You mentioned that you want to "make a point” with your stories. What, are you some kind of finger-wagging preacher?

Let’s put it in this way. A good story is the main goal. You have to make the reader care about your characters and keep up the readers’ interest in what happens to them. But, in the end, it would be awfully nice if the reader had this obscure feeling that some thought processes were actually involved.

And what are those themes you want to wag your finger about?

Environmental issues are quite important to me. For example, in Not Before Sundown I developed the idea that trolls are not mythological creatures but real wild animals, and used that to tell a culture/nature clash story. Also equality in all its aspects...

A-ha! I smell another rat! A foilhat AND a damn feminist!

Yes.

Why should I read anything written by you?

Because I’m so darn good. Boston Globe called my novel "brilliant”. Who am I to question their taste?

Future plans?

Yes, I am currently writing a new novel. Its working title could be translated roughly as "Of Blood of Angels”. And, because our ten questions are now up, I can’t tell you what it is all about. And that suits me well, too, because I do never discuss uncompleted works in public, anyway. Serves you right for being such a bitch. (Nyah nyah.)

http://www.bookslut.com/fiction/2005_02_004371.php

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Not-Before-Sundown-Johanna-Sinisalo/dp/0720611717

Dancing With Myself: DOUGLAS LINDSAY interviews DOUGLAS LINDSAY

Last week I found myself up the Amazon without a paddle. Sometimes I wasn't sure if I even had a boat. The piranhas came in their droves and took their huge chunks of flesh and what did I do? Put myself back into the water. Next time I'll be keeping my feet on dry land.

It was nice, then, to get a lovely review from Paul Blackburn at EURO CRIME at the weekend. Paul, it mentions you're in Scotland so if you're ever Dunbar way, I'll buy you a drink.

One man who'se been kicking against the pricks for a while now is Stephen Leather. He's come in for a lot of stick from those piranhas, but he's managed to get his own back by becoming Mr Kindle here in the UK.

Last week he sent me some comforting words and advised me to ignore the 'trolls' as I believe they're called. To me trolls is too positive a term; it seems like a nice way of saying mean-spirited, bitter and angry people who have no care for the feelings of others.

He also supported the ebook I've put out with a class of 6 year-old children from my school (Jack And The Giant , stil only 71p and all proceeds to the Save The Children charity) by posting about them in the US and then making a donation to the cause with a cheque and a book. You can imagine just how delighted the children were to hear from a famous author. More information is available from the P2P blog. And to think this is Tranent we're talking about. Way to go kids.

Thanks, Stephen.

I'm hoping that he'll be coming along here to dance with himself when he's a little less busy than he is now.

I do have a great interview for you here today, so here's Douglas Lindsay to show you a few moves of his very own.

Good to have you Doug.

1. This is a bit strange. Are you excited about getting to ask yourself questions, rather than being asked by someone who's not necessarily interested in your work?

Well, I have a guy who works as Head of Marketing at Long Midnight Publishing called Elvis Shackleton, and sometimes he gets interviewed on my website by another guy who works at LMP, called Eldon Crayfish, but weirdly neither of these men actually exist; it's just me interviewing myself. So I have previous.

2. Don't you think that's slightly narcissistic? Or psychotic even?

Not sure. You'd have to ask Elvis.

3. You talk about your company Long Midnight Publishing a lot, referring to it as your own imprint. But really, aren't you just a self-publisher, and as such on a par with the uruk-hai in The Lord Of The Rings?

Pretty much. Although I'm not as good with women as some of those fellows.

4. Would you ditch the company and sign up to another publisher if you had the chance?

I carry a pen with me at all times so that I'm in a position to sign any contract that's placed in front of me.

5. Yet, surely there must be some benefit to publishing your own books?

Well, you get control of the cover, release date, blurb, all that kind of thing. The time frames are short. I can decide to publish and then release a work of fiction in the kind of time that mainstream publishing reserves for biographies of newly-dead celebrities. My latest, 21 Years On The Back of Dixie Klondyke's Spanish Guitar for example. Decided to publish it in mid-October. On the shelves, first week in December. It was, I should add, already written before I made the decision. And the question, of course, is how many shelves is it on?

6. It sounds terribly exciting and seat of your pants, a life of exotic publishing derring-do. Freedom to walk the publishing earth and get in adventures.

Doesn't it? It's just not for me. Really, I just want to go and sit at a table looking out at the sea, a steaming mug of tea beside me, sheathed in melancholy, writing books that I then send to an editor who either a) lavishes me with praise, or b) tells me it's shit, and what re-writes they think are required, but most of all c) pays me and publishes the book so I don't have to.

7. So, are you weighed down and crushed by an all-encompassing sense of failure at your inability to achieve any kind of mainstream popularity in the world of crime fiction?

Yes.

8. Time to do something else perhaps?

I currently have an application in for Astronaut School. Of course, I'm scared of heights, confined spaces and great speed, and even the slightest hint of dizziness makes me vomit, so I'm not sure I'm doing the right thing.

9. I meant, write something else. Non-fiction for example. Magazine articles or a guide on how not to bring up two kids or Nietzsche v Kierkegaard or romance or erotica or a history of Meadowbank Thistle?

To be honest, most of those subjects are covered in an average Barney Thomson novel.

10. So, inevitably we come to Barney Thomson . Have we seen the end of the world's last barbershop death junky?

Maybe. Maybe not. The series is at a stage where it can pretty much be about anything. Comedy, horror, serial killers, political satire... It's fun and easy to write. I like to try other things - such as not writing, and just sitting at the kitchen table drinking coffee and eating cake - but eventually I can see myself getting lured back to Barney. I currently write a 140-character Barney novel on Twitter every day, so we still each other, even though it's on a more casual basis.

OK talent scouts, you heard the man - he's carrying a pen. What are you waiting for? If you need more comfort before getting him to sign, go to:

http://www.barney-thomson.com/blog.asp

Apostle Rising by Richard Godwin

Richard Godwin is a prolific writer of short fiction. Of course prolific doesn’t necessarily mean good, but in Godwin’s case he never puts a foot wrong.

I’ve loved his short stories and the way he constructs them. He makes me look into the darkness for a few seconds more than I’d like until I see what it is he wants me to see and he holds my attention at places where I might rather be skimming into easier territories.

He also has an amazing versatility in terms of the settings, characters and voices he uses as though he’s some kind of twisted ventriloquist.

My only reservation about tackling his debut novel Apostle Rising was that he wouldn’t be able to transfer his talent from the short piece to the long. It didn’t take me long to realise that there was no problem for him on that score.

He handles the police-procedural aspect of things as though this were the tenth in a series, with a craft and poise I hadn’t expected. At the same time he dips us into the bloodbath of his darker-workings just to let us know he’s still around.

‘Apostle Rising ’ is like a massive Venn diagram of plots that are fitted together skilfully to produce one very satisfying whole.

Detective Chief Inspector Frank Castle is a long in the tooth policeman who was damaged years before by a series of murders known as ‘The Woodland Killings’. His life is spinning out of control as alcohol obscures his memories from his waking life only to drag them into his dreams. His side-kick DI Jacki Stone who knows Castle is good at his job also knows he’s a poor role model as a human being. The way their characters are drawn I reckon I could have read about them working any-old case and enjoyed it. Make their case a copycat of The Woodland Killings, throw in the twisted cult leader Karl Black and his training of a band of extremist believers and add a host of slayings of political figures and you’re in for a treat.

Just like in his short stories, Godwin has you staring at things you’d rather look away from at times as though he’s holding your head in one direction with one hand and your eye-lids up with the other. It gets messy out there – brutally so. It also becomes psychologically disturbing as we see Karl Black work his way into the minds of Castle and Stone. There’s nowhere to run once your inside and there’s not going to be a way out until you get to the end, Godwin’s new twist on the term page-turner.

A word of warning. This isn't for readers who are turned off by the more graphic depictions of violence. If that's not you, you have yourself a great read.

Dancing With Myself: HELEN FITZGERALD interviews HELEN FITZGERALD

Brian Lindenmuth described Helen Fitzgerald as Allan Guthrie with ovaries. What a tag that is.

I’m interviewing myself at my desk in Hope Street Studios in Glasgow, a genius space for creative types, the brainchild of colourist Jamie Grant. Artists, fashion designers and novelists shame each other into working here and offer friendly and unpretentious water cooler conversations to those who would otherwise rot away in their lonesome attic spaces at home. Love it.

What, I ask myself, am I working on at the moment?

After an unproductive 2010 - for some reason my thinking powers took an extended holiday - I am bursting with ideas and in full swing again. Today I've been working on my next adult book, as yet untitled. My son disapproves of the idea for this book wholeheartedly as it sounds darker and sadder and more twisted that the four already published. He asked me to write something with joy in it. I told him I will, but she will die horribly.

I've also been working on a radio play idea based on the donor my fifth book, published this July by Faber and Faber and on feature articles to promote the book. I’m hoping my new room-mate, Lesley McDowell, will inspire me in relation to the latter, as she’s an experienced journalist and author. Also hoping my other room-mate, designer Camille will make some clothes that make me look younger than 153.

In a few weeks, my husband (Sergio Casci) and I will do another draft of the screenplay for The Devil’s Staircase,as we’ve now got Aussie producers (MacGowan Films) co-producing with Synchronicity Films. When I say another draft, I mean we’re upping the thriller element, and when I say “my husband and I” I mean “my husband”. I’ll make the coffee and Aussify it with references to cheesles, chocolate teddy bear biscuits, eucalyptus trees and words like daggy. We also have the excellent job of watching a pile of Aussie films to check out potential directors and cast.

So, Helen, Does the writing process change once you’ve written several books?

It does actually Helen. It becomes less fun. I suppose I know I can reach the end of a story now, so the surprise (OMG I am an utter genius) element has gone. Also, I know exactly how much work is involved – a lot – and a slight feeling of dread enters the scene when I set to work. I find myself wondering: Am I ready to think about nothing else for six to twelve months? To fall asleep, dream, and spend all day thinking about it? Do I have the stamina? Do I have enough ideas?

Which brings me to my next question: Where has the idea for the next book come from?

The next book is set down under. I’ve wanted to do this for a while, but hadn’t found the right story. This one’s about a couple who accidentally kill their baby. Without realising it, both parents have given the newborn painkillers on the long haul flight from Scotland to keep him sedated, and discover he is dead as they drive from Melbourne to Geelong. For many reasons, they decide to cover it up. Not surprisingly, this cover-up is a bad idea. I’m writing it from the POV of the parents, and hope that the reader feels some sympathy for them as the situation unfolds and escalates.

What has surprised you about being a full time writer?

Several things. The amount of work I have to do to promote myself, for example. I hadn’t used the Internet much beforehand, and now find myself navigating the terrifying world of facebook, twitter, blogs and podcasts. I’ve always been scared of spiders, and I feel like the hairy legs



of the Internet have invaded my life. Gotta get with it, though, and am attending a day in Edinburgh this week, organised by my agent at Jenny Brown Associates, which is designed to help authors promote themselves online. At first, I had a bit of an addiction to Amazon rankings and self-googling. That has subsided now. If anything, I avoid it, even though I do have a much thicker skin than I used to have.

The other aspect that has surprised me is how supportive and fun the writing world is in Glasgow and in the international world of crime fiction. I’ve met so many writers, made so many friends, and finally feel I am in the right job, with the right colleagues. NB: Crime writers are the best - unpretentious, a good laugh, non-competitive, generous and helpful.

Now, back to that twisted novel. Ideas for titles welcome (Best suggestion so far is from my hairdresser - THE NAP).