The launch of Death of an Avid Reader will be on Saturday, 4 October at 11 a.m. in the historic Leeds Library, 18 Commercial Street, Leeds LS1 6AL. The oldest surviving subscription library in the country, it was established in 1768 and has made its home on Commercial Street since…
Last weekend I had the pleasure of staying in Dinan, a medieval walled town in Brittany, France, during the biennial medieval festival. Having hired a costume from the West Yorkshire Playhouse wardrobe department (what a fabulous selection) I was able to enter into the spirit of the celebrations. The small…
One of the pleasures of writing is being able to stop sometimes and take a jaunt. The recent jaunt was to London to meet my agent, editor and publicist on Monday last. I arrived early, two days early, so as to do a little swanning about town, otherwise known as…
The Malice Domestic Convention in Bethesda, Maryland provides a watering hole for readers, writers and fans and of the traditional mystery to gather, celebrate this broad genre and generally have a good time. It’s always a pleasure to meet readers and since mystery fans like to travel, there were friends…
A National Trust pamphlet describes Coleton Fishacre as ‘the spirit of the Jazz Age on a Devon cliff.’ Light, airy and spacious with fabulous gardens that lead down to Pudcombe Cove, the house was built in 1923-6 for Rupert D’Oyly Carte and his wife Lady Dorothy. He was the son…
Last week, I visited Devon. One of the places I wanted to see was Agatha Christie’s holiday home, Greenway, bought in 1938. Locations around Greenway Estate feature in several of her novels. Dead Man’s Folly, the final episode of Poirot, was filmed there. The estate is owned by the National…
In May, I’ll be attending the Malice Domestic Convention in Bethesda, Maryland. This year, Malice remembers Reginald Hill who died on 12 January, 2012. Special guest Martin Edwards has been invited to accept the commemorative award. Reginald Hill was such a good writer that unless one has read everything he…
Belatedly wishing Kate Shackleton’s friends and mine a very happy New Year! I’m surprised to see that I haven’t written on these pages since November. Time flies when a deadline looms. Death of an Avid Reader, book number six in the Kate Shackleton series, went to the publisher on Monday,…
Gladys Mitchell (1910-1983) wrote 66 novels featuring her detective Mrs Beatrice Adela Lestrange Bradley, a psychoanalyst with a brilliant mind, incisive views and an unorthodox view of crime and punishment. A member of the Detection Club, Mitchell was ranked alongside Agatha Christie and Dorothy L Sayers. Unlike Christie and Sayers,…
The Fiction Addiction Rafflecopter has selected two winners for signed copies of Murder on a Summer’s Day. Congratulations to Karen C of Essex and Rosemarie C of Lincolnshire: Fiction Addiction
