5 more things I learned from TV (and the movies)
Last week’s blog sparked some interesting responses. So many of you got back to me with what you yourselves had learned from TV and the movies, that this week I’m adding five more. Obviously, I’m…
10 things I learned from the movies and TV
We’ve all learned from the movies. Films and TV shows are a faithful reproduction of real life, aren’t they? After a year or more locked away for our own safety, even more of what we…
Read Catch-22 for free
We know that the Internet thrives on free information. As the saying goes, “Information wants to be free.” But I was still surprised by what I found when I began writing my book on free…
Alexei Sayle without the drunken lunches
In 2007, Channel 4 viewers voted Alexei Sayle the 18th greatest stand-up comic of all time. A feature of the alternative comedy circuit from the 1980s, he’s been a stand-up comedian, film actor, television presenter, Shakespearean…
Nine long years for Julian Assange
Watch now Eleven years ago, Julian Assange published the first of a series of leaks from American military intelligence, showing a US gunship killing civilians and journalists in Iraq. Nine years ago he took refuge…
Foul Play – a murder mystery in your own home
Those of you who have been hanging on my every blog will remember that two years ago I braved a country house murder mystery evening in Morecambe, run by the creators of the crime festival…
Putting on the squeeze. Review: Squeeze Me by Carl Hiaasen
What’s a poor author to do? You write a comic novel that satirises the orange blob in the White House and no sooner is it in print than he’s gone. Carl Hiaasen is one of…
Get best-seller Room 15 for just 99p/99c this week
Fed up with the virus? Bloodhound Books are promoting my amnesia thriller Room 15 for 99p/99c just this week. Room 15 is a psychological thriller about a police detective who has amnesia and believes he…
Why are books and movies fascinated by forgetting?
Is it me, or are novels and movies fascinated by forgetting? This century, amnesia is very in. I was invited to talk about this and my new amnesia-based psychological thriller Room 15 at Milim Leeds…
Why I love writing thrillers
My twice award-nominated noir thriller The Breaking of Liam Glass officially comes out in its second edition today. And I’m delighted to announce the winner of this week’s competition for a signed hardback souvenir edition…
Win a personally signed hardback copy of The Breaking of Liam Glass
To celebrate the launch of the second edition of my 5* darkly humorous thriller The Breaking of Liam Glass, I’m delighted to give away one of the very first hardback copies, which I’ll sign to…
Fight club: Review of Lionel Shriver’s The Motion of the Body Through Space
Bestselling author Lionel Shriver is not one to run away from a fight. In her latest novel, she runs full tilt towards it, in just about every sense of the word. This week, I’m looking…
Interview: Sam Blake #1 bestselling author
This week I’m talking to bestselling author Sam Blake. Originally from St. Albans in Hertfordshire, Sam has two teenagers, three cats and lives in a 200-year-old cottage at the foot of the Wicklow mountains with…
Breaking bad? Review of Graham Greene’s Travels with My Aunt
I’m very into re-reading at the moment (if you’re interested there’s a great article on the subject by novelist Richard Bradbury) but this week’s review is of a book I re-read by accident. To be…
Crime wave caught on camera
Today’s story is a crime story with everything a good crime story needs: An idyllic setting, a crime wave, missing bodies, mystery, violence in the dead of night, a criminal unmasked. To begin at the…
Will you be gripped by The Singapore Grip? Review
As disaster looms, the incompetents in charge can offer only complacency, arrogance and grandiosity. Sounds familiar? But this isn’t Covid-19, it’s Singapore in the Second World War. Based on an acclaimed satirical novel, the glossy…
Room 15 out today
It’s here. Publication day for Room 15 – psychological mystery thriller. And to celebrate the day Bloodhound Books have reduced the ebook price for a very short time to 99p/99c. Already the novel is rising…
Room 15 launch competition
Room 15 is almost here. Publication day arrives tomorrow – Monday July 27 2020 – and as promised I have a launch competition for you. Because sales in the first week are so important to…