2016 - People and Places

Each year brings its ups and downs as well as many unforgettable moments. For me, 2016 has been a wonderful twelve months, but before reflecting on some of the lovely people I've spent time with, and some of the fantastic places I've visited, allow me to pause and remember some old friends who died this year, including fellow crime writers Stuart Pawson and Tim Heald. I've happy memories of both of them; not least driving around Arizona with Stuart and his wife Doreen (she took the above photo of Stuart and me) and spending a bizarre but convivial weekend with Tim at a book festival to which hardly anyone came.

This year I've taken part in events to which quite a lot of people did come, in the company of a fascinating range of people - John Simenon, son of Georges, at the Essex Book Festival, for instance, and Kate Summerscale, Simon Brett and James Runcie at the London Library's 175th anniversary celebration, while Mark Lawson interviewed  Ann Cleeves and me at the British Library. I've given talks at libraries in Cheshire and Nottinghamshire, as well as hosting a murder mystery evening in North Wales and giving an after-lunch talk to the Margery Allingham Society. The CWA's conference at Norwich was not only convivial; it gave me the chance to fulfil an ambition of taking a boat trip on the Norfolk Broads. Each event had its own character; each was pleasurable. And having met John, it was especially amusing to share a seat with a statue of his father when on the Simenon trail in Liege a few months later.

Further afield, I've met up with old friends at Malice Domestic in Bethesda and at the New Orleans Bouchercon. And I've made a number of lovely new friends, including Shelly Dickson Carr, grand-daughter of the king of the locked room mystery, and Cathy Ace, born in Wales but resident in Canada, another writer of distinction. One of the most surreal moments of the year was joining up with Ali Karim and Mike Stotter on a flight from Atlanta and then taking a stretch limo from the airport to the Bouchercon hotel. Amazingly, it was cheaper than the regular transport. Only in New Orleans, I guess...

Through my involvement with the British Library, I've attended some terrific exhibitions and. I can strongly recommend the current exhibition on maps. A murder mystery weekend organised by Joy Swift in Stratford-on-Avon was great fun - Joy's events are also a must if you love interactive mysteries. As for seeing Burt Bacharach and Joss  Stone on stage at the Royal Festival Hall in the summer, it was a special treat. So were a birthday trip on a steam train in Llangollen, and a climb up to the limestone pavement at the top of Malham Cove on a sunny day which ended with a Yorkshire supper at Betty's Tea Room in Ilkley, where I gave a talk about Gil North's Sergeant Cluff.

Quite apart from conventions, I've done a lot of travelling, to places as varied as Antigua, Avignon, and Antwerp, Seville and St Thomas, Cordoba and Costa Rica, Brussels and Barbados, Stockholm and St Maarten, Panama and Puerto Rico. I've eaten in one of the late Stieg Larsson's favourite dining spots, been a guest of Janet Hutchings at Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine brunch in Bethesda, drinks party in New York, and dinner in New Orleands, as well as sharing a dinner table with Lee Child, Val McDermid and Andrew Taylor in Oxford. Nobody's lucky all the time, but I've certainly had a huge amount of good fortune this past year. Believe me, I'm grateful for it. .

Cold Earth by Ann Cleeves

A couple of weeks ago, I spent an enjoyable evening at the British Library. Mark Lawson was interviewing Ann Cleeves and me on the topic of "the return of the Golden Age of crime fiction". Ann is a contemporary writer working in the vein of the traditional mystery, and very successfully too. She talked about her take on Golden Age writers - though she's not such a fan of Agatha Christie as I am, for instance - and about how, on occasion, there are GA elements in her work. An example is The Glass Room, a very good book featuring Vera Stanhope.

The event came, for her, at the end of a hectic tour promoting her new book, part of the Jimmy Perez series this time, Cold Earth, which is published by Pan Macmillan. This is her 30th novel, and Maura, her publicist, arranged as a surprise a video with contributions from a wide range of writers, including Ian Rankin, Val McDermid and her colleagues in Murder Squad, congratulating her on the milestone. A nice touch. When recording my snippet, I took the opportunity to take a look again at her very first novel, which was certainly in the GA tradition, and it was pleasant to reflect on the progress she's made since those early days.

In Cold Earth, excellent thematic use is made both at the start and the end of the story of earth as a powerful elemental force. The book opens vividly with a landslide on Shetland which coincides with the funeral of a character encountered previously in the series, and which causes considerable havoc. When rescue operations get under way, a body is discovered. But, surprise, surprise, the deceased did not die of natural causes. The corpse belongs to a woman, and there is some mystery about her true identity.

A key feature of the book is the development of the relationship between Perez and his boss Willow Reeve. In this story, we get a fuller picture than before of Willow s personality, and it is an appealing one. There is some debate - especially among people who like Golden Age fiction - about whether modern writers spend too much time on exploring the personal lives of our detectives. Some people prefer us simply to get on with the story.

I agree that one can over-do the tormented personal lives of one's detectives, but, like Ann, I find that the development of the detectives' lives is an integral part of a crime series. There is no reason in principle why this should prevent us from getting on with the story. Admittedly Poirot and Miss Marple never changed during their long careers, but look at the emphasis Dorothy L. Sayers laid on the evolving relationship between Harriet Vane and Lord Peter: she set the pattern that we follow today, I reckon. The key to success is to balance character, plot, and setting. This is easier said than done, but in Cold Earth, Ann does just that with her customary skill.;

A Night to Remember

Last Thursday evening was for me very special. The highpoint of my crime writing life, no less. For Thursday was when, during a wonderful occasion as the Dorchester Hotel, I became President of the Detection Club. Since 1930, there have only been seven previous Presidents, plus a co-president, Lord Gorell, who acted as a public speaker during the early years of Agatha Christie's nineteen year reign as President. My immediate predecessor was Simon Brett, who has served with distinction for the past fourteen years.

The first President, from 1930, was G.K. Chesterton - Sir Arthur Conan  Doyle was approached, but too infirm in the months before his death to accept. Chesterton was followed by E.C. Bentley, author of the book that really inaugurated the Golden Age of detective fiction, Trent's Last Case. Next came Dorothy L. Sayers, and when she died, Agatha Christie took over. After her death, Julian Symons became President; he was followed by another leading crime novelist and critic H.R.F.Keating, and then Harry handed over to Simon. As I said at the close of the installation ceremony, those are big shoes to fill. And there's a big presidential robe to fill, too! It was clearly designed, as Simon noted, to accommodate the well-upholstered Chesterton

A very happy feature of the evening was that we had the largest turn-out for a Detection Club event for many years. Those attending included Harry's widow Sheila, Jessica Mann (who was the Club Secretary for several years), the eminent journalist Katherine Whitehorn, and a host of distinguished novelists including Andrew Taylor and N.J. Cooper. The guest speaker was Mark Lawson, himself a novelist of note, as well as a leading cultural critic and commentator. He spoke movingly and well about a trio of recently departed crime writers, P.D. James, Ruth Rendell, and Henning Mankell, and we also had a chat about The Golden Age of Murder, which he reviewed very generously some months ago.

The Detection Club is a private, London-based dining club, no more, no less. But it has the distinction of being the first major social network for crime writers, and it played a significant part in the genre's development and its cultural heritage. And next year will see the publication of the first Detection Club novel for decades. This is The Sinking Admiral, a book which we thoroughly enjoyed putting together. I'm very glad to be part of the Club, and naturally I'm thrilled that the members have honoured me by asking me to take over from Simon. It's not something I ever anticipated, but I'm very, very glad that it's happened.

The Deaths by Mark Lawson - review

The Deaths, by Mark Lawson, is one of the most interesting books I read in 2013, and also the most thought-provoking. Although I've often listened to Lawson's radio programmes, and watched him on TV, I've never read his fiction before, although it's been clear for a long time that he's very interested in the crime genre. The Deaths is a book about crime, but it's also a mainstream novel, rather than avowedly a genre work.

That said, the central plot gimmick is one that was (to the best of my knowledge) dreamed up by Anthony Berkeley in the Golden Age of detective fiction. This is a "whowasdunin", when we know that murder has been committed, right from the outset - the opening line is "The deaths are discovered because of the country's sudden obsession with perfect coffee" - but are left to guess who the victims are, as well as whodunit.

This is a book set in the aftermath of the financial crisis, and focuses on four wealthy couples who live cheek by jowl, and whose apparently charmed lives are just about to turn rather unpleasant. There is a great deal of social comedy in this book, with some very funny lines, and acute observations. I struggled to like the characters, I must say, and it may be that Lawson overdoes their odiousness, but this is a gripping story which kept me fascinated from start to finish.

I have one or two quibbles. The idea that a PR guy would be sent out to negotiate a severance deal with a departing bank boss struck me as incredible,but then again, this book was not aimed at employment lawyers. I also wasn't convinced by some aspects of the life and career of one character who is a barrister. These points nagged at me, because it would have been easy to avoid them,but in the overall scheme of things, they didn't matter much. I've enjoyed discussing The Debts with someone else who has read it, and although in this post I'm keen to avoid spoilers, I can recommend it with confidence that others will enjoy it as much as I did..

Sherlock: The Sign of Three - BBC 1 TV review

Sherlock returned in double-quick time tonight with another nicely titled episode, The Sign of Three,which saw Watson (Martin Freeman) marry Mary Morstan (his real life partner, Amanda Abbington). Much as I've enjoyed previous episodes in the series, I think this is the one I've relished most. It was crammed with good things, and above all, it was great fun. That matters, because the central point about Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes stories is that they were great fun, and all the best detective fiction (whatever its other virtues may be) is highly entertaining..

I love the way the writers take aspects both of the Conan Doyle stories, and detective fiction from the Golden Age, and refresh them, cleverly and wittily. Tonight, for instance, we had a "locked room" mystery, countless neat deductions, an idea borrowed from Agatha Christie (a murder committed by way of rehearsal) and a plot line founded on Dorothy L. Sayers' theory that Watson's middle name was Hamish. Great stuff.

Mark Lawson wrote a fascinating piece in The Guardian the other day, ruminating on the festive season episodes of Doctor Who and Sherlock, from the prolific and talented Steven Moffat and Mark Gatiss, and the way that fan speculation (on blogs, for instance) seems to have influenced the writing. Like me, Lawson admires their achievements, but suggested that one risk of the writers' approach is that they cater increasingly for the more diehard series fans, rather than the typical viewer. His point is well-argued, but I think it is more persuasive in the case of Doctor Who than Sherlock. It seems to me that detective fiction tends to be more structured than sci-fi, and tends by its nature to impose rather more discipline on the writer.Much as I enjoy Doctor Who, I feel sometimes that the stories tip over into self-referential self-indulgence (and this was my feeling about the Christmas special), whereas in Sherlock, the self-indulgence which is undoubtedly present does not get in the way of the story.

Part of the cleverness of The Empty Hearse lay in the multiple solutions to the mystery of Sherlock's survival, and this device was not just a nod to fan obsessions but also, and more significantly, to the Golden Age tradition of multiple ingenious solutions to a given mystery. Anthony Berkeley was the master when it came to multiple solutions, but Agatha Christie, the excellent John Dickson Carr and others (including, in one wonderful post-modern take on the Golden Age story, "Cameron McCabe") also played games with their mysteries to great effect. Other than Jonathan Creek, I can think of no television show which has played games with the genre so often and so well as Sherlock.

History and Dubrovnik

In an excellent article for The Guardian a couple of days ago, Mark Lawson wrote that; "One of the functions of fiction is to serve as a kind of tourism, either showing us places, situations and people that we might not otherwise reach or scrolling through snapshots of events or sensations that we remember." This is a very well made point, and it struck a real chord with me after my return from the Adriatic, and especially in relation to my visit to Dubrovnik.

I first went to Dubrovnik almost a quarter of a century ago. It was an impressive place, but my main, if rather hazy, recollection, is of a sense of regulation and limitation, imposed by the state machine of the time - in those days, Dubrovnik was part of Communist Yugoslavia. Since then, it was besieged during the terrible war with Serbia, and the marks of that war can still be seen if you look around. But the over-riding impression I had, not least from talking to a young taxi driver, was of a place which has been liberated from tyranny and which is loving that liberation.

If Venice is my favourite foreign city, Dubrovnik is now probably not far behind. It really looked fantastic in the sun, and we tried to cram as much as possible into a day's visit This meant an hour's trip in a glass-bottomed boat, a walk around the full length of the incredible city walls, and a cable car ride - three different perspectives on one of the most photogenic places I've visited.

I think if you know a little about the history of a place, it enhances the experience, and that's true even of somewhere as intrinsically and obviously attractive as Dubrovnik. I read a deeply felt message written by one of the residents whose home had been devastated during the war, and it was impossible not to feel a real sense of horror about what was done to innocent people within our lifetime. Our visit coincided with various Independence celebrations,and it was easy to understand why, given what they have endured, the people of the city have embraced capitalism (with all its faults) and are even looking forward to being part of the Eurozone (which I suppose could prove even more of a mixed blessing.).

It's because I believe that history matters, and that it is good to try to learn from history and experience, so as to try not to repeat the mistakes of the past, that I chose a historian as the male protagonist of the Lake District Mysteries. The series is intended to be very much about the Lakes in the21st century - but every book, and every story-line is informed by the past. And it's because of this interest in history that, as I walked the walls of Dubrovnik, I tried to imagine what Daniel Kind would make of the city. I reckon he'd like it as much as I do.

Harrogate - the panels

Once you have attended a few crime fiction conferences, you learn that it’s a good idea to pace yourself. It’s inevitable that some themes and interviews crop up regularly, and it’s a good idea to be selective. It also helps to take time out to recover from those late nights chatting in the bar….

But I really did enjoy a diverse range of events and activities during the Festival. These included a panel hosted by Barry Norman, and a session where Mark Lawson interviewed both Reginald Hill and John Banville, a brilliant and contrasting pair of writers. I had the pleasure of a long chat before and during lunch with Reg and, as ever, he was as witty and entertaining in person as he is in his books. (The photo of Reg and myself was kindly supplied by Ali Karim.)

There was also an interesting discussion of ‘nursery crimes’ led by Andrew Taylor which featured a classy line-up, including three writers I’ve never heard speak before, Suzette Hill, Christopher Fowler and Jasper Fforde, all of whom were very good indeed. The level of discussion was so high, I wished the hour could have stretched to two.