Editing Anthologies

I was pleasantly surprised, last week, to see that Blood on the Tracks, my anthology of classic crime stories with a railway theme, had become a number one Kindle bestseller. And this prompted me to reflect on my unexpected but now quite lengthy career as an editor of anthologies. It dates back long before my involvement with the British Library - to the early 1990s, in fact.

At that time, I suggested to my colleagues in the northern chapter of the CWA that it would be nice if we could produce an anthology of our work. Before I knew it, I'd been elected to edit the book and find a publisher for it. It proved to be great fun. I enlisted the help of a small press, Didsbury Press, and I remember a fun weekend staying with Ann and Tim Cleeves, and meeting up with fellow contributors Reg Hill, Bob Barnard, Chaz Brenchley and Val McDermid to discuss the project. The book that resulted, Northern Blood, did pretty well and earned some nice reviews. And that appeared to be that.

Except that I was then asked to collaborate with members of the East Anglian chapter on an anthology called Anglian Blood; the contributors included P.D. James and Alan "George Gently" Hunter. Another fun project with another small press, though I have to say that the cover artwork was about the most horrible I've ever seen - I was never brave enough to ask Phyllis James her opinion of it!

One thing led to another, as it so often does in life. A year or two later, I was asked to take over as editor of the national CWA anthology, and (again) to find a new publisher for it. More than twenty years later, I still sit in the editorial chair. The experience of editing the book nearly every year has been hugely rewarding - what could be better than being the first person to see a new story by Ian Rankin, or Christopher Fowler, or Liza Cody, or Simon Brett, or...well, you get the idea. It's also been fascinating to take on stories by relatively unknown (at the time) writers such as Sarah Hilary and Mick Herron, who have proceeded to become hugely successful.

As a reader of anthologies as well as an editor, I do feel that it's desirable for each book to have a personality of its own. Typically this comes from a unifying theme, even if it's a relatively broad theme. I've read anthologies that are really just random collections of stories, and that approach isn't for me. That said, I do think it's inevitable that not every story in a book will appeal equally to all readers.

In a few days' time, I'll be taking part in a panel at the Florida Bouchercon which concerns anthologies,and I'm looking forward to it. The joy of an anthology comes from the blend, in my opinion, the combination perhaps of the well-known and the much less well-known, a range of writing styles, and so on. So the editing process does seem to me to be a highly subjective one; but then, that's the nature of writing. This career as an anthologist is something I never anticipated all those years ago. But for me, it continues to be genuinely enjoyable. 

Robert Barnard - A Talent to Entertain

The response to my blog post last week-end about the death of Robert Barnard really shows how popular were both the man and his books. I'm not sure how many of you read the comments on blog posts, but among the numerous very welcome comment, I'd particularly like to highlight the little anecdote told by Bob's old friend Peter Lovesey. It really captures the man and his sense of humour perfectly.

The last time I saw Bob, he presented me with copies of his two final books, as well as a very interesting article about his writing. This prompted me to write a piece about him for Mystery Scene, and Bob's fans might like to know that I've now had it uploaded on to my website.

I also thought I'd share a memory of an occasion in Bob's company more than twenty years ago. The Northern Chapter of the CWA agreed that we would produce an anthology of our crime writing (including one or two pieces of true crime) and everybody offered to chip in. It was decided that I would edit the book - a touching demonstration of faith, given that I'd never edited a book in my life at that point.

Several of us gathered, as I remember, at Ann and Tim Cleeves' house in Whitley Bay. Those also present were Bob, Val McDermid and Chaz Brenchley, as I recall. We debated issues like the book's title, and mulled over the choice of artwork offered by the publishers (ah, those were the days!) And I recall Bob entertaining us with a very good story about his late father's battles with the taxman. He was great company, and I think it says a lot that, as a very well established author at that time, he was willing to put in time and effort to a project that was enjoyable but certainly never made us any money. The book that resulted was called Northern Blood, and Bob's contribution was an entertaining story called "A Sure-Fire Speculation". From the first paragraph, which introduces us to a member of the Young Conservatives (not an organisation Bob admired greatly, it's fair to say), you knew that you were in for some fun, and so it proved.

And thanks to the efforts of people like Bob, Val, Ann and Reg Hill, Northern Blood started me off on my strange but very satisfying career as a crime anthologist. Tweny-one anthologies later, I remain grateful to them.

Susan Moody and Stephen Murray

You might think that, over the course of rather more than 1600 blog posts, I'd have discussed at great  length all of the crime writers whom I know and like, and probably I should have done. But I haven't, and a conversation at Windermere reminded me of this. So I thought that I'd start filling in some of the gaps, with particular reference to authors whose stories I've included in anthologies that I've edited over the years. .And I'm beginning with two people who share the same initials but whose literary styles are quite different.

I first came across Susan Moody as a writer when I bought a paperback copy of her first book, Penny Black in the mid 80s. At that time, I was casting around for ideas for a crime series of my own, and assessing what else was happening in the market. Suffice to say that I was impressed with the witty and zestful writing. Fast forward a few years, and I met Susan in person, at about the time when she was starting a new series, featuring Cassie Swann, a bridge expert. I can't play bridge (I'm afraid that I once went to evening classes to learn, and found the tutor incomprehensible), but even so the books struck me as successful.

I was impressed by the versatility Susan displayed in a number of short stories which appeared in high profile anthologies edited by the likes of Tim Heald, and Liza Cody and Michael Z. Lewin. She even turned the long-running 'Gold Blend' TV commercials into a novel, and literary versatility doesn't get much more striking than that!  With this in mind, when I was asked to put together an anthology for the CWA, Susan Moody was one of the first people I approached to contribute. The resulting story, 'Moving On', with its viewpoint shifts, certainly lived up to expectations, and helped to make Perfectly Criminal a book I was proud to have edited. In recent years, Susan has been less prolific, but she came up with another notable story for Guilty Consciences, my most recent anthology, 'Deck the Halls with Poison, Ivy'.

Stephen Murrary is a contemporary of mine, but he achieved publication as a novelist rather more quickly, and was already well-established by the time I met him. His series of books featuring Alec Stainton, a quiet but likeable cop, achieved considerable distinction, and Stephen too contributed to a couple of early Northern Blood anthologies. The Stainton series came to an end, but when he supplied another good short story, 'Landfall', to Crime on the Move, I thought it was a sign that Stephen's crime novels would be hitting the bookshelves again before long. It hasn't happened yet, but I live in hope.