Notes from the desk
Blog
Occasional writing about the work: how the books actually get made, why Birmingham, and what happens on the evenings when the words won’t come.
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Why I Write Crime Fiction (And Why Birmingham)
It started in a bookshop in Hay-on-Wye, with a shelf of small, pocket-sized paperbacks that were designed to go with you rather than stop your life while you read them.
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A Day in My Writing Life — The Unglamorous Truth
There’s a version of the writer’s life that gets a lot of airtime: a desk by a window, morning light, words flowing. That’s not this one.
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What I Do When the Words Won’t Come
Bad writing days have a few different flavours. Here’s what actually gets the words back — and it isn’t a productivity trick.
Free prequel novella
Start with Clean Hands
Birmingham, February 2009. A bank manager is found dead in the Sidings — one stab wound, no witnesses, and a department that wants it filed as a mugging by Friday. Detective Sergeant Ray Holder isn't so sure a mugging goes wrong like this.
Short chapters, no padding, finishable in an evening. Yours free — Kindle, ePub or PDF.