WEB NEWS, FEATURES & REVIEWS

Dave Zeltserman

In the 'Man out of Prison' Noir Trilogy by Dave Zeltserman, the reader is presented with three dangerous men released from prison and the three distinct noir journeys which follow. Dave Zeltserman in Profile...

M C Beaton

Marion Beaton started to write Regency romances. Encouraged by her husband, she wrote over 100 of these books under her maiden name of Marion Chesney. But Marion eventually found herself fed up with setting every story within the years of 1811 to 1820, so she began to write detective stories. On a holiday trip from the USA to Sutherland in the UK, a course at a fishing school inspired the first Hamish Macbeth. Marion returned to Britain and bought a croft house and croft in Sutherland where her husband, Harry, reared a flock of black sheep. When Charles finished school in London, he also moved to the Costwolds, where Marion created the Agatha Raisin series.

Valerie Laws

contributor: A Pathological Profile of a New Talent
'It's not easy, cutting off a head.' The first line of 'The Rotting Spot', from the Skull Hunter's blog, came to me early on, and I, as a semi-lapsed skull collector myself, know it's true...

Maureen Carter

Is writing the sixth book in a series easier than the first, the third, the fifth? Not for me. It's harder, much harder. Your professional bench mark is higher, readers' expectations raised. Writing a series is an on-going challenge and that's absolutely how it should be. There's a degree of comfort, of course, in knowing lead characters so well. But I see it like this: comfort can be a tad too close to complacent. And that's deadly to creativity. As is what I think of as, SWR. Not a killer virus or a dodgy dance step: series writers' rut

Donald Westlake

contributor: Peter Snow
On his way to dinner in a Palm Beach restaurant, the crime writer Donald Westlake dropped down dead. As abruptly as in one of the plot twists in his books, Westlake's death halted one of the most fertile careers in American literature. For over half a century Westlake had pumped out - under his own name and a wide variety of pseudonyms - over ninety books (no-one, including Westlake, seemed sure of the exact total): mysteries, comedy thrillers, spy stories, screenplays, science fiction, pornography, even a children's book...

Scott Turow

contributor: Barry Forshaw
Speaking to Scott Turow is a salutary experience for the jaded crime fiction journo (who has perhaps spoken to too many none-too-bright American authors). It's a refreshing change to encounter a writer — doyen of the legal thriller alongside John Grisham — whose personal qualities are matched by a sharp intelligence

Jim Kelly

What is it about snow that fascinates the British? As we struggle to deal with the worst snow for twenty years, for crime author Jim Kelly, whose latest novel published today DEATH WORE WHITE set on a snow-choked country lane, it's a particularly pertinent question.

William Diehl

contributor: Michael Carlson
Michael Carlson on the Man Behind Sharky's Machine

Margery Allingham

contributor: Julia Jones
Biographer Julia Jones on Margery Allingham

Edgar Wallace

Brief profile and synopsis of the key works of Edgar Wallace

Cath Staincliffe

Brief profile and synopsis of Cath Staincliffe's work, posted 2002

Anne Perry

Profile of Anne Perry, posted 2001

James Sallis

contributor: Woody Haut
An overview of Sallis' early work by Woody Haut

Peter May

Profile of Peter May, posted 2001

Natasha Cooper

Profile of Natasha Cooper posted 2001

Ann Cleeves

Profile of Ann Cleeves, with thanks to Naomi Berwin at Macmillan for the content

James Hadley Chase

Brief profile of James Hadley Chase and a synopsis of his work

John Baker

Profile of John Baker from 2002

Henry Cecil

Brief profile of Henry Cecil and a synopsis of his work

Desmond Bagley

Brief profile of Desmond Bagley and a synopsis of his work

Steve Aylett

Profile of Steve Aylett from 2000

Lisa Appignanesi

Profile of Lisa Appignanesi dating from 2001