Tag: crime fiction

A Double Win for Jacqueline Bublitz at the 2022 Ngaio Marsh Awards

Neil

The Ngaio Marsh Awards celebrate literary excellence in crime, mystery, and thriller writing. This year’s winners for 2022 were announced last month and the big surprise of this year’s awards was that one book won both the Best Crime Novel and the Best First Novel.

Huge congratulations to Taranaki author Jacqueline Bublitz whose novel Before You Knew My Name won both the Best Crime Novel and the Best First Novel categories. She is the first author to do so for the same book in the same year. And whilst the competition was fierce with many great books in the shortlist, regular readers of this blog will know what big fans of this novel we are, so we were delighted to see it win .

This is the  twelfth year for The Ngaio Marsh Awards and, as always, they were a terrific showcase of exciting and innovative Aotearoa New Zealand storytelling that is truly world class. Congratulations to all the short and longlisted authors.

Before you knew my name / Bublitz, Jacqueline
“Dead girls don’t usually get to tell their story, but Alice Lee has always been a different type of girl. When she arrives in New York on her eighteenth birthday, carrying nothing but $600 cash and a stolen Leica in her bag, Alice is a plucky teenager looking to start a new life away from her dark past. Now she’s ‘Jane Doe’, ‘Riverside Jane’, an unidentified body on a slab at City Morgue. Newspaper headlines briefly report that ‘the body was discovered by a jogger’. Ruby Jones is a lonely Australian woman trying to put distance between herself and a destructive relationship back home, and is struggling in the aftermath of being the person to find Alice’s body. When she encounters Death Club, a small group of misfits who meet at bars around the city to discuss death and dying, she finds a safe space to explore her increasing obsession with the girl and her unidentified killer. Alice, seemingly stuck between life and death, narrates Ruby’s story, hoping that this woman will help her come to terms with what happened and help identify her body. From this first, devastating encounter, an enduring connection between the two women is formed. One that will eventually lead to the man who murdered Alice…” (Adapted from Catalogue) Also available as an eBook.

Verb 2022: Val McDermid, Michael Robotham & J.P. Pomare in conversation with Brannavan Gnanalingam

Neil

Thanks to our good friends at the Verb Festival, on Sunday 11 September 2022 at 7:00pm there is a rare opportunity to see some of the biggest names in the crime firmament as they swing into Wellington. It’s for one night only and tickets are selling out fast.

The event includes The Queen Of Crime herself, Val McDermid, whose novels have sold more than 16 million copies and have been translated into 40 languages worldwide. Val will be accompanied on stage by no less than multi-award-winning Michael Robotham, whose Joseph O’Loughlin series has been a worldwide smash hit, bestseller and is currently being adapted for the screen. Rotorua-born J.P. Pomare, whose debut novel Call Me Evie won the Ngaio Marsh Award for Best First Novel, and whose second book In the Clearing will soon grace our screens via Disney+. And Wellington’s very own multi-award-winning author Brannavan Gnanalingam will be hosting. Each author is a star in their own right, and the evening promises to be unmissable for all crime and thriller fans.

Verb Wellington have very kindly given us one pair of tickets for this very special event to give away as a prize. To be in with a chance of winning, comment your favourite Val McDermid, Michael Robotham or J.P. Pomare novel on our Instagram post here. The competition winner will be drawn on Sunday 4 September and will be contacted directly from our Instagram account.

To whet your appetite, below is a specially-recorded WCL interview with Val McDermid .

The Verb festival also includes some very special events with the amazing  Sarah Winman on 15 September, and Mohamad Hassan on 29 September. Find full details of the Verb festival here.

1989 / McDermid, Val
“It’s 1989 and Allie Burns is back. Older and maybe wiser, she’s running the northern news operation of the Sunday Globe, chafing at losing her role in investigative journalism and at the descent into the gutter of the UK tabloid media. But there’s plenty to keep her occupied.” (Adapted from Catalogue)

 

1979 / McDermid, Val
“1979. It is the winter of discontent, and reporter Allie Burns is chasing her first big scoop. There are few women in the newsroom and she needs something explosive for the boys’ club to take her seriously. Soon Allie and fellow journalist Danny Sullivan are exposing the criminal underbelly of respectable Scotland. They risk making powerful enemies – and Allie won’t stop there. When she discovers a home-grown terrorist threat, Allie comes up with a plan to infiltrate the group and make her name. But she’s a woman in a man’s world… and putting a foot wrong could be fatal.” (Adapted from Catalogue)

Lying beside you / Robotham, Michael
“Twenty years ago, Cyrus Haven’s family was murdered. Only he and his brother survived. Cyrus because he hid. Elias because he was the killer. Now Elias is being released from a secure psychiatric hospital and Cyrus, a forensic psychologist, must decide if he can forgive the man who destroyed his childhood. As he prepares for the homecoming, Cyrus is called to a crime scene in Nottingham. A man is dead and his daughter, Maya, is missing…” (Adapted from Catalogue)

 

When you are mine / Robotham, Michael
“Philomena McCarthy has defied the odds and become a promising young officer with the Metropolitan Police despite being the daughter of a notorious London gangster. Called to the scene of a domestic assault one day, she rescues a bloodied young woman, Tempe Brown, the mistress of a decorated detective. The incident is hushed up, but Phil has unwittingly made a dangerous enemy with powerful friends. Determined to protect each other, the two women strike up a tentative friendship. Tempe is thoughtful and sweet and makes herself indispensable to Phil, but sinister things keep happening and something isn’t quite right about the stories Tempe tells…” (Adapted from Catalogue)

Call me Evie / Pomare, J. P.
“Meet Evie, a young woman held captive by a man named Jim in the isolated New Zealand beach town of Maketu. Jim says he’s hiding Evie to protect her, that she did something terrible back home in Melbourne. In a house that creaks against the wind, Evie begins to piece together her fractured memories of the events that led her here. Jim says he’s keeping her safe. Evie’s not sure she can trust Jim, but can she trust her own memories?” (Adapted from Catalogue)

 

In the clearing / Pomare, J. P.
“Amy has only ever known what life is like in the Clearing. She knows what’s expected of her. She knows what to do to please her elders, and how to make sure life in the community remains happy and calm. That is, until a new young girl joins the group. She isn’t fitting in; she doesn’t want to stay. What happens next will turn life as Amy knows it on its head. Freya has gone to great lengths to feel like a ‘normal person’. In fact, if you saw her go about her day with her young son, you’d think she was an everyday mum. That is, until a young girl goes missing and someone from her past, someone she hasn’t seen for a very long time, arrives in town…” (Adapted from Catalogue)

Slow down, you’re here / Gnanalingam, Brannavan
“Kavita is stuck in a dead-end marriage, and is juggling parenting two small kids while also being the family’s main breadwinner. When an old flame offers a week away in Waiheke, she agonises but decides to accept. When she steps onto the ferry she knows she has left her family behind – but she’s not sure for how long.” (Adapted from Catalogue)

 

Sprigs / Gnanalingam, Brannavan
“It is Saturday afternoon and two boys’ schools are locked in battle for college rugby supremacy. Priya – a fifteen year old who barely belongs – watches from the sidelines. Then it is Saturday night and the team is partying. Priya’s friends have evaporated and she isn’t sure what to do. In the weeks after ‘the incident’ life seems to go on. But when whispers turn to confrontation, the institutions of wealth and privilege circle the wagons.” (Adapted from Catalogue)

“Life isn’t a loan; it is a payment fraud”: Recent crime and mystery books

Neil

happy old school GIF by Feliks Tomasz Konczakowski

Life isn’t a loan; it is a payment fraud. – Antti Tuomainen, The Rabbit Factor

A magician who also doubles as a  detective, two mysteries that involve libraries and a different take on the world of Sherlock Holmes — you can find all of these in this month’s selection of recently acquired crime and mystery titles.

Included in our selection this month as well, is Antti Tuomainen’s The rabbit factor — a quirky, witty, and darkly humorous Scandi Noir outing that revolves around an insurance mathematician who inherits an adventure park, and features (at various points) both a giant mechanical rabbit and a lot of debt to loan sharks.

Amusement and adventure parks are of course popular around the world, and intriguing settings in their own right. They evolved from Medieval European fairs and pleasure gardens, but probably gained the form we are more familiar with in the 18th and 19th centuries, when mechanical rides, such as the steam-powered carousel, came into play. Disneyland, one of the most famous amusement parks in the world, opened in 1955 and expanded the popular imagination even further.

Helsinki, where Antti Tuomainen was born, boasts its very own amusement park called Linnanmäki. Linnanmäki opened in 1950 and is run as a non-profit organisation, with all monies collected being passed on to children’s charities. Some of the attractions it boasts include: a wooden roller coaster, a carousel built in 1896, a river rapids ride,  a Ferris wheel  and various spinning rides. In total Linnanmäki has 43 rides and is visited by over one million visitors annually. So far it has contributed over 120 million euros to the charities it supports.

So — some interesting background to one of our titles this month. And here they all are:

The rabbit factor / Tuomainen, Antti
“What makes life perfect? Insurance mathematician Henri Koskinen knows the answer because he calculates everything down to the very last decimal. And then, for the first time, Henri is faced with the incalculable. After suddenly losing his job, Henri inherits an adventure park from his brother – its peculiar employees and troubling financial problems included. The worst of the financial issues appear to originate from big loans taken from criminal quarters … and some dangerous men are very keen to get their money back. But what Henri really can’t compute is love. In the adventure park, Henri crosses paths with Laura, an artist with a chequered past, and a joie de vivre and erratic lifestyle that bewilders him. ” (Adapted from Catalogue)

Death and the conjuror / Mead, Tom
“In 1930s London, celebrity psychiatrist Anselm Rees is discovered dead in his locked study, and there seems to be no way that a killer could have escaped unseen. There are no clues, no witnesses, and no evidence of the murder weapon. Stumped by the confounding scene, the Scotland Yard detective on the case calls on retired stage magician-turned-part-time sleuth Joseph Spector. For who better to make sense of the impossible than one who traffics in illusions? Spector has a knack for explaining the inexplicable, but even he finds that there is more to this mystery than meets the eye. ” (Adapted from Catalogue)

The woman in the library : a novel / Gentill, Sulari
“The beautifully ornate reading room at the Boston Public Library is completely silent one weekday morning, until a woman’s terrified scream echoes through the room. Security guards immediately appear and instruct everyone inside to stay put until they determine there is no threat. While they wait for the all-clear, four strangers who had been sitting in the reading room get to chatting and quickly become friendly. Harriet, Marigold, Whit, and Caine each have their own reasons for being in the reading room that morning–and it just happens that one of them may turn out to be a murderer. ” (Adapted from Catalogue) Also available as an eBook.

Silence in the library / Schellman, Katharine
“London, 1815. Lily Adler is settling into her new London life when her semi-estranged father arrives unexpectedly, intending to stay with her while he recovers from an illness. Lily is drawn into spending time with Lady Wyatt, the new wife of an old family friend. One morning Lily arrives to find Lady Wyatt’s husband, Sir Charles, has died. All signs indicate that he tripped and struck his head late at night, but Bow Street constable Simon Page suspects foul play. With the help of Captain Jack Hartley, Lily and Simon learn anyone who might have profited from the old man’s death seems to have an alibi … until Lily receives a mysterious summons to speak with one of the Wyatts’ maids, only to find the young woman dead when she arrives.” (Adapted from Catalogue)

The return of Faraz Ali / Ahmad, Aamina
“Not since childhood has Faraz returned to the Mohalla, Lahore’s infamous walled inner city, where women still pass down the profession of courtesan to their daughters. But he still remembers the day he was abducted from the home he shared with his mother and sister there, at the direction of his powerful father, who wanted to give him a chance at a respectable life. Now Wajid, once more dictating his fate from afar, has sent Faraz back to Lahore, installing him as head of the Mohalla police station and charging him with a mission: to cover up the violent death of a young kanjari. It should be a simple assignment to carry out in a marginalized community, but for the first time in his career, Faraz finds himself unable to follow orders. ” (Adapted from Catalogue)

Observations by gaslight : stories from the world of Sherlock Holmes / Faye, Lyndsay
“A new collection of Sherlockian tales that shows the Great Detective and his partner, Watson, as their acquaintances saw them. How well did those who worked with Sherlock Holmes know him? The peripheral characters — Irene Adler, Geoffrey Lestrade; witnesses to the cases; even his cook and housekeeper, Martha Hudson — what did they think of the man and his methods? Discover aspects of Holmes and Watson that you have never seen before.” (Adapted from Catalogue)

Kalmann / Schmidt, Joachim B.
“Kalmann Odinsson is the self-appointed Sheriff of his town. Day by day, he treks the wide plains which surround the almost deserted village, hunts Arctic foxes and lays bait in the sea — to catch the gigantic Greenland sharks he turns into the Icelandic fermented delicacy, hákarl. There is nothing anyone needs to worry about. Kalmann has everything under control. Inside his head, however, the wheels sometimes spin backwards. One winter, after he discovers a pool of blood in the snow, the swiftly unfolding events threaten to overwhelm him. But he knows that his native wisdom and pure-hearted courage will see him through. There really is no need to worry. How can anything go wrong with Kalmann in charge? He knows everything a man needs to know about life – well, almost.” (Adapted from Catalogue)

Rock of ages : a Junior Bender mystery / Hallinan, Timothy
“Four of Dressler’s old gangster colleagues have put together a national tour of once-popular rock bands they own a piece of: three nights of concerts by guys (and a few gals) who were big shots back in the 1960s and 1970s, and who are now hoping for one more gasp of glory with this nostalgia exhibition. The Rock of Ages tour has proved itself to be anything but a love fest: plenty of the bandmates have been feuding for forty years, and-perhaps unsurprisingly-drugs and bad behavior have created health, wellness, and legal problems for the musicians and managers. Can Junior recover Dressler’s money, prevent a murder, talk his daughter out of pursuing a life of crime, and somehow survive all that bad music?” (Adapted from Catalogue)

Marginalia and curses: New crime and mystery titles

Neil

julien brachhammer illuminated manuscript by GIF IT UP

In this month’s selection of recently acquired crime and mystery titles we have The Twyford code by Janice Hallett, a book with a very intriguing premise where it appears that a book’s marginalia holds the clues to solving a mystery. The novel has already proved hugely popular with critics and readers alike with some comparing her writing to that of Agatha Christie.

We would never encourage creating your own marginalia in library books, it is however a subject with a rich, long, and deep history. Marginalia are marks made in the margins of a book or other document. They vary widely; from full commentaries on works, to medieval illuminations, scribbles and secret codes. Marginalia began before the printing press was invented, when scholars often short of writing materials would write notes for future readers in the margins of works. Medieval monks would create vivid works of art in the margins, often with blasphemous or scandalous content, such as the Pope playing cards with animals.

In Shakespeare’s time it wasn’t unusual for people to write magical spells into the margins of books, sometimes love spells and sometimes curses. The poet Keats’ heavily personalised version of Paradise Lost has given scholars of this work a fascinating insight into the poets mind. One of the most famous of all marginalia came from the mathematician Fermat, a seventeenth century French lawyer and amateur mathematician who used the margins in his books to write extensive notes. In one of these books he wrote about the theorem on how to split a given square number into two other squares, stating “I have discovered a truly marvellous proof of this, which this margin is too narrow to contain.” His proof was never found in his papers, leading to the mystery of Fermat’s Last Theorem which was only solved in 1995.

The late 1800’s saw a huge shift in attitude to marginalia, which came about with a religious drive to make books pure and unsullied. Libraries would guillotine margins off books and even bleach old books to remove extra markings of any kind.

The Twyford code / Hallett, Janice
“Steven Smith has just been released from prison, and he is finally free to investigate a mystery that has haunted him since childhood. Forty years ago, he found a copy of a famous children’s book, full of strange markings and annotations. He took it to his remedial English teacher, Miss Isles, who became convinced that it was the key to solving a puzzle. That a message in secret code ran through all Edith Twyford’s novels. Then Miss Isles disappeared, and Steven’s memory won’t allow him to remember what happened. Did she sense her own imminent death? Was she right about the code? And is it still in use today? ” (Adapted from Catalogue) Also available as an eBook.

Fifty-four pigs / Schott, Philipp
“A swine barn explodes near a lakeside Manitoba town, putting veterinarian Dr. Peter Bannerman on a collision course with murder and a startling conspiracy. Peter is an odd duck, obsessed with logic and measurable facts, an obsession he puts to good use in his veterinary practice. When a murder is connected to the swine barn explosion and his friend Tom becomes the prime suspect, Peter feels compelled to put his reasoning skills, and his dog Pippin’s remarkable nose, to use to help clear him…” (Adapted from Catalogue)

The murder of Mr. Wickham / Gray, Claudia
“After many years of happy marriage, Emma Knightley and her husband are throwing a house party, bringing together distant relatives and new acquaintances-not all of whom are well known to the Knightleys but are certainly beloved by every Jane Austen fan: Elizabeth and Fitzwilliam Darcy, Marianne and Colonel Brandon, Anne and Captain Wentworth, and Fanny and Edmund Bertram.  Yet the Knightleys and their guests are all shocked when Wickham turns up murdered-except, of course, for the killer hidden in their midst. With everyone a suspect, it falls to the house party’s two youngest guests to solve the mystery .” (Adapted from Catalogue) Also available as an eBook.

Sunset swing / Celestin, Ray
“Los Angeles. Christmas, 1967. A young nurse, Kerry Gaudet, travels to the City of Angels desperate to find her missing brother, fearing that something terrible has happened to him: a serial killer is terrorising the city, picking victims at random, and Kerry has precious few leads. Ida Young, recently retired private investigator, is dragged into helping the police when a young woman is discovered murdered in her motel room. Ida has never met the victim but her name has been found at the crime scene and the LAPD wants to know why… ” (Adapted from Catalogue

A rip through time / Armstrong, Kelley
“May 20, 2019: Homicide detective Mallory is in Edinburgh to be with her dying grandmother. While out on a jog one evening, Mallory hears a woman in distress. She’s drawn to an alley, where she is attacked and loses consciousness. May 20, 1869: Housemaid Catriona Thomson had been enjoying a half-day off, only to be discovered that night in a lane, where she’d been strangled and left for dead . . . exactly one-hundred-and-fifty years before Mallory was strangled in the same spot. When Mallory wakes up in Catriona’s body in 1869, she must put aside her shock and adjust quickly to the reality: life as a housemaid to an undertaker in Victorian Scotland. ” (Adapted from Catalogue)

Two nights in Lisbon / Pavone, Chris
“Ariel Price wakes up in Lisbon, alone. Her husband is gone–no warning, no note, not answering his phone. Something is wrong. She starts with hotel security, then the police, then the American embassy, at each confronting questions she can’t fully answer: What exactly is John doing in Lisbon? Why would he drag her along on his business trip? Who would want to harm him? And why does Ariel know so little about her new–much younger–husband? The clock is ticking. Ariel is increasingly frustrated and desperate, running out of time, and the one person in the world who can help is the one person she least wants to ask.” (Adapted from Catalogue)

Vine street / Nolan, Dominic
“Soho, 1935. This was his London. ‘Savage beautiful, mesmeric. It’s impossible not to marvel at the detail, at the sheer richness of each and every scene. Sergeant Leon Geat’s patch. A snarling, skull-cracking misanthrope, Geats marshals the grimy rabble according to his own elastic moral code. The narrow alleys are brimming with jazz bars, bookies, blackshirts, ponces and tarts so when a body is found above the Windmill Club, detectives are content to dismiss the case as just another young woman who topped herself early. But Geats – a good man prepared to be a bad one if it keeps the worst of them at bay – knows the dark seams of the city…” (Catalogue)

Razzmatazz : a novel / Moore, Christopher
“San Francisco, 1947. Bartender Sammy ‘Two Toes’ Tiffin and the rest of the Cookie’s Coffee Irregulars, a ragtag bunch of working mugs last seen in Noir, are on the hustle: they’re trying to open a driving school for Chinatown residents; shanghai an abusive Swedish stevedore; get Mable, the local madam, and her girls to a Christmas party at the State Hospital without alerting the overzealous head of the S.F.P.D. vice squad; all while Sammy’s girlfriend, Stilton (a.k.a. the Cheese), and her ‘Wendy the Welder’ gal palsmight be attracting the attention of some government Men in Black. And, oh yeah, someone is murdering the city’s drag kings and club owner Jimmy Vasco is sure she’s next on the list …” (Adapted from Catalogue)

Still and untroubled: New crime and mystery titles

Neil
A selection of book covers from our recent booklist

A selection from our new mystery picks

I am, as it is bliss to be, Still and untroubled.

― Charlotte Brontë,


There’s a whole sub-genre of crime and detective fiction which stars real life historical characters as the investigating detectives. Just a few of these historical characters, turned fictional detectives, include Oscar Wilde, Jane Austin, Charles Dickens, and Agatha Christie.  There’s even a Barrack Obama and Joe Biden mystery series, where the current and former American presidents form the sleuthing duo. One particularly unlikely, fictionalised team that I particularly like is the Raymond Chandler and Boris Karloff team up, found in Kim Newman’s Something More than Night. In this month’s newly acquired crime and mystery titles, we can add The Bronte sisters to these illustrious ranks.

In The Red Monarch, literature’s most famous siblings are also amateur detectives. The tale is set around the time of their self-published collection Poems of Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell, where the sisters adopted male names as they thought it would help sales and avoid gender prejudice. The collection was published at their own expense, and sadly sold exactly two copies. In The Red Monarch, the sisters are also battling against a slum dwelling criminal gang.

Other highlights from the below list include a tale that takes us on the Trans-Siberian Express, a police transcriber and a mystery set on a cocoa plantation in Ecuador.

The red monarch / Ellis, Bella
“The Bronte sisters’ first poetry collection has just been published, potentially marking an end to their careers as amateur detectors, when Anne receives a letter from her friend Lydia Robinson. Lydia has eloped with a young actor, Harry Roxby. Harry has become embroiled with a criminal gang and is in terrible danger after allegedly losing something very valuable that he was meant to deliver to their leader. . She knows there are few people who she can turn to in this time of need, but the sisters agree to help Lydia, beginning a race against time to save Harry’s life.” (Adapted from Catalogue)

Death on the Trans-Siberian Express / Farrington, C. J.
“Olga Pushkin, Railway Engineer (Third Class) and would-be bestselling author, spends her days in a little rail-side hut with only Dmitri the hedgehog for company.  And one day Olga arrives at her hut only to be knocked unconscious by a man falling from the Trans-Siberian, an American tourist with his throat cut from ear to ear and his mouth stuffed with 10-ruble coins. Another death soon follows. But with no leads to follow and time running out, has Olga bitten off more than she can chew?” (Adapted from Catalogue)

Bryant & May : London Bridge is falling down / Fowler, Christopher
“When 91-year-old Amelia Hoffman died in her top-floor flat on a busy London road, : she slipped through the cracks in a failing system. But detectives Arthur Bryant and John May of the Peculiar Crimes Unit have their doubts. Bryant is convinced that other forgotten women with hidden talents are also in danger. And, curiously, they all own models of London Bridge. With the help of some of their more certifiable informants, the detectives follow the strangest of clues in an investigation that will lead them through forgotten alleyways to the city’s oldest bridge in search of a desperate killer.” (Adapted from Catalogue)

A question of guilt / Horst, Jørn Lier
“In 1999, seventeen-year-old Tone Vaterland was killed on her way home from work. Desperate for a conviction the police deemed the investigation an open-and-shut case and sent her spurned boyfriend, Danny Momrak, down for murder. But twenty years later William Wisting receives a puzzling letter. It suggests the wrong man was convicted for Tone’s death and the real murderer is still out there. Wisting is quickly thrown into a terrifying race against time where he must find the sender, decipher this mysterious letter and catch the real killer before they strike again.” (Adapted from Catalogue)

The Spanish daughter / Hughes, Lorena
“Inheriting a cocoa plantation in Vinces, Ecuador, that someone will kill for, Puri, after her husband is murdered, assumes his identity to search for the truth of her father’s legacy and learn the identity of the enemy who stands in her way of claiming her birthright.” (Adapted from Catalogue)

 

Mrs. Rochester’s ghost : a thriller / Marcott, Lindsay
“Jane has lost everything: job, mother, relationships, even her home. A friend calls to offer an unusual deal–a cottage above the crashing surf of Big Sur on the estate of his employer, Evan Rochester. In return, Jane will tutor his teenage daughter. She accepts. But nothing is quite as it seems at the Rochester estate. Though he’s been accused of murdering his glamorous and troubled wife, Evan Rochester insists she drowned herself. Jane is skeptical, but she still finds herself falling for the brilliant and secretive entrepreneur and growing close to his daughter…” (Adapted from Catalogue)

The shadows of men : a novel / Mukherjee, Abir
“Calcutta, 1923. When a Hindu theologian is found murdered in his home, the city is on the brink of all-out religious war. Can the officers of the Imperial Police Force–Captain Sam Wyndham and Sergeant “Surrender-Not” Banerjee–track down those responsible in time to stop a bloodbath? Set at a time of heightened political tension, beginning in atmospheric Calcutta and taking the detectives all the way to bustling Bombay, the latest instalment in this remarkable series presents Wyndham and Banerjee with an unprecedented challenge. Will this be the case that finally drives them apart?” (Catalogue)

Hello, transcriber / Morrissey, Hannah
“Every night, while the street lamps shed the only light on Wisconsin’s most crime-ridden city, police transcriber Hazel Greenlee listens as detectives divulge Black Harbor’s gruesome secrets. As an aspiring writer, Hazel believes that writing a novel could be her only ticket out of this frozen hellscape. And then her neighbor confesses to hiding the body of an overdose victim in a dumpster. The suspicious death is linked to Candy Man, a notorious drug dealer. Now Hazel has a first row seat to the investigation and becomes captivated by the lead detective…” (Adapted from Catalogue) Also available as an eBook.

Interview with Portico Prize winning author Sally J Morgan

Neil
Sally J Morgan - Toto

Debut novel Toto Among the Murderers by Sally J Morgan, is a dark, compelling, and immersive work that recently won the Portico Prize for Literature — a British prize given to a work that evokes the “spirit of the North of England”. The book was also longlisted for the 2021 Acorn Prize for Fiction.

We were thrilled when Sally agreed to talk to us about ‘Toto Among the Murderers’ and what it feels like to win one of the big fiction prizes! She even gave us an exclusive sneak peek into her thoughts about her new book, still at the writing stage. Have a listen and read more about Sally below…

Please note: this interview was done in conjunction with Caffeine and Aspirin, an arts and entertainment review show on RadioActive FM. The interview was conducted by Caffeine and Aspirin host, Tanya Ashcroft.

Sally J Morgan was born in the Welsh mining town of Abertyleri and describes her childhood as nomadic — following her father’s career in the motor trade across Britain. Sally graduated from the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Antwerp and eventually moved to New Zealand where she is now a professor at Massey University in Wellington.

As a young woman she was once offered a lift by the serial killers Fred and Rose West. Sally declined, but that experience planted the seeds for Toto Among the Murderers.

We wish to extend our heartfelt thanks to Sally for both the interview and for her kind permission to reproduce the photographs in this blog — all © Sally J Morgan. (Photographer: Jessica Chubb)

Toto among the murderers / Morgan, Sally J

“It is 1973 and Jude – known to her friends as Toto – has just graduated from art school and moves into a house in a run-down part of Leeds. Jude is a chaotic wild child who flirts with the wrong kind of people, drinks too much and gets stoned too often. Never happy to stay in one place for very long, her restlessness takes her on hitchhiking jaunts up and down the country. Her best friend, Nel, is the only steady influence Jude has but Nel’s life isn’t as perfect as it seems.”

“Reports of attacks on women punctuate the news and Jude takes off again, suffocated by an affair she has been having with a married woman. But what she doesn’t realise is that the violence is moving ever closer to home: there is Janice across the road who lives in fear of being beaten up again by her pimp and Nel, whose perfect life is coming undone at her boyfriend’s hands. At the same time infamous murderers, Fred and Rosemary West, are stalking the country, on the lookout for girls like Jude.” (Catalogue)