It might come as a shock to some people when they read my gritty books that I actually started out writing women’s fiction. Back then, my inspiration came from authors...

“Resistent! It’s the German spelling. They want to rename your book for the German market-and re-design the cover too. I think we should agree.” That was the good advice of...

Doing research for a novel is a trap – a gorgeous honey-trap you set for yourself. It is work, or a form of it, but it can easily undermine the...

‘Crime writers are the loveliest people’ is a phrase I’ve heard many times over, most recently at Harrogate Crime Writing Festival. I write psychological thrillers, which comes under the crime...

Last month, I stood on a station platform and made my farewells to a host of friends. They never looked back and, truthfully, I felt only relief as their train...

As a child, books fascinated me because they were compact objects with people and worlds in them. My parents read to me when I was too little to read to...

My ideal writing day begins at ten, after a leisurely breakfast of something freshly baked and an hour alone with the newspapers. After that, I settle in with a pot...

Combine what has never been combined before. I don’t remember who said this or where I read that quote but it inspired me. When I first started writing my novel...

19 July, 2018 was the 26th anniversary of the murder of the anti-mafia magistrate Paolo Borsellino at the hands of Cosa Nostra. As I watched the usual TV documentaries, listening...

Usually when leaving my kids’ bedroom at 3am, all that’s going through my mind are a series of expletives interspersed with ‘Sleep, SLEEP. I need more sleep’. Yet one night,...