The Crime Warp

You know when you pick up a book that's full of great forensic facts, a touch of romance, a few murders and a damn good storyline  that its going to be a fast read ... and that's just what I felt when I read I've Been watching You.  KA Richardson has a deft touch with the plot twists and her characterization is great.

Can't believe it's almost that time of year again when the sun comes out and there's nothing but crime on everyone's minds.  Wine and beer flow, laughter floats on the air and all is well in the world.  The event you ask?  Well it's quite clearly Theakston's Old Peculier Crime writing Festival 21st -24h July 2016 Harrogate.

This novel is definitely not a ‘donkey at the Grand National’, as one critic once described crime fiction in relation to literature. If you like elegantly written mysteries with an international flavour, then the work of the award winning Argentine writer Claudia Pineiro is just the ticket. Betty Boo, the middle aged protagonist, is a previously successful author who is facing failure not only in her love life but in her career as a writer. Unable to start another book, she pays the bills by ghost writing for shallow celebrities. So when an unusual opportunity at a national paper presents itself, she can’t say no. After the death of a prominent industrialist, she is drafted in to provide a more literary take on events, to be published in parallel with the articles by a junior crime reporter. Set in the journalistic milieu of Buenos Aires, Claudia Pineiro uses her acute psychological understanding of human nature to strip bare editors and journalists alike. She dissects their ...

Once in a while you are lucky enough to come across a book so charming you immediately fall for it - a book with a cast of colourful characters so well drawn that you are immersed into the plot from the first page. How better to escape your every-day pressures, than a trip to Mumbai, India where you participate in the hunt for the famous Koh-i-Noor diamond, stolen in a brazen heist? ‘The most honest man in India’ is a hard label to live up to, but Inspector Ashwin Chopra (Retd) more than deserves it. Forced to take early retirement due to complex political machinations in the police force, Chopra sets up a private detective agency. When the Queen permits an exhibition of a selection of the British Crown Jewels with the famous Koh-i-Noor diamond as its centrepiece all of Mumbai is buzzing. Some Nationalists use this exhibition to advocate the return of the famous diamond to India, its country of origin. So who is to blame when the famous diamond is stolen? In a change from his us...

If the cover of  The Optician's Wife doesn't draw you in, then, once you open the book, the characters certainly will, for Reavley's main characters are deliciously unlikeable, strangely compelling and wonderfully alluring.  They draw you into their world and keep you hooked right to the very end.

Writing historical fiction poses an interesting challenge. If you are into fancy terminology you could call this ‘deliberate values dissonance’, if not, you could simply ask: How well do morals and values travel through time? When creating characters who lived in the past do you portray them accurately or give them modern attitudes to make them more appealing to contemporary readers? Not so long ago there was a debate at Oxford University about Cecil Rhodes and whether or not his statue should continue to grace the campus. According to some, Rhodes was an ideological coloniser and racist, perhaps even a mass murderer, to others he was a statesman and philanthropist who held opinions common to many during his life time. It has been said that Churchill was a racist too. In 1937 he told the Palestine Royal Commission: "I do not admit for instance, that a great wrong has been done to the Red Indians of America or the black people of Australia. I do not admit that a wrong has...

A round-up of books for Father's Day to suit any taste.The relationship between a father and his children is mostly beautiful... however, it can also be destructive, dehumanising and fraught with danger and lies.  The books I've chosen for Fathers Day feture the paternal relationship with there child in various forms.  All are absorbing reads and I hope you enjoy them.A father who'll go to extreme lengths to protect his child, to a father whose strange reactions to his daughter's disappearance are unsettling.

James Swallow is the author of Nomad, released on 2nd June by Bonnier Zaffre publishing Click here  to view it on Amazon.  Nomad has been described as 'A terrific white- knuckle, lip chewing thriller' by Rhianna Pratchett.  Whilst Ben Aaronovitch describes Nomad's hero Marc Dane as 'An intelligent, likeable and, above all, believable hero.'   Here on The Crime warp (5th June 2016) I described this amazing book as being  'the sort of book you finish reading and then, hours later, you've still got adrenalin fizzing around your system.'  The Crime Warp warmly welcomes James Swallow.

Nomad by James Swallow (Bonnier Zaffre publishing Release date 2nd June 2016) I don't read many espionage type thrillers, but when I received a review copy of Nomad from the publishers complete with a dossier folder and confidential correspondence alongside the book and I was hooked...

Sometimes when an author writes a long series of books with the same protagonist, the energy gradually fizzles out. Not in this case, not even after 25 books! M.C. Beaton is as wickedly funny as ever.  Anyone who has ever lived in an English village will recognise the ensemble of characters, the eligible bachelor who is mean to a fault, the nosey, bitchy older woman who loves to hurt people, the kindly put upon vicar’s wife, the siren who leaves men reeling in her wake… This satire on English village life demonstrates why Agatha Raisin is such a popular character.