Many libraries are struggling during the pandemic restrictions, so it's more appropriate than ever that the Crime Writers' Association (CWA) should champion them through its annual award, the Dagger in the Library.

The world-famous CWA Daggers have been synonymous with quality crime writing for more than half a century. Only library staff can…

Delighted to say that there are plenty of decent reviews and ratings coming in on Amazon for my twentieth crime novel to be published. Thank you to everyone who has contributed.

Kill Shot (The Book Folks) plunges DCI Jack Harris into a scenario where what appears to be a local murder not only challenges his view of an old friendship but also…

I am preparing to carry out the final edits on my latest DCI John Blizzard crime novel before sending it to those fine people at my publisher The Book Folks in the New Year - and that means taking as objective a view as I can manage of what I have written.

But what exactly does that mean? Well, for all authors, it means comparing what they have…

I have written before about my fascination with the way that characters evolve during the writing process. For me, when they are revealing things about themselves which you as the writer had not planned, that is when you know that writing is truly working. That your characters have made the transition from cardboard cut-out to real human being.

I am being given a striking example of that the more I work on the latest DCI John Blizzard novel for The Book Folks.

Major characters…

Author Alan McClure, who is based in Dumfries and Galloway, has launched a new youtube channel called Tales fae the Shed, on which he is posting weekly stories and sketches. Well worth checking out at…

Writing a novel is a big undertaking and one that will take up many, many hours so how do you know that it’s going to be worth all that effort? How do you know that the idea ‘has legs’? That you are not going to reach the end and have produced something that does not quite work?

For me, it’s simple. If you have an idea that only mildly occupies…