24hrs with Crime Reporter Abigail Rieley
It’s a very precise form of journalism but one that is a fantastic way to learn how to tell a story. I’ve been working in the courts for the past five years. It’s not something I ever thought I’d find myself doing but I love the job. It’s…
Touching Evil: Melissa Moore
Three years ago Melissa Moore was playing with her then six year old daughter in their back garden in Spokane, Washington. As the swing came to rest, her daughter asked an innocent question that set off a chain of events that was to bring Melissa…
Threaten to Win: Brian O’Connor
When you meet Brian O’Connor he seems like a gentle, mild mannered chap, but when it comes to his opinions, think cat and pigeons. The Irish Times racing correspondent writes a “Tipping Point” column on Mondays that tends to get people’s back up, including comedian…
Finding the Solution: Lynda LaPlante
“The first blow to his head made his body lurch sideways, striking his face against the bedside cabinet…” Crime writers are always told that they need to begin with a hook, and this is the gripping opening line to Lynda La Plante’s twenty sixth novel…
The Reckoning: Jane Casey
There is something serene about Jane Casey that utterly belies the darkness of the books she writes. Brought up in Dublin, Casey is elegant and cultured, her Irish accent subtle. On meeting her you might guess that she has a degree in English from Oxford,…
The Ghosts of Belfast: Stuart Neville
Stuart Neville has been a musician, a composer, a teacher, a salesman, a film extra, a baker and a hand double for a well known Irish comedian, but is currently a partner in a successful multimedia design business in the wilds of Northern Ireland. He’s…
Stop Me! Richard Jay Parker
So who is Richard Jay Parker and how did he start writing? Richard was a professional TV writer for twenty-two years, contributing to a wide variety of TV shows, and eventually becoming a head writer and script editor. Sounds good, but in tuuth he much preferred drinking with the …
True Crime with Niamh O’Connor
Sam: Getting published can be long and rocky road for many writers, how did you get started writing? Niamh: I trained as a journalist and ended up covering big criminal trials. I realized that one in particular would make a really great book so I…
Risky Business: Niamh O’Connor
If I Never See You Again introduced readers to ballsy DI Jo Birmingham, a mother of two with a failed marriage and her own skeletons in the cupboard. Taken is the second novel in the Jo Birmingham series, and while ‘gripping page turner’ may be a cliché, this…
Paul Finch on ‘The Killing Club’
The inspiration for the DS Mark ‘Heck’ Heckenburg novels came from a variety of sources: not just from my own life as a cop, but my lifelong fascination with the hard-boiled detective medium, and my desire to branch out a little more into mainstream writing….
Liza Marklund: Exposed
Lisa Marklund has the sort of presence that makes everyone in a room look up. Tall (very), attractive (very), she commands attention in the same way that she grabs you when you pick up one of her books. But it’s not only her readers who…
Lee Child on Writing, Reacher & The Affair
So there’s this guy called Jack Reacher (no middle name) whose mother was French, who’s ex US Army Military Police, who travels across the USA with nothing except a toothbrush. He’s 6’5’’and weighs 220-250lbs, has dirty blonde hair, ice blue eyes. And he knows how…
How I Write by Lucy Clarke
Last year I spoke to Lucy Clarke about her debut novel The Sea Sisters, a book that hit the ground running with multiple foreign rights sales as well as becoming a Richard & Judy Book Club Choice. You can read the interview here. It’s not…
Giving the Victim a Voice: Niamh O’Connor on the Graham Dwyer Trial
I worked as a crime reporter for twenty years, but when I went to the Graham Dwyer trial on the first day of evidence in January – it was to delve deeper into the theme of a novel I was working on that asks if…
Galway’s Giant of the Book World: Joe McCoubrey Talks To Ken Bruen
By any measurement Galway author Ken Bruen is right up there with the best of them. With 35 novels neatly stacked on his bookshelf, six TV movies in the can, a 12-part series just agreed with Swedish TV, and the completion of two big screen…
