If you're not writing books, what are you doing?

Well, today I'm unpicking a chapter on Air Raid Shelters in Cardiff.

Hey - whatever floats your boat, right?

In three months all this academic stuff will be over and I will be back to writing fiction. I promise.

I did actually do something writerly this week. I spent a lovely evening talking books with Vanessa Savage as part of the Cardiff Library Crime and Coffee Festival. It was fun, with a super audience. Reminded me why I enjoy being a writer. The Festival was fab. I hope they do it again next year and I can be part of it. Maybe even with a new book on the horizon!

Crime and Coffee

The Second Crime and Coffee Festival will be taking place in Cardiff next week - from 3rd to 8th June, with a day full of events at the main library on Saturday 8th. Before that there are lots of talks, including some in Welsh, and a book launch and a workshop, some of which are taking place in the branch libraries. I shall be talking to a long time friend, Vanessa Savage, at Cathays library on Tuesday 4th at 7pm. Tickets £5, if you want to be there. The link is below. It will probably be worth getting a omnibus ticket if you are a crime fan. That will get you into all the events. If it's as good as last year, and the programme looks as if it is, it will be a lot of fun.

Vanessa and I met as members of the Romantic Novelists' Association. She's moved on to write crime/horror now, but we're still friends! We'll be talking, among other things, about the importance of relationships in genre fiction. I mix my crime with a love story and the dynamics of couples and family are what makes Vanessa's work tick. That and a lot of creepy stuff.

If you can come along, you'll be most welcome.

TICKETS HERE

Unaccustomed as I am ...

Being a writer has its advantages - it's possibly the only job you can do in your pyjamas, in bed, surrounded by toast crumbs, if you want. I only confess to the pyjamas. Occasionally.  While you're producing the books, no one cares what you look like. But then there comes that moment when the book is done and out there and members of the public are meant to be parting with hard cash to read it - and you have to start promoting it.  And that often involves the exact opposite of the pyjamas and toast crumbs - you have to speak,  in public.

I'm lucky that I had an English teacher who believed that writing and giving speeches was one of the things she needed to teach us - agony at the time, but useful since - and I've always had jobs where I've had to get up and talk, and I think I'm also a bit of a frustrated actress too - but even so, making an appearance, talking to readers, is still an event.

This is on my mind as I'm appearing at the Cardiff Library Crime and Coffee Festival this weekend. I'm part of a panel with two other local crime writers, Derec Jones and Phil Rowlands, so we can share the load, and I think it will be fun, once we get going, but it still needs a deep steadying breath before anything starts.

I have to say that the thing I like best about doing public appearances is the questions from readers. It's interesting to know what interests them, and also to hear what other writers have to say about their writing process. Sometimes there is a question that really makes you think, and if the audience have read some of your work and ask about that, it's a real bonus.

All that is in store on Friday. I'm looking forward to it, I think.

Crime and Coffee - Cardiff Library

Crime and Coffee is a new two day festival being staged by Cardiff library on 1st and 2nd June, which will feature writers living and/or setting their crime fiction in Wales. There will be a host of authors involved, including me. There are some well known names, including Belinda Bauer and Christopher Fowler, with a full supporting cast of authors who write all sorts of crime - the cosy, the historical, the downright scary. Workshops, panels, talks - a great chance to hear about crime novels you might not have discovered yet, and maybe even buy a few!

I'm sharing a platform at 1pm on Friday 1st with local authors Derec Jones and Phil Rowlands.

Derec is an artist as well as a writer of both novels and poetry. You may have come across his Boys from the Back Fields, which involves the then and now of a 50 year old murder on a Welsh council estate. Phil Rowlands is another writer with extra talents on his CV, including acting and screen writing. His debut novel Siena is out now - featuring a Welsh heroine and some fabulous locations in Italy. And, of course, I'm writing romantic suspense and very light romantic crime. We are all quite different, but we all have Welsh roots in common and I'm sure we'll have a lot to talk about. I'm looking forward to it.

You can buy tickets for the day or for individual events and I'm told they are selling fast. I hope I might see you there.

Ticket link Here