On the platform at Harrogate station, someone has chalked the outline of a body. I give it a nervous glance as I hurry towards the taxi rank – I know tensions can run high in the publishing world but has the Harrogate crime writing festival already claimed its first victim?
This was my first trip to Harrogate although, like most of my colleagues at Vintage, I’d heard rumours of events full of dedicated crime fans, fiendishly difficult late night quizzes and wine. Lots and lots of wine. This year – with Ruth Dudley Edwards and Arnaldur Indriđason both up for daggers at the CWA awards, Stuart Neville taking part in an event on the new stars of crime fiction and international bestseller Jo Nesbø flying over for an event on international crime writing – I knew it was time for a trip to Yorkshire.
I was so thrilled that Ruth went on to win the CWA Gold Dagger for Non-Fiction for Aftermath, her extraordinary account of the struggle for justice by the families of the Omagh bomb victims, that I was even prepared to forgive our Ealing colleagues, Transworld, for pipping us to the post for the International Dagger. That proved lucky when another of their authors, Belinda Bauer, joined Stuart on Val McDermid’s Saturday panel for the best up and coming crime writers. Val did a fantastic job of showcasing the brilliance of her four favourite new writers, and it was especially cheering for all the editors in the audience to see so many readers who were genuinely passionate about crime fiction and about discovering new authors. And it’s been a long time since I’ve seen such a massive queue at the signing afterwards, with audience members clutching copies of each of the authors’ books. With the arrival that afternoon of Jo and our publicist, Bethan, we were confident we’d assembled a crack team ready for the late night crime quiz. Then we saw the calibre of the other teams…
Jo’s event on the Sunday morning was the penultimate event of the festival but the crowd were just as enthusiastic as they’d been at the previous talks. While Bethan and I nursed our hangovers and handed out crime brochures, Jo debated who were the new villains in crime fiction, discussed the morality of his characters and completely charmed the audience.
Now, you’ll just have to excuse me while I brush up before next year’s quiz…