There’s been a good old-fashioned stushie recently, on Twitter and elsewhere, about a new literary prize for crime novels that eschew violence against women. The Staunch Book Prize, launched earlier this year, will be awarded to a ‘novel in the thriller genre in which no woman is beaten, stalked, sexually exploited, raped or murdered’. In part, the award builds on a Radio 4 Documentary, ‘Body Count Rising’, written and presented by Doon Mackichan, one of the inaugural judges of the Staunch Prize. In the documentary, Mackichan argues that women in crime dramas are too … [Read more...]

So, the proof copies of The Quaker have just made their way to the ends of the earth, arriving here in New Zealand yesterday. I think they look pretty flash, but then I would say that... There's always a 'woah' moment when your proofs arrive and you realise that this thing you've been wrestling with for endless months on your computer screen and in printouts of various kinds is going to end up as an actual, proper, bound, bona fide book. It's a glorious feeling. Scary, too. Because now other people get to read it... … [Read more...]