I did a little live reading for this excellent authors’ association this morning. It’s a cold, rainy August morning so this might be nice with a coffee huddled inside. If you’d like to see the reading, click here

And if you can’t wait to find out what’s upstairs, click here

Have a lovely day x

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I’ve not done one of these for a while, as the very excellent Esther Wane does them so well on her narration for the audiobook. But they’re a lot of fun to do so I thought I’d dive back in. I started doing these at the beginning of the first lockdown and they’ve become a bit of a tradition in our house. I hope you enjoy it. Have a brilliant day. Here’s the link.

I’m a huge fan of listening to audiobooks. There’s always a Miss Marple or Poirot on in my car. I think a book takes on a subtle change and different nuances arise when it’s read aloud. People don’t read to each other very often anymore and yet it used to be quite popular. My little boy still does and it’s an utter joy and so relaxing to be read to. He’s listening to How to Train Your Dragon read by David Tennant and now when he reads that book to me, it’s always with a Scottish accent!

I’m utterly thrilled that the first three books in my series have been picked up by Tantor and are going to be produced as audiobooks. The first in the series, The Smart Woman’s Guide to Murder, is out on 29th June and is being read by the incredibly talented Esher Wane. I’m so excited to hear it. The Smart women have been talking inside my head for a very long time. It will give them a whole new dimension to hear someone else’s interpretation.

In the meantime, as many of you know, I’ve been doing a little live reading every week since the lockdowns began. I’ve done a special one today to celebrate the audiobook launch and you can listen to it here.

Thankfully, a professional will be doing the real thing and you can find that on Audible here or Amazon here.

I hope you enjoy it and maybe you’ll be tempted to read aloud to someone or be lucky enough to have someone read to you. Have a lovely day.

The Smart women have a playlist! I was asked in a recent interview if I would ever consider doing one for the book and it kind of kick started this. I’ve been adding to it over time and really it’s become more what I thought Ursula would listen to rather than just me. Here’s a link to it if you’d like a listen. There’s also a clue to what might be in store for Ursula in later books! If you prefer Spotify to Apple music, here’s the link to that too.

Crediton Literary Festival was fabulous fun this year. I gave a talk on Agatha Christie and the rules of modern detective fiction. As you can see, great fun was had by all! It was recorded for their Youtube channel so you can watch the full event and all the other panels too. It was a real whistle stop tour through some of Agatha Christie’s ground breaking novels and some very recent whodunnits that have redefined the genre too. Here’s the link to the talk and I hope you enjoy it. x

I still cannot believe The Smart Woman’s Guide to Murder has won The People’s Book Prize! To celebrate, here’s a reading of my very favourite bit of the book and an introduction to Ursula’s darker side. I hope you enjoy it and thank you so so much for all the support. It means the world! Here’s the link to the reading.

I cannot believe that The Smart Woman’s Guide to Murder has won the People’s Book Prize for fiction! I just wanted to say thank you to all the wonderful readers, reviewers, bloggers and authors who have been so supportive over the last year. I received the announcement on the book’s first birthday – what an amazing present! I can’t believe it’s been a year! I’ve learned so much and met so many amazing people. Most of all I want to say a massive thank you to Joffe Books for taking a chance on a dark comedy whodunnit that was an homage to Golden Age fiction – not something everyone would be willing to take a chance on! Jasper, Emma, Laurel, Nina, Annie and all the team are unbelievable, kind and brilliant. Thank you so much for giving me my dream. Here’s a link to the prize and the truly amazing trophy!!!

Here’s the link to this morning’s live reading from Body on the Island.

The first book in the series is a finalist in the People’s Book Prize and voting closes today if you’d like to add your vote. Here’s the link.

Have a lovely day! xx

Here’s what happened after I couldn’t find a copy of my own book to read, the internet decided not to exist anymore and my cat was violently ill on me. Still smiling. On the outside! click here for the live reading of Body on the Island that followed.

So incredibly excited to see a review of Body on the Island in The Arbuturian magazine. This is a seriously fabulous magazine with some gorgeous articles. I’m very honoured to have such an amazing review in there. Thank you so much.

You can see the review here but I’d urge you to look at the whole of this amazing publication too. Just wonderful!