Blog posts
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It was a tragedy that shocked people in the North Pennines, a passenger aircraft that tried to cross the uplands but was flying far too low due due a technical fault, aviation investigators later concluded. The plane clipped one of the summits and ploughed into a hillside, killing all aboard.Despite an intensive search of the…
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One of the most prestigious awards in crime writing has a new sponsor. Run by the Crime Writers’ Association (CWA), the annual Diamond Dagger Award was introduced in 1986 and recognises a lifetime’s achievement. Part of the CWA’s annual Daggers, which having first been staged in 1965, are the genre’s oldest awards, the Diamond Dagger’s…
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Authors in the early stages of their careers are being offered the chance to bid for four £5,000 bursaries to further develop their work. The Charlotte Aitken Trust has awarded New Writing North £30,000 to support the development of four published writers living in the North of England. Known as the Charlotte Aitken Trust Awards,…
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Exciting things are happening as Kirkcudbright Book Week becomes Kirkcudbright Book Festival with a new website, a new programme and a new Facebook page. The 2026 event in the town in Dumfries and Galloway will run from March 5-8 and details will be announced on January 1. The old Book Week website will no longer…
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The excellent Scottish Book Trust (SBT) is seeking donations for its ongoing campaign to provide books for disadvantaged families who do not own them. According to the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, more than a million people in Scotland are living in poverty and a quarter of them are children. The most disadvantaged children are 50% more…
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Sometimes it’s the smallest things that sustain an author and I have just read the latest review on Amazon of my ebook boxset of Jack Harris crime novels (nine novels for 99p, published by The Book Folks, a Joffe Books company). The review (thank you, Angela) included the line ‘I can imagine meeting Jack ‘Hawk’…
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A reminder that a number of competitions are open for entries from writers living in the North of England. Open now until 5 February 2026 are: Plus, the Hachette Children’s Novel Awards are still open until 12 January, the Young Northern Writers’ Awards until 5 February, and the Children’s Books North Network Prize until 26…
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Rapidly-expanding UK publisher Joffe Books is closing in on the completion of a deal to acquire Canongate’s Severn House, which is known particularly as a crime fiction specialist operating in the United States. The deal, which the two parties hope will be completed in the New Year, is the latest in the expansion of award-winning…
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The importance of books to the Scottish economy was underlined when a major tourism award was awarded to the Edinburgh International Book Festival. The 2025 Scottish Thistle Awards National Final, whose winners are pictured here, shone a spotlight on Scotland’s tourism offering with events and festivals well represented throughout the evening. After winning the Regional…
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Analysis by Google has added to the growing perception that 2025 has been a very good year for crime fiction sales both in the UK and globally. A number of pieces of market research released through the year have already supported the contention that the genre is performing much better than a number of others.…
John Dean - Crime Writer 