I’m delighted to welcome one of my favourite crime authors to my blog today.  I featured David in the March issue of Writers’ Forum but  the 800 words I am allowed for my column are just not enough to do justice to this prolific and highly successful author.

Me

Welcome to my blog, David.  Let’s kick off by talking about about your books in general.  What genre do you write and do you write a series or are your books standalone?

David

I write crime. Mostly blue collar cosy with a deliberate vein of humour. But I also turn out much darker works, Feyer & Drake, for example, or the Cain Hypno-Thrillers published under my pen name, Robert Devine.

I try to produce series. It’s a commercial decision as much as anything. Series sell much better than standalones, and readers soon become familiar with the core characters. As you progress, however, it becomes more difficult to say anything new about those key characters, which is why I put Joe Murray through the mill over the last few Sanford titles.

Me.

The Sanford titles would be your Sanford Third Age Club mysteries, which I really enjoy. ‘Blue collar cosy’ has a nice ring to it and sums up the series perfectly.  How about giving us the blurbs from, say, your first book and then your most recent one?

David

I have nothing in the immediate pipeline so here’s the blurb from the very first, Sanford 3rd Age Club Mystery, The Filey Connection, published nine years ago by Crooked Cat, and now under CC’s darkstroke banner. It’s followed by the blurb for The Frame, the second Feyer & Drake title.

The Filey Connection

It’s summertime, and the Sanford 3rd Age Club are living it up in the seaside town of Filey. But the hot months don’t pass without problems for amateur sleuth, Joe Murray.

Was Nicola Leach’s death an accident or deliberate? Did Eddie Dobson fall into the sea or did he jump? What’s going on behind the innocent façade – and closed doors – of the Beachside Hotel? And who raided Joe’s room?

Joe and his sidekicks must find the answers to solve the mystery of The Filey Connection.

The Frame:

Sam Feyer, relishing her role as head of Landshaven CID, and Wes Drake, a broken man after the murder of his partner, are charged with reopening the inquiry into Barbara Shawforth’s brutal murder.

For Sam, it’s a path littered with obstacles from the autocratic hierarchy of Landshaven and the police, to handling the ill-tempered Drake, a man who greets every attempt to thwart him as a personal challenge there to be crushed.

Amid frequent disagreements, an air of thin tolerance between them, they must forge a fresh alliance to battle through a smokescreen of corruption, suspicion and lies if they are to learn what really happened four years ago.

Then the body count begins to rise

Me.

Thank you, David.  I’ve only recently discovered the Feyer and Drake series and really enjoy them.  And I understand there’s a new one coming out this year which is something to look forward to.

So, what inspires you most when you sit down to write? Is it characters?  Settings? Or maybe even books you have read?

David

My work is mainly character driven. I’m an ardent people-watcher and the apparently random, sometimes mindless activity of others is a source of endless fascination to me. Many of the humorous incidents in the Sanford Mysteries are events I’ve observed in real life. The snooty receptionist in Summer Wedding Murder is such an example, although the hotel in question was in Majorca, and the receptionist was neither female, nor aiming his criticism at me. I simply observed it.

Location comes second. My wife and I are seasoned travellers, and most of the towns, hotels, holiday parks I write about are based on places we’ve visited. Of particular note is the architecturally quirky hotel in Peril in Palmanova. That hotel exists and it’s as described, right down to the entertainment staff identified with the word “Animacion” on their uniforms. 

Landshaven, the location for The Frame, Feyer & Drake #2, is a barely concealed clone of on Scarborough, one of our favourite British seaside towns.

I never base any of my work on books I may have read, although I do read a fair number and often think to myself, “I could have done that better”.

Me.

So, how did your writing journey start?  Have you always written? And what was your first published piece?

David

I’ve been writing since my teens, but I didn’t publish my first piece until the mid-1980s. It was a short article published by our local newspaper, and it concerned the colloquial language differences between my home city of Leeds, Yorkshire, and Northeast Manchester where I now live. Only 35 miles separate us, but the linguistics differences are striking. The article paid me the princely sum of £8.

Me.

Ha!  My first piece earned me the princely sum of £6 from BBC Radio Bristol.  They obviously pay better ‘up North’!  

I really enjoy your dry sense of humour, David, and love your YouTube channel.   How did that come about?

David

A combination of arthritis which makes typing tedious and often difficult, and my frustration at never having the bottle to try my luck as a stand-up comedian. I’m naturally gregarious, possessed of what I call a ‘one-megaton sense of humour’, and I’m more than a little eccentric. Sitting, talking to the webcam is faster and less painful than typing out or even dictating blog posts. 

Me.

And what of your future plans?

David

More of the same. A third F&D novel, working title The Crypto Killings is well-advanced, and the 22nd Sanford Mystery, Death on the Shore is in progress.

Me.

Hooray!  I’m really looking forward to that.  So finally, tell us three things we might not know about you.

David.

1: I had my tonsils and adenoids removed when I was eight years old. My recovery at home coincided with the 1958 FA Cup Final between Bolton Wanderers and a Manchester United team rebuilt after the Munich air crash. During that game (which United lost 2-0) I became a devout Man U supporter. This is despite being born a Yorkshireman and attending most of Leeds United’s home games.

2: After a minor operation went wrong in 1989, my liver couldn’t drain and in 1991 I was told that I without a transplant I had two years to live. It was a misdiagnosis (although I did need five hours of surgery to correct the problem) but it took away any fear of death I may have had. I’m in no hurry to shuffle off this mortal coil, but I have no fear of dying. 

3: Over the last 30 years, I have attended no less than six funerals of relatives who should have outlived me. Three stillborn grandchildren, a nephew killed in a car crash at the age of 20, my younger brother, aged only 54 when he had a massive heart attack, and most distressing, my daughter, barely 49 years of age when she died through complications of Motor Neurone Disease.

me.

That’s really sad, David and I am so sorry for your losses.  Thank you so much for answering my questions with such openness and patience.  And thank you, too, for the hours of reading pleasure you have given me and your many fans.

Social Media Links, blog, YouTube, website etc.

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/dwrobinson3

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/user/Dwrob96/videos

Website: www.dwrob.com 

Blog: https://mysteriesaplenty.blogspot.com/ 

GoodReads:https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/4496576.David_W_Robinson

The all important buy link.

All titles are exclusive to Amazon

Sanford 3rd Age Club Mysteries

The Filey Connection: https://mybook.to/fileyconnection

The Summer Wedding Murder:https://mybook.to/sumwed

Peril in Palmanova: mybook.to/peripal

Tis the Season to be Murdered.mybook.to/Stacseason

Feyer & Drake #2

The Frame mybook.to/frame

Author Bio

David Robinson retired from the rat race after the other rats objected to his participation, and he now lives with his long-suffering wife in sight of the Pennine Moors outside Manchester.

A workaholic, gregarious and eccentric, and an animal lover, he has an absolute loathing of politicians, over-hyped celebrities, and television.

Best known as the creator of the light-hearted Sanford 3rd Age Club Mysteries, and the cynically humorous Midthorpe Murder Mysteries, he also produces the darker, more psychological, Feyer & Drake police procedural crime thrillers.

Writing as Robert Devine, he also produces stark psycho thrillers bordering on sci-fi and horror.

When I was searching around for something to write about in my column in the current issue of Writers’ Forum, I turned to my often used source for inspiration, my old notebooks.

I have kept journals, diaries and notebooks most of my life.  Many of the earlier ones were thrown away but one of the oldest to survive was a diary that I kept the year I was taking my ‘O’ Levels when I was, it seemed, far more interested in the boys on the school bus than I was in my schoolwork.  Funny that – I always told my sons that I was a model pupil!

I kept a diary, too, in the months leading up to my wedding and, a few years later, in the months leading up to the birth of my firstborn.  That one stopped abruptly when he was about two weeks old.  (Can’t think why!).  I love flicking through them every now and again and it always brings back such lovely memories.

But when I began writing and selling short stories,  about fifteen years ago, I started to keep a writing journal and have kept it up more or less ever since.  It’s not nearly as entertaining (or cringe making) as my diaries but a lot more useful when I am looking for something to write about.

I have kept notes about most of my short stories (and there are, by now, literally hundreds of them) and these notes have been a goldmine when looking for something to write about in my monthly column, Ideas’ Store.

And the current issue was no exception.  As I opened one of my notebooks, I found a handwritten note inside from the then Fiction Editor of Woman’s Weekly, enclosing a letter from a reader saying how much they’d enjoyed a particular story of mine.

It’s very unusual for a short story writer to get reader feedback (or, at least, it is for me) and this was such a lovely one.  It was from a man who said my story had moved him and his wife to tears (but in a nice way).  So I dug the story out, which I’d called Paradise Revisited and read it through – and it moved me to tears as well!

So in my column I wrote about how I came to write this particular story and promised the readers that the full story would be on my blog.  And here it is.

I hope you enjoy it.  It certainly is one of my favourites.  And a little note of warning to anyone thinking of signing away all rights to their work, which many of the magazines are now asking for.  And which I refuse to do.

Because had I done so, I’d have been unable to reproduce this story here.  Or anywhere else, come to that.  

Anyway, on a happier note, I hope you enjoy reading Paradise Revisited as much as I enjoyed writing it.  And if you want to read the story of how I came to write the story (if you see what I mean)  it is in the current issue of Writers’ Forum, which is packed, as always, with lots of wonderful, writerly goodies.

Paradise Revisited

They say it’s best not to go back, don’t they? That places are never as good as you remember. Or you’ll find they’ve built a supermarket on the fields where you used to walk the dogs and they’ve ripped out the hedges where you used to gather musky sweet blackberries and sloes, sharp as sherbet lemons, that shrivelled your tongue when you bit into them.

Better by far, they say,  to leave those special places  precious and untarnished in your memory.  It’s good advice, of course, but when did I ever take any notice of good advice?  And yes, I admit, that sometimes that’s been to my cost.  But there are other times, like today, that I’m glad I ignored them because I know everything’s going to be as wonderful as I remember and nothing, but nothing is going to spoil it. 

And so, here we are now, me, Paul and our daughter Sophie, packed snugly into in our little blue Morris Minor that’s more at home on smooth surfaced suburban roads than chugging up and down these steep, winding roads, some of which, Paul is horrified to see, have grass growing up in the middle. We’re on our way, Morris Minor permitting, to a remote valley deep in the Yorkshire Dales where my parents took me when I was four years old, the age Sophie is now.

It’s strange but that trip to Yorkshire was the only holiday I remember as a child. There may well have been others but I can’t recall them. But people didn’t go away so much back. Not like now, jamming the roads with their cars and caravans every Bank Holiday.

‘Paradise,’ my mother told me when I asked where we were.  She got out of the car, stretched her arms above her head, tilted her face to the sun and filled her lungs with the crisp, clean air. ‘Smell it, Libby.  That’s Paradise, that is.’

It wasn’t until years later I discovered the valley’s real name was Langstrothdale. Named by the Vikings when our history was young but the landscape over which they rampaged was already old.

So today, Paul and I have brought Sophie with us to Paradise  I’m holding my breath as we drive along the narrow winding road, with its unforgiving stone walls on either side.  Past fields full of lambs and cow parsley.  Past the small, squat church at Hubberholme that I still think looks like a fat broody hen, even though my mother used to tell me I was being fanciful and silly.

The car bumps over the cattle grid, we go round a corner and Langstrothdale opens up in front of us, spreading out like one of those books Sophie has where the pictures pop up when you open the pages out flat. And today, there’s no Mother around to tell me off for being fanciful.

Yes, oh yes.  I was so right to come back.  It is all exactly as I remember.  I am back in Paradise.

Paul parks the car as close to the river as we can get.  I think this may be the exact spot where my father parked all those years ago, but can’t be sure.  But what does it matter?  We’re here.  That’s enough. 

‘Be careful,’ I call out as Sophie jumps out of the car and dashes down towards the river, long golden plaits flying out behind her.

But I wasn’t worried.  At this part of its journey, the river Wharfe is just a baby, playful and gentle, teasing us with a game of  hide and seek as it slips in and out of the boulders at the river edge.  

I show Sophie how the river bed is made of giant slabs of smooth grey rock that look as if they’ve been carved into steps.

‘Do the steps go all the way to the giant’s house?’ she asks, her voice catching with excitement, ‘Like in Jack and the Beanstalk? Shall we find a giant if we climb up the stairs?’

‘We might so you’d better hold my hand,’ I say. ‘Just in case.’

Sophie and I take our shoes and socks off, then holding hands and giggling, step gingerly into the brown peaty water.  We wade across to the top of the step where the water slithers over and down on to the next, like a small waterfall.

We laugh as the river rears up around our feet like a startled horse.  The afternoon is warm but the Wharfe started life at the top of the nearby fell and hasn’t travelled far enough to lose its legacy of winter snows.  It is cold.  So cold our feet ache and our toes are turning numb.

The river, as always, wins.  Sophie and I return to the bank.

Still in bare feet, we walk on the close cropped grass which is soft and springy as newly laid carpet.  I tell her how, when the winter rains come, this placid, easy-going river turns hot-headed and wild, like some stroppy adolescent, and storms down the valley, tearing vegetation from the banks in restless, reckless fury.

‘What’s a stroppy adol … adoless ..?’ she tries to ask but the word is strange and new to her and ties up her tongue.

‘We’ll both find out soon enough,’ I say and although I laugh, a chill runs down my back at the thought of how soon that time will come. I think of tears and tantrums and staying out too late. Of outrageous clothes, unsuitable boys and loud, messy music.

But today is Sophie’s first trip to Paradise so I push the thought away, unwilling to let fears of the future cloud this oh so perfect day.  Instead, I  show her where the swollen winter torrents have left clumps of dried up grass hanging like a forgotten line of washing on the lower branches of a sycamore tree on the opposite bank.

I sit down and absorb the sights and sounds of the valley.  There are black-faced sheep nagging at their lambs to stay close and swallows that shriek and chatter as they flicker over the surface of the water like skimming stones. And I am content.

Sophie’s behind me, stretched out on her stomach, her chin resting on her hands.  She never ceases to surprise and delight me, this so precious child of ours who arrived like a miracle when, after three miscarriages and years of monthly disappointments, we had given up hope.

It still amazes me how one minute she’s a bundle of shrieking, hyperactive energy, like the swallows and the next, like now, is quiet and still as she watches a bee plundering a blue-grey harebell, its fragile stem trembling under the bee’s weight.

Sophie is totally absorbed, not moving until the bee flies off.  Then she looks up at me.  Her beautiful eyes, the same blue-grey as the harebell, are wide with the wonder of it all.

Too soon, the spell’s broken.  She hears Paul calling and scrambles to her feet.  She urges me to hurry as she runs ahead, skipping and dancing, golden hair glinting in the sunlight.

I follow more slowly but just as eagerly, for we’re both drawn by the smell that drifts towards us. Paul’s cooking sausages on a small camping stove.  As I get closer, I can hear them hissing and spitting and smell, too,  the crusty rolls that were still warm when we bought them in the shop in Hawes this morning.  There are apples and nuts, crisps and chocolate and, as a special treat, a large bottle of brilliant orange, fizzy Tizer.

And I realise I’m hungry.  Very very hungry.

………………

‘Can’t you sleep, dear?  Can I get you something?’

A woman is bending over me.  Who is she? Sophie?  Maybe.  No. Can’t be.  Sophie’s got blue eyes.  These are brown.  So who -?

‘What’s going on?’ I try to say.  ‘Who are you? And what are you doing in my bedroom?’

Only I don’t say anything.  Because someone’s making soft whimpering noises.  And I rather think it’s me.

Don’t like this.  Don’t like it at all.  I’ve got to sort things out.  Get my bearings. Think, woman, think.  I know one thing for sure.  This is not my bedroom.  Mine has pink walls and white floaty curtains and a vase of ivory silk roses on my bedside table.

This place is beige with high narrow windows and ugly pipes travelling up the walls. Someone’s tried to hide them by painting them the same boring beige as the walls.  But it hasn’t worked.  They’re still ugly.

Then I see the lettering on the beige cellular blanket and, finally, I remember. It says ‘Bankside NHS Trust.’

The blanket’s been smoothed with prim, pristine precision to cover my old, useless legs. To cover me, an old useless woman who’s lived too long and is now nothing but a worry to her daughter.  Those lovely harebell blue eyes, that once marvelled at the antics of a bee are now dulled as Sophie has grown old herself, worn out and tired from the strain of worrying about me. Wondering if there was anything she could have done to prevent that stupid fall that broke my hip and a couple of ribs and landed me in here.

The nurse – I remember her now, bright and kind enough in her own brisk, impersonal way – has asked me if I want something to make me sleep.  But I don’t want to sleep.  Sleep is black.  Empty.  Nothing.  I want to stay awake forever and dream.

I want to close my eyes and dream of how it used to be when Sophie and I were much, much younger and my darling Paul was still alive.  I want to relive again and again that moment of perfect happiness all those years ago in that lovely Yorkshire dale. 

I’ve noticed lately it’s been there for me every time I close my eyes. And every time it gets harder to come back.

‘I said, would you like some hot chocolate, dear?’ The nurse has obviously asked the same question before because she laughs softly and adds: ‘You were miles away just then.  Where were you?’

Ah yes.  I was indeed miles away.  So many miles.  And so very, very far away.  Shall I tell her where I’ve been?  If I do, she’ll no doubt think I’m crazy.  Going gaga.  Losing my marbles.  One more thing for Sophie and that social worker with the soft voice and ill-fitting suit to fret over.

So what the hell? They do that anyway.  I’ll tell her.

‘I’ve been to Paradise,’ I say and then I wait, impatient for her to leave.  Impatient to get back there, to see once again the sunlight sparkle on the miniature waterfalls, to rejoice in the wonder in my child’s eyes, there for all eternity. And to take off my shoes and socks and dance the dance of life and youth and gladness on the soft springy turf.

This time, I’m not coming back. Not for the hot chocolate which I have to sip through a straw like a child.  Not for this beige room with its empty beige windows, nor for the nurse whose eyes never meet mine and who’s more interested in the numbers on the chart that’s clipped over the end of my bed than in me as a person.

No, I’m not coming back, not even for Sophie, who needs to be free of the detritus of my life – the social workers, care workers and now, we are told, nursing homes – and get on with her own life again.

This time when I get back to Paradise, I’m staying there. For ever and ever.

It’s a great pleasure to welcome fellow crime writer, Robert Crouch, to my blog this week. 

I first ‘met’ Robert on the UK Crime Book Club on Facebook.  This is a brilliant group (link here) whose almost 11,000 members include a mix of readers and writers, including some very well known crime writers.  

The site was set up in 2016 by David Gilchrist with the aim of discussing and promoting the work of (mostly) UK crime writers and is one of my favourite  Facebook groups.  I am grateful to David as, through his group I’ve come across some brilliant, new to me authors, including Robert Crouch.

I really enjoyed No Accident, the first book in a series featuring Environmental Health Officer Kent Fisher.  I was intrigued by this unusual choice for a ‘sleuth’ so I contacted Robert and asked if he’d be interested in being interviewed for my column, Ideas Store in Writers’ Forum with the option of a longer interview for this blog.

Thankfully, he said yes!

The Writers’ Forum interview is in the current issue but unfortunately, as a result of lockdown the magazine’s publishers put publication on hold.  It was published recently, but as many of the WH Smith stores are still closed (at the time of writing this) this issue did not reach its usual number of readers.

So I am reproducing the interview here in which I ask Robert where he gets the ideas for his books.

Ideas Store, Writers’ Forum Issue 223.

“When I had the idea to write crime fiction, I wanted to create something new and distinctive, something different from the police procedurals and private eyes novels around. I wondered if an environmental health officer (EHO) like me could solve a murder,” he explains.

“I was driving around my district when the idea came to me. There was only one small problem. You wouldn’t walk into your local council offices and ask an EHO to investigate a murder. But what if the murder wasn’t a murder? What if it was something an EHO could investigate – like a fatal workplace accident?

“If the murder was disguised as a work accident, the police would leave the investigation to environmental health. Time for my hero, Kent Fisher, to step forward in No Accident, the first novel in the murder mystery series.

“After solving the murder, he’s a local hero with the credibility to investigate more.

“Aware I’d created something unique, environmental health had to be an integral part of the stories. I could give readers a glimpse into a world they knew little about, and plunder my extensive experience for inspiration and ideas.

“I’ve used infectious diseases, such as E. coli, which can kill the vulnerable, in No Bodies, the second mystery. If anyone dies without relatives to bury them, the local council step in. I used this in No Remorse, to draw Kent into another investigation.

“In No More Lies, the police seek his assistance with a cold case, linked to a café he closed for poor hygiene ten years before. The latest novel, No Mercy, features a restaurateur from hell, who complains about the poor hygiene rating his restaurant is awarded. When he’s found dead inside his deep freezer, Kent Fisher becomes a suspect and has to solve the murder to clear his name.

“The ideas aren’t restricted to murder. Having managed an environmental health team through austerity and cuts to public services, I use my experiences in the backstory, to add more depth, conflict and drama to the novels.

“EHOs work differently from police officers. EHOs can go into most workplaces and food businesses, offering almost limitless opportunities for settings, situations and plots that will hopefully keep my stories fresh and interesting for a few more years.

“But while I may harvest my experiences for ideas, everything is fictionalised to protect people. It’s also far more exciting to write.”

Of course, Robert Crouch isn’t alone in using his day job as material for his writing.  Agatha Christie herself qualified as a pharmacist’s assistant in 1917 and went on to use her extensive knowledge of pharmaceuticals in many of her novels. 

A few years ago now I worked as a village correspondent for my local newspaper and covered such exciting (not!) events as parish council meetings, jumble sales and flower shows.  I particularly liked covering flower shows as they always had long lists of prize-winners – and I got paid by the line.

 So when I was looking for an occupation for Kat, the main character in my Much Winchmoor Mysteries series, this was an obvious choice as it gave her the opportunity to go around asking questions.  She’s found, as I did, that the job doesn’t pay very well, so she’s also a dog walker (handy for discovering dead bodies in out of the way places) and a barmaid (incredibly useful for overhearing local gossip and, sometimes, careless alcohol fuelled talk).  

Kat has what is called in recruitment consultant speak as a ‘portfolio career’, which, according to her is: “when you don’t have one decent full time job but a variety of rubbish part time ones that no one else wants to do and for which you get paid peanuts. With, of course, zero staff benefits, such as holiday or sickness pay.”

Do you use the experience gained in your day job in your writing?  As always, I’d love to hear from you.

………………….

No Accident.  The Blurb.

A former gangster is dead. It looks like an accident. Only Kent Fisher suspects murder.

When the police decide Syd Collins’ death is a work accident, they hand over the investigation to environmental health officer, Kent Fisher, a man with more baggage than an airport carousel.

He defies a restraining order to enter Tombstone Adventure Park and confronts the owner, Miles Birchill, who has his own reasons for blocking the investigation. Thwarted at every turn, Kent’s forced to bend the rules and is soon suspended from duty.

He battles on, unearthing secrets and corruption that could destroy those he loves. With his personal and professional worlds on a collision course, he knows life will never be the same again.

Inspired by Agatha Christie and Sue Grafton, Robert Crouch brings a fresh voice and a new twist to the traditional murder mystery.

‘Agatha Christie fans will love it.’ Tamara McKinley.

Me

That made a great interview for the magazine, Robert.  Thank you.  Now for the ‘extras’. So, what inspires you most? Is it characters?  Settings? Or maybe books you have read?

Robert

This is almost impossible to answer inspiration is everywhere.  It could someone you see in the street, an overheard snippet of conversation, a headline in a newspaper, a comment on social media.

I love the characters I’ve created, the relationships they have, and the way they develop with each story. I love the South Downs setting I’ve created, Kent’s animal sanctuary, his workplace and job. I love coming up with the most complex and baffling plots I can.

But most of all, being different inspires me most.

It’s taking situations and themes you wouldn’t normally associate with crime fiction and building murder mysteries around them. A murder investigated as a work accident throws up a very different type of story and process.

My sleuth is an environmental health officer. He works differently to a police officer. When I started, I thought an EHO would struggle to investigate a murder. After all an EHO doesn’t have the powers, technology, forensic support, national database, DNA and a team of dedicated officers to help.

Instead, my EHO has to be more imaginative and creative to get to the truth. He has to work much harder and approach a murder investigation in a different way. That’s what inspires me most.

Me.

Being different certainly works for you. Your settings are great and I love the touch of authenticity your day job gives you.

So, how did your writing journey start? 

Robert

Like many authors, I imagine, it began with reading. My father taught me to read the newspaper when I was four, so I had an early start. When I started senior school, English soon became my favourite subject, especially the writing stories. I always achieved high marks thanks to my love and enthusiasm for stories.

For my 13^th birthday, I asked for a typewriter and produced a comic/newsletter to entertain my friends. When I’d saved enough money from my paper rounds, I bought a much sturdier portable typewriter and wrote my first novel at the age of 17.

It still sounds pretentious, no matter how I describe it. That’s why I didn’t tell the publisher my age, believing they would think I was a precocious kid who thought he knew it all. They sent me a lovely letter, which I still have, complimenting me on my characterization and dialogue, but no offer to publish.

Sometimes, I wonder if life would have been different had I revealed my age.

Life, women and work got in the way after that. While I kept writing, it wasn’t until the early 1980s that I published my first piece of work. It was an article on the harmful effects of bonfire smoke. I sold it to national magazine, Practical Gardening and received about £40, I think.

More articles followed, including a regular column in Writers’ Monthly on technology. Computers were starting to become more widely available, along with the internet and email. It was great to get in at the beginning and secure a regular feature, which ran until the magazine closed down.

But I’d always wanted to write novels. After a couple of mediocre psychological thrillers, I found my niche with murder mysteries, thanks to Miss Marple, Morse and a fictional PI called Kinsey Millhone. Determined to use what I knew, I created Kent Fisher, an environmental health officer who solved murders. The stories were intended as a contemporary classic whodunit in the vein of Agatha Christie.

Thanks to Fisher’s Fables, a humorous blog about my experiences as the manager of an environmental health team, I found my author voice. It led to my first crime novel, No Accident, being published in 2016. Since then I’ve written four more whodunits.

Me.

I remember Writers’ Monthly and have always loved technology so I probably read your column!

What about your plans for the future?

Robert

I can’t think beyond the Kent Fisher novel I’m writing. As a pantser, I don’t plan in any detail. I usually have a scene, a snippet of dialogue or a theme I’d like to develop and start from there. As I write each chapter, the story becomes more complicated. I have more ideas as I progress until I reach a point where I have a fairly good idea what the story is about.

As the actions of Kent Fisher and other characters determine where the story goes, there are always surprises in store. They don’t always behave as expected and can take the story to places I hadn’t foreseen. When this occurs in the backstory, it can have a profound effect on what follows.

Before I start the next book in the series, I have to consider all the backstory issues, like Kent’s work, his animal sanctuary, relationships. Once I know where I’m going with these, I begin to think about the murders.

As long as this continues to work, and I write to a publishable standard, I will continue with the Kent Fisher mysteries.

I’ve also started writing a collection of the humorous events that I’ve had during my career as an environmental health officer. It’s provisionally entitled, When a Health Inspector Calls, and is a work in progress.

Me.

Sounds great!  I’ll look out for it.  Now, tell us three things we might not know about you.

Robert.

1. I’m half Italian, though I can’t tell you which half.
2. I won a national 500-word short story competition at the age of 12. This is what prompted me to ask for a typewriter for my 13^th birthday.
3. At the age of four, I almost drowned in a swimming pool. We were in a circle, playing Ring a Ring a Roses and I went under. No one noticed for some time, I was told, so I was lucky to survive. I was 15 before I plucked up the courage to enter a swimming pool again. That’s why I’m happy to remain on dry land.

Me.

Thank you so much for a fascinating interview, Robert.  It’s been fun.

Social Media Links, website etc.

Website – https://robertcrouch.co.uk

Twitter – @robertcrouchuk

Facebook – https://www.facebook.com/robertcrouchauthor

Amazon – https://www.amazon.co.uk/-/e/B01HFPCYOM

The all important buy link.

No Accident – https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B0747S2YMP

Author Bio

In a crowded crime fiction market, it’s difficult to offer readers something original and fresh.

Inspired by his love of cosy murder mysteries, featuring characters like Miss Marple, Kinsey Millhone and Inspector Morse, Robert Crouch drew on his extensive experience as an environmental health officer to create a different kind of detective.

Only Kent Fisher’s not a detective – he’s an environmental health officer who uncovers a murder only he can solve.

This fresh approach to the murder mystery adds a contemporary and often irreverent twist to the traditional whodunit, offering readers something familiar but different.

After reading No Accident, bestselling author, Tamara McKinley, believes ‘Agatha Christie fans will loveit.’

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Duke – an update

Our 9 year old rescue Dalmatian, Duke, has caused us a lot of worry when he had to have emergency spinal surgery in November and has since had to learn to walk again. His recovery is slow, which as anyone who knows Dalmatians will appreciate is not something that comes naturally to them. But, thanks to the skill of the nurses and surgeons at Langford Veterinary College and loads of physio and hydrotherapy he is getting there. Our biggest challenge is keeping him quiet and calm!

Note: The above picture shows him quiet and calm. This does not happen very often!

One of my favourite short stories

I was delighted to be a guest on crime writer Robert Crouch‘s blog recently and he asked some really interesting questions which were a joy to answer.

But the one that stood out – and the reason for this post – was: ‘what was the best compliment you’ve ever received for one of your books?’  (A great question to ask an author!)

I said:

“I think the best compliment of all is that someone has taken the trouble to read one of them and I am grateful to each and everyone of my readers, particularly those who are kind enough to leave a review.  I treasure every single one.  

“But one of my most treasured compliments came from a story I wrote for Woman’s Weekly.  It was about a widow, struggling to come to terms with her husband’s sudden death,  who was persuaded to keep a journal to write down her feelings.  She did so quite reluctantly but gradually came to discover just how very therapeutic writing can be. The magazine forwarded a letter they’d received from a reader, saying that she too had been recently widowed and that after reading my story, had tried keeping a journal.  And it had worked!  She found (as all writers know) that writing can be the best therapy.  That just blew me away!  

“In fact, while I’m thinking about it, I am going to put that story on my blog,”

And here it is!  So, if you’ve come here from Robert’s excellent website, welcome.

The 100 Day Journal

It was a beautiful book.  Thick creamy pages and a butter soft leather cover in a deep midnight blue.  Sue frowned as she flicked through the empty pages.

“What is it?” she asked out of politeness.  She didn’t really want to know.

“It’s a journal, Mum” Melanie said.  “You write in it.  I read this article that said how writing can be a good therapy and I thought it might help.  You know, if you write about how you’re feeling, that sort of thing.”

Help? If Sue had the energy, she would scream at her daughter.  “You think writing about my feelings would help?” she’d yell. “That putting a few words down on a page is going to fill this huge gaping hole in my life since John died?”

But Melanie was looking so anxious, so eager to help that Sue’s little spark of anger faded away, to be replaced by the usual numbness that settled back around her shoulders like an old grey blanket.

“Thank you,” she said quietly and put the book on the coffee table, intending to put it in a drawer later.  

Melanie gave a long shaky sigh, like she’d been holding her breath. “I read the article and it says that for it to work, you need to write in it every day for 100 days.”

Sue shook her head.  “I don’t think I can do that. I wouldn’t know what to write about.”

“Oh, that’s easy.  You just write about what you’ve done, or seen.  Maybe even what you feel.”

“But I can’t write -“

“It doesn’t matter.  You’re the only one who’ll see it.  Promise me you’ll give it a try, Mum?”

She looked so anxious that Sue found herself promising and quite forgot to ask why one hundred days.

Day 1.

Melanie came. Gave me this book. Said I should write in it every day for 100 days.  How I feel, what I’ve done. That sort of thing.  All nonsense really but I promised to give it a go.

Day 2.

Today I did – nothing. Felt – nothing.  Saw – nothing.

Day 3.

Today I did – nothing. Felt – nothing.  Saw – nothing.

…

Day 7 (I think. Forgot to count)

Today I did – nothing. Felt – nothing.  Saw – nothing. As usual.

Day 8

Melanie came. Asked how I was getting on with the journal.  Showed her and I could see she was disappointed that I’d written the same thing on every page.  But that is what my life is like now.  Same nothingness. Every day. No point in trying to explain though.

Day 9. 

Today I did – nothing. Felt – nothing.  Saw – nothing.

Day 10.

Today I did – nothing. Felt – nothing.  Saw – nothing. (Added later) Not true.  My sister came by and I’m really quite cross with her.  I thought it better to write it down rather than say it to her face.  Margaret, you’re a bossy, interfering woman.  Always has been ever since we were children.  Just because she’s a couple of years older than me, she thinks she knows what’s best for me. 

And now she wants me to meet this – this Arthur.  But there’s no way I’m going to do that.

Day 11.

Nothing. 

Day 12.

Margaret came today.  Took me to meet this Arthur.  And it was really funny.  He didn’t want to know me any more than I wanted to know him.  Ha! Serve her right for interfering.  “Give him time,” she said.  “He needs to learn to trust again. He’s got no reason to trust humans, not after the way he’s been treated.”

Day 13

I went to Margaret’s precious Animal Rescue Centre again today.  I wasn’t going to but that dog’s sad eyes haunted me so that I couldn’t sleep last night.  I told her I didn’t want a dog.  She said fine.  I told him I didn’t want a dog and that it was nothing personal but he turned his head away and wouldn’t look at me.  Margaret says it’s the human contact he needs.  He says (in dog body language) ‘Go away and leave me alone.’  Well, I know that feeling well enough.  So I will respect his wishes.

Day 14

Didn’t go to the Animal Rescue Centre.  But I can’t help wondering how Arthur is.

Day 18.

Margaret called to say Arthur’s not eating and they’re worried about him.  Said he seemed to have taken to me so will I come?  But when I got there, he was as aloof as ever.  But this time, instead of leaving him, I sat down next to him and talked.  There in that scruffy little cage thing that is now his home, I told him things I’ve never told another human being. Of course he’s not a human being. I know that. But even so I told him how frightened I was when John collapsed, how I was frozen into inaction.  How I’m sure there were things I could have done to have saved him.  CPR, I think they call it.  Only I didn’t.  I just stood there, shouting his name and panicking. How I thought if I shouted at him loud enough, he’d come back. And how guilty I feel about it now and how I can’t look  our Melanie in the eye, because my pathetic behaviour robbed her of her beloved Dad.  Arthur didn’t respond.  Kept his head turned firmly towards the wall and I can’t say I blamed him.

Day 23

I slept better last night.  Must be all the exercise I’m getting, now I’ve taken to going up to the Rescue Centre every day to walk Arthur.  Not that he seems to enjoy it.  Just plods around the field, does what he has to do.  Never stops to sniff or follow rabbits.  Still won’t look at me when I talk to him but  after we’ve finished our walk and I take him back to his pen, I sit down beside him and keep talking anyway.  Now that I’ve started talking to him, I can’t seem to stop.  He doesn’t tell me what to do, or say that I’m doing great when I’m not – or tell me what I should be feeling. So I told him about the central heating playing up today and how fixing it was always John’s job.  I was going to ask Margaret’s Brian to look in and sort it for me.  But do you know what, I got out the manual, read it through carefully, twiddled a few knobs and what do you know?  Job done.

Day 28 (I think.  Losing count!)

Melanie’s going to tell me off for not writing in this every day  but I can’t see what good it’s doing.  Every day is much the same.  I go to the Rescue Centre most days to walk Arthur and have a chat.  But he doesn’t respond.  Maybe that’s what I like about him.  I can (and do) talk to him about everything and he doesn’t try to make things right for me, or tell me what I should do or how I should be feeling.  He doesn’t respond to me in any way.  Except today.  Today, I was telling him about how I’d woken up this morning, thinking I’d had this awful dream about John being dead.  And that crushing, awful thud to my stomach when I looked across to his side of the bed and realised it wasn’t a dream.  As I was saying this, I felt something cold on my hand and went to brush it away, when I realised it was Arthur’s nose.  He touched my hand briefly then went back to his customary staring at the wall.

Now what am I going to do?  I told Margaret and she said that was a brilliant sign, that I was the first human he’d responded to.  But I don’t want him to respond to me. I don’t want him to be dependent on me.  And I certainly don’t want a dog.

Day 30

Five more nothing days.  I decided not to go to the Rescue Centre, that I was being selfish, letting Arthur think I cared about him when if I’m honest, I was only using him as a sounding board.  Might as well talk to the wall, like Shirley Valentine.  Only I don’t.  Any more than I talk to this journal.  Nothing. Nothing. Nothing.

Day 32.

I went to the Rescue Centre again today.  Had to check up on Arthur one last time.  Margaret wasn’t there and the girl on the desk didn’t know me.  But when I went to Arthur’s pen, there was another dog there.  I asked the girl what happened to the other dog, the weird looking brown one with mis-matched eyes called Arthur and she said he’d gone.  Has he been rehomed?  Or was he -? She didn’t know.  Said she’d go and find out.  But I didn’t wait for her to come back.  I hurried away, came home and cried my eyes out.

You see, I knew I shouldn’t have got involved with that dog and am furious with Margaret for pushing me into it.  Then, in the middle of my cry, what do you know?  The bloody central heating broke down. Again.  Nothing I ever do works and I –

Day 33

What a day.  I was writing this yesterday when Margaret came by.  She said Gilli at the Rescue Centre was worried she may have upset me.  About Arthur.  It was her first day and she doesn’t know any of the animals or the helpers.  So, what about Arthur? I asked, hardly daring to breathe.  He’s fine, she said. Missing you though.  All the time you were coming, he was gradually improving, eating a little more, taking more of an interest.  But he’s gone back to the way he was when he first came in now.

I felt a wave of relief. I thought he was…  

Day 34.

I don’t want a dog.  I told Arthur that and he’s ok with that.  I said I’d come and visit him at the Rescue Centre and he shrugged and turned his head away.  I told him I was busy and wouldn’t have time for daily walks.  And that my garden probably isn’t big enough.  And I don’t have room in my kitchen for a dog basket.  He said nothing.  

I said I have the TV on too loud which he would hate.  I told him that I get days when I’m very, very low and don’t want to talk to or see anyone.  And that I’m grumpy in the mornings. I told him next door has a cat who would hiss and spit at him.  That there was probably room in my bedroom for his basket provided he didn’t snore.  And that if his presence in the garden kept next door’s cat away from my bird table, that would be a good thing.

He said nothing.  But gave a tiny, almost imperceptible flick of his tail as he touched my hand with his cold, cold nose.