Wednesday 27th March 2024
19:00 at Waterstones, Brighton
We’re so excited to be relaunching the Brighton Crime Wave for 2024. To start out, we have a fantastic evening where Julia Crouch discusses setting crime fiction in and around Brighton with two wonderful Brighton-based authors.
One Of The Good Guys has been receiving some terrific reviews since its release in January, and we’re delighted that Araminta has accepted our invitation to be part of March’s Crime Wave.
The novel centres around Cole & Lennie, each of whom have moved to the coast craving solitude, where they meet and begin a relationship. But, as this relationship develops, two young women go missing nearby while on a walk protesting gendered violence. Cole & Lennie find themselves at the heart of the police investigation and media frenzy, and it soon becomes apparent how little the pair actually know about each other.
Joining Araminta will be former detective turned crime writer Graham Bartlett, who will be talking about the latest installment in his DS Jo Howe series, ‘City On Fire’.
Having lost her sister to an overdose, Chief Superintendent Jo Howe is desperate to tackle the all consuming drug trade that plays out in the grimy backstreets of Brighton. However, it is not just the street criminals that Jo finds herself taking on. There are powerful people with connections in very high and murky places who have a vested interest in seeing her venture fail. How will she survive being caught in the line of fire?
THE GRILLING
Every Crime Wave features a half-hour session where we grill a debut or fairly new author. It’s a great opportunity to find out about a new talent. This month Stu Cummins will be grilling local author Katy Massey.
Katy was a journalist for many years before studying for an MA and PhD in Creative Writing from Newcastle University. Her memoir, Are We Home Yet? was published in 2020 and praised by Bernardine Evaristo as ‘a gem’. It was shortlisted for the Jhalak Prize and the Portico Prize. In addition, her fiction and nonfiction has been widely anthologised, including Common People edited by Kit de Waal, The Place for Me from Scholastic, and speculative collection Glimpse. All Us Sinners, published in March 2024 by Sphere, is her first novel. It is an unusual take on the crime genre, featuring Maureen, a tough but tender-hearted brothel-keeper in 1970s Leeds, who is unexpectedly drawn into the killing of a friend’s son. These events take place against the disturbing backdrop of the Yorkshire Ripper’s murders. A second book in this series will appear in 2025.