The summer sun arrived just in time for Crimefest. As my taxi drew up outside the Bristol Marriott Hotel, all over College Green people were enjoying the warm weather, lounging on the grass eating lunch. I could tell it was going to be a great weekend and it was.
I wasn't even wearing my name badge when a lady came up to me and said ‘You're Linda Stratmann aren't you? I love your books!’ That was such a wonderful thing to be greeted with! Soon afterwards I bumped into Lizzie Hayes and learned that the photo of my latest book launch is to be on the cover of the next issue of Mystery People.
Crimefest is about so many things; catching up with friends, meeting new people, gathering useful information, all the great guests and panels, the fun social events, and the wonderful atmosphere that is always generated by so many creative people in the same place at the same time. While I was there a book plot that had been lurking unformed in my mind suddenly blossomed and came together in spectacular fashion. Above all Crimefest is a friendly festival, where writers and readers meet and have a good time.
I was involved in two events, a panel on historical crime writing and a solo spotlight session, which I entitled Victorian Midsomer, Inventing a Community. In this I was talking about how the idea of Victorian Bayswater as a kind of Midsomer, a place where everything happens, occurred to me and how I have created a thriving community with its own characters, societies and organisations which interact to produce a rich background for my plots. At the end of the talk, one of the audience revealed that he was Douglas Watkinson one of the originators of Midsomer Murders, which caused me a moment of alarm until he reassured me that I had understood the concept of the show.
The panel, Not All Downton – the British Perspective - was moderated with great skill by Patrick Easter and the other panellists were Imogen Robertson, Andrew Martin and Dolores Gordon-Smith. One of the really fun things about doing this panel was that we knew each other and so there was a lot of friendly interaction. All of us enjoy taking that time machine into the past and making it live for the reader. What came across was that we all enjoy writing about our chosen periods and there is real pleasure in the search for fascinating facts. It’s easy of course to be distracted in the process of research and travel down an unintended avenue, but sometimes as Imogen said that can lead to unexpected gems one would never otherwise have found, and in my case I often make a note of discoveries which many years later I get the chance to revisit and explore.
My other highlights in a weekend of highlights – listening to Simon Brett’s hugely witty pastiches; meeting Maureen Jennings who writes the Murdoch Mysteries and Thomas Craig who plays Inspector Brackenreid, my team coming second in the pub quiz, meeting Rachel the publicist from the History Press and generating lots of ideas, and sampling Icelandic schnapps.
Here’s to next year!
Linda's crime fiction series featuring Victorian sleuth, Frances Doughty is available from The History Press, the latest enstalement, An Appetite for Murder is out now!