Crime fiction

I imagine writing a crime novel is close to the middle of human experiences ranked by difficulty. It isn't brain surgery, but neither is it a walk in the park (although, conceivably, you could write a novel while doing either of those things, and I'm sure plenty have). I was fortunate to come from a family that loved books, and lucky to go to good schools, where books were bountiful.  Read more

For years, crime fiction titles have topped the bestseller lists and library lending tables. That sales of the genre have now overtaken general fiction, as revealed at the London Book Fair last week, comes as no surprise to its readers, practitioners, critics and industry professionals.

Between 2008 and 2012, I was a judge for the Eric Gregory award for poets under the age of 30. The prize was founded with the aim of encouraging young poets. Who could possibly object? One person did: a friend of mine in his 60s, who grimaced when he heard I was judging the prize. "Why is all the encouragement directed at young writers?" he asked.  Read more

Do we like reading about fictional rape? An affirmative answer would make us sleazy and voyeuristic, but it's a common enough fantasy and so present in our culture that to answer with an unequivocal no can't be right either. Yet it's conundrums like this that make living in rape culture so confusing.  Read more

Bestselling crime writer Mark Billingham has just joined the judging panel of Audible's New Writing Grant: The Crime Edition - the UK's first ever audio-first writing grant. In an exclusive piece for FutureBook he highlights that writing for audio is a skill distinct from novel writing, and champions the need to treat audio as a more than a mere add-on, but as a separate storytelling form.