Crime writer William Shaw confesses he’d be an awful criminal - Fishbourne Literary Fesitval

“I think generally that would be true of all crime writers – that crime writers would be terrible criminals. I think the key thing to be if you're writing crime is to be quite empathetic and I think if you have that empathy then you would probably be pretty rubbish as a criminal. You would be forever hesitating and wanting to revise it and thinking ‘Oh I need an editor!’ as you work yourself up for your crime.”

Plus also, as William says: “Crime writers are the loveliest people that you could ever meet. I started my crime writing in my early 50s and everyone I come across has been great. They really are the loveliest bunch of people which is surprising really because they do the most despicable things in their books!”

For Fishbourne, William will be offering a talk/discussion entitled See The World Through Crime-Tinted Glasses. It’s perhaps the best way of looking at it: “Don’t just think of crime fiction as escapist pleasure,” he says. “It’s the literature that’s saying the most about our world right now.

“Crime fiction has evolved and changed over the years.

"At the moment we're seeing a resurgence of the Agatha Christie style a bit but I do think crime fiction has become so much more diverse and basically it is reflecting the world that we live in.

"It is no longer just about the crime. It is about the times that we are in and if you look back over crime fiction then you will always get a good idea of the world that it was written for. Ian Rankin says that if you are travelling to somewhere, don't just buy the guide book if you want to find out more about the place. Buy some of the local crime fiction because it will give you a far better feeling for the place than the guide book will.”

The point is that it has to: “I think it is harder to convince a sceptical population of the reality of murder now. We are living in one of the safest societies we've ever lived in.

"The murder rate was down to something like 671 in England and Wales last year and that was partly because of the lockdowns.

"A few years ago it was in the 700s and we will continue to see that go down.

"The murder rates are in a progressive decline but if you pick up a crime fiction book you'll probably get four or five murders and the fact is that that is just incredibly unlikely. It is just so hard to believe.”

And that is the job of the writer – to persuade the reader that it is possible by playing on the fact that we are drawn instinctively to such books: “We want to be disturbed. We want to get drawn into the dark, dark woods. It is the centre of storytelling. When you think back to the ancient stories, they were all pretty dark tales!”

William’ latest book is The Trawlerman, the fourth in his series featuring set in Dungeness and featuring DI Alex Cupidi, who originally appeared as one of the characters in his 2016 novel The Birdwatcher.

Speaking at the sold-out Fishbourne Literary Festival on March 25 will be Claire Fuller, Phil Hewitt, Nicci French, Deborah Moggach and William Shaw in a full day’s programme from 10-4pm.

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