Beware Zombies on Steroids!

NEWS

Dark Water published 5th August 2010

EVENTS

20-23 May 2010 - Bristol Crimefest

3 June 2010 - Millport Library

22-25 July 2010 - Harrogate Crimefest

You can now get in touch with me on Facebook, or on email at caro.ramsay@ntlworld.com should you want to book me for any events etc.

Hi All,

Well it has been an exciting week - and volcanic ash permitting I think the next two weeks are going to be even better! There has been lots of tooing and froing from publishers to agents and back again. The German publisher of Absolution and Singing to the Dead are buying Dark Water. Indeed the commissioning editor said she wanted to buy it after reading the prologue. Praise indeed. Funny thing is you never know how a book is going to be received until its out there doing the rounds and up for grabs. Penguin, the British publisher, have called me to a meeting in London to discuss the re-packaging and the German publishers are following suit. As long as they don't try and re-package me as Cheryl Cole - far too fond of fried egg rolls to be that thin!

Weegie Wednesday was as interesting as ever ... as usual the speakers provoked much, although unintentional, discussion (we didn't really have a clue what they were going on about so we - at the bar - were just making it up). I think they both have a future career in politics saying a lot and saying nothing at all! But that might be me ... Or maybe just a Glasgow thing - I don't think we do well with words like motivation, action, function, communication, harmonise and facilitate ... much easier just to get on with it. We had a strange little bit at the bar - all to ourselves - it was a bit like middle earth, a weird but glorious sub-culture of extreme violence. Helen Fitzgerald, fab Aussie Glasgow-based crime was telling us about the identity parade of the hacked off penis's (not from personal experience - well I don't THINK from personal experience) while the great 'Will' was talking about mutant babies taking over the world and how this could be prevented. Looking at David Cameron and Nick Clegg I think Will might be too late. There was defo talk of a disembowelled pigeon blowing up St Enoch Centre and should zombies be put on steroids? One for the anti doping lobby there. Seriously though, I had been writing a bit where a female in a forest gets fired at by a sniper. I had her react to something hit the ground beside her... And an ex soldier pulls her into cover - as I thought a normal person would have no idea they were being shot at by a long range sniper - speed of bullet versus speed of sound etc - my editor scribbled - why? Is she deaf? Ex royal marine questioned at bar in middle earth agreed with me and told me technical words like 'bloody scary' and 'shitless'. Maybe the snipers could take on the mutant ninja babies!

Was also at Rutherglen High School -8 pupils decided they wanted to interview me (God help them!) I'm convinced they think I'm related to Gordon Ramsay - at least they asked if I was his sister ... and not if I was his mother! Been asked that before. I explained that I do swear a lot but I'm useless at both football and cooking. I don't think he's too hot at crime writing come to think about it.

The kids are great though. Kids on high octane thought processes with little steering - good on zombies and ideas for body disposal especially for the disposal of the body of the maths teacher sitting at the side of the room. In the end we decided to weight her body down and have her skeletonised by prawns. I used to feel that way about my maths teacher as well.

And last week, we have a new government - mutant shiny people are in charge. Strange thought is that the country was doing very well with nobody in charge. Do you remember Yes Minister - it's all the Sir Humphries that really run things. Personally I always thought Victoria Wood would be rather good at running the country - free duvets for the elderly on the NHS, Hellman's Mayonnaise on prescription and ban anything on the tv with Andrew Lloyd Webber in it or the word celebrity in the title ... apart from celebrity death squad!!

And my pitbull type dog wants to say hello to Figbane! Stripey dogs of the world unite.

So, I am still polishing up on my Desmond Bagley and Duncan Kyle for the crimefest tomorrow - full of plot lines that would not work nowadays with the use of mobile phones.

Going to Bristol means I'm missing Lesley McDowell's launch on Thursday at Waterstones ... all writing women should go!! Google her and see what it is all about. Great stuff.

Caro