My Prison Book – Blood Tide

I’m delighted to say that Blood Tide is now available to purchase HERE in the Kindle Store where you can also Click Inside and read the first three chapters for free.

The price is £2. 83 (I forgot that VAT would be added hence the odd number of pence)  but as I like to say this is less than the price of a coffee in town, wherever your town maybe.

In my last post I said I would tell the story of how the novel came close to mainstream publication- so here it is in brief…

Blood Tide began as a novel about a girl forced to work in the sex trade and who went missing.To begin with I called it ‘Looking For Gina.’

I knew I wanted a young Iraq war veteran  in the story because at the time I was so appalled by the Iraq war and have always been appalled by the damage war does to men. I didn’t know however that there would be an ex prison Governor turned Private Investigator at the novel’s heart. This was a suggestion made to me by my writing buddy Wendy which I quickly took up.

I always knew I wanted to set the story in winter in Newcastle and Weardale.

I wrote the first draft 80,000 words – a chapter a day – in two months in Agde in France.I then worked hard to get it into shape for about a year when I got back.

When I first sent the novel to my agent I got an immediate and positive response – she liked it – she particularly liked the main characters and the dialogue. Things were looking good. It was picked up more or less straight away by an editor in a London publishing house who was keen to commission it. It went to the States to the co-publishers; was read there, and they declared in its favour. It looked like full steam ahead. I supplied the English publishers with photo, biography etc, etc. I foolishly, naively perhaps, thought we were home and dry.

Then suddenly everything went very quiet until finally after some months the editor said she was sorry but she was no longer in a position to commission crime fiction – not until 2012 at least. The story rolled on from there with other thwarted attempts (which I won’t go into) to sell by my agent until we finally agreed that the best way forward was Kindle !

All of this took several years and got to me the point where I began to lose my enthusiasm for writing. I know I’m not alone in this – that there are many other writers out there who’ve had a raw deal. I’m just very grateful to have found an alternative and retrieved my love of writing.

I think of Blood Tide as my ‘prison book.’ It would never have been written if I hadn’t worked at HMP Low Newton for all those years

Here is the DEDICATION and SPECIAL THANKS – as it appears at the front of the novel –

For John – for discovering the city with me.

Special thanks also to all my colleagues and friends in the Prison Service who do such a great job; without them life inside would have been so much harder. In particular, thanks to the lovely Carole for showing me the south side of the river and for the special day of freedom we enjoyed. To Tony – thank you for your friendship and unerring support and for sharing your stories with me.

Finally, thank you to David for the companionship, the honest feedback, and for truly helping to shape Danny Beck. And to Katie, for being there.