Tuesday, October 17, 2017

Murder by the Barrel (A Libby Sarjeant Murder Mystery Series) by Lesley Cookman Giveaway & Interview


Series: Libby Sarjeant series number 18 (can be read as a standalone)
Genre: Cosy crime
Release Date: 5th October
Publisher: Accent Press
When the village of Steeple Martin announces its first beer festival, the locals are excited. Beer, sun and music, what could possibly go wrong?

But when an unexpected death shakes the village, it’s up to Libby Sarjeant and friends to solve the puzzle.

Was it just another rock star death or is there something more sinister afoot?

BUY LINKS



About The Author:
Lesley Cookman writes the Libby Sarjeant Mysteries and the Edwardian mystery series, The Alexandrians. She has a varied background as a model, an air stewardess (when it was posh), a nightclub DJ (in a silver sparkly catsuit), editor of a Music Hall magazine, The Call Boy, a magazine called The Poulty Farmer, and pantomime writer and director. She lives on the Kent coast and has four grown up children who are variously musicians and writers, two grandchildren and two cats, not necessarily in that order.


Interview:

1.    What literary pilgrimages have you gone on?
1 If you mean going to places where authors lived or worked, I suppose I have, although I didn’t know I was. I spent a large number of holidays as a child in Broadstairs, and I live in East Kent and inadvertantly travel to various sites associated with Dickens.

2.    What is the first book that made you cry?
2 Golly. I cry at films, plays and documentaries sometimes, but I don’t think I’ve ever cried at a book. Perhaps I simply avoid those I think might have that effect!.

3.    Does writing energize or exhaust you?
3 Oh, exhaust, without a doubt.

4.    What is your writing Kryptonite?
4 Not sure what that means, but I can’t think of anything except the work itself that has a dampening effect.

5.    Did you ever consider writing under a pseudonym?
5 I have. Two early category romance novels that I didn’t own to – although they have subsequently been re-published.

6.    What other authors are you friends with, and how do they help you become a better writer?
6 I have a huge circle of writer friends – mostly from when I wrote those two romance novels and was persuaded to join the RNA in the days even before email groups. Notably, right from the beginning, Katie Fforde, Jenny Haddon (Sophie Weston) Bernardine Kennedy, Christina Jones and Judy Astley. I’m still friends with them all.

7.    Do you want each book to stand on its own, or are you trying to build a body of work with connections between each book?
7 I am currently working on book 19 in a mystery series. I hope that each book stands alone, but I’m sure they are better if read in context. There are currently two books in another series which I shall get round to when I’ve got a minute...

8.    What authors did you dislike at first but grew into?
8 Can’t think of any. Not keen on Nabokov, Fielding or Hardy, but I’ve grown into Hardy’s poetry.

9.    What’s your favorite under-appreciated novel?
9 My own.

10.                       As a writer, what would you choose as your mascot/avatar/spirit animal?
10 A cat, I suppose.

11.                       How many unpublished and half-finished books do you have?
11  A couple of early romances and several which got as far as a chapter and petered out. This was when writing was work, but story-telling was a hobby. This was mainly because I got paid for everything I wrote and I couldn’t afford the time to spend on a possibly unpublishable novel.

12.                       What did you edit out of this book?
12 Nothing other than the things the editor found – typos, etc.

13.                       If you didn’t write, what would you do for work?
13 I wouldn’t. I’m past official retirement age, so I’m grateful that writing keeps me in work!

14.                       Do you hide any secrets in your books that only a few people will find?
14 No – except once, when infuriated with someone I included them in a story and changed their sex. The group of friends who were also infuriated all recognised the character. Perhaps I wasn’t subtle enough.

15.                       What is your favorite childhood book?
15 Oh, so many. How long have you got? The Swish of the Curtain by Pamela Brown, The Little White Horse by Elizabeth Goudge, all the Monica Edwards Romney Marsh books, Malcolm Savill’s Lone Pine series, Pooh, The Famous Five (a long way behind, though, Enid Blyton) and by the time I was 9 and allowed the run of my parents’ bookcases, the Nagaio Marsh Roderick Alleyn series,Three Men In A Boat, I Capture The Castle... Sorry – is that too much?



GIVEAWAY
An ecopy of Murder by The Barrel

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