2:37pm Thursday 18th February 2010
Mark Billingham remembers the spark of inspiration that led to a successful career as a crime novelist.
It was a conversation with a technical advisor for the BBC’s Casualty, that resulted in the first installment in the Barnet author’s series of bestselling Detective Inspector Tom Thorne stories.
“I’d read The Diving Bell and The Butterfly by Jean-Dominique Bauby, which was about locked-in syndrome (a condition in which a patient is aware and awake, but cannot move or communicate except by blinking),” he says.
“I went to him and said: ‘Could you do this to someone on purpose?’ ‘Well you could, but it would be really difficult and if you didn’t get it right, you’d kill them.’ I thought, ‘Boom. That’s it’.”
Thus followed Sleepyhead, published in 2001, the first of Mark’s eight Tom Thorne books.
Prior to penning these novels, Mark, 48, was a stand up comedian and actor, playing minor TV roles in shows including The Bill, Boon and Dempsey & Makepeace, as well as a literary reviewer.
“I was devouring crime fiction by writers from both sides of the Atlantic, so I began writing about the subject as a way to get free books,” he recalls. “I interviewed authors, went to conventions and did reviews for newspapers and magazines. The missing piece of the jigsaw was to sit down and write a crime novel myself.
“During a fortnight’s holiday with the family, I wrote a third of a novel, sent it off to a bunch of agents and chose one of the two who were interested. It went to auction with several publishers and that was it. Essentially, I got incredibly lucky very fast.”
Originally from Birmingham, Mark now combines family life with his writing. But despite the kids being at school all day, he still finds the two or three hours after midnight to be the most productive time.
“Looking out the window at darkness as opposed to a nice garden with squirrels scampering about is less distracting.”
Mark’s latest Tom Thorne novel, Blood Line, is published by Sphere.
Mark will be headline speaker at Verulam Writers’ Circle Get Writing conference in St Albans on Saturday, February 20. Details: www.vwc.org
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