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| Val McDermid webchat – post your questions now | Val McDermid webchat – post your questions now |
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| Post your questions for Val McDermid | Post your questions for Val McDermid |
| Scottish crime writer Val McDermid is a leading light of “tartan noir”, though she spent many years living in England and one of her best known characters – the kick-boxing private investigator Kate Brannigan – is from Manchester. | Scottish crime writer Val McDermid is a leading light of “tartan noir”, though she spent many years living in England and one of her best known characters – the kick-boxing private investigator Kate Brannigan – is from Manchester. |
| Asked what she meant by tartan noir, the Fife-born, Edinburgh based writer has described it as a tradition started by William McIlvanney’s 1977 novel Laidlaw: “[It] encompasses a wide range of work, from apparent rural douceness to raw urban savagery. But it seems to me that all of us who write from that Scottish sensibility have common underpinnings that draw us together and distinguish us from our English, Welsh and Irish colleagues.” | Asked what she meant by tartan noir, the Fife-born, Edinburgh based writer has described it as a tradition started by William McIlvanney’s 1977 novel Laidlaw: “[It] encompasses a wide range of work, from apparent rural douceness to raw urban savagery. But it seems to me that all of us who write from that Scottish sensibility have common underpinnings that draw us together and distinguish us from our English, Welsh and Irish colleagues.” |
| She has used multi-book series to create not just crime novels but crime universes. Brannigan, hardbitten journalist Lindsay Gordon, and psychologist-detective combo of Tony Hill and Carol Jordan have all delved into twisted criminal impulses, while having their own emotions picked out in detailed relief. | She has used multi-book series to create not just crime novels but crime universes. Brannigan, hardbitten journalist Lindsay Gordon, and psychologist-detective combo of Tony Hill and Carol Jordan have all delved into twisted criminal impulses, while having their own emotions picked out in detailed relief. |
| There have been bold left turns though, with McDermid’s quirky pair of books last year: a retelling of Jane Austen’s Northanger Abbey and Forensics: The Anatomy of Crime, a non-fiction history of forensic science from 13th century China to the networked crimes of today (and with an accompanying Wellcome Collection exhibition). Relentlessly prolific, she has recently introduced a new detective, Karen Pirie, in her novel The Skeleton Road which is out in paperback this week. | |
| She is joining us to answer your questions in a live webchat at 1pm on Wednesday 25 March. Post your questions in the comments below about anything in her life or career, and she’ll try and answer as many as possible. | She is joining us to answer your questions in a live webchat at 1pm on Wednesday 25 March. Post your questions in the comments below about anything in her life or career, and she’ll try and answer as many as possible. |
| Updated at 4.41pm GMT |