The Death of Mrs Westaway Blog Tour

Hello everyone and welcome to my stop on The Death of Mrs Westaway blog tour! The Death of Mrs Westaway is one of my favourite reads of 2018. If you like bleak family dramas with an Agatha Christie style mystery running through it then you are going to love this book! Today I've had the absolute pleasure of interviewing Ruth Ware for my stop on the tour and I'm also giving one of you lucky lot the chance to win a signed copy of The Death of Mrs Westaway and a special set of signed tarot cards to go with it!

Hi Ruth, welcome to the blog! Can you tell us a little bit about The Death of Mrs Westaway and what sparked the idea behind it? 

The Death of Mrs Westaway is about a tarot reader, Hal Westaway, who receives a letter telling her that she has inherited a substantial bequest from her grandmother Hester. There is just one problem - Hal’s grandparents died many years ago, and this woman is a total stranger to her. However she sets out to collect the bequest anyway.

I’m not sure where exactly the idea for the novel came from, but the character of Hal is easier to pin down - having written three books where the main character was someone who stumbles into events through no fault of their own, I wanted to do something very different for my fourth. So I came up with the idea of a girl who sets out to commit a crime, and in doing so sets the whole complicated mechanism of the plot in motion.

What can fans of your previous books expect from this one?
I hope they’ll find some similar pleasures - a twisty plot, an atmospheric setting, and a dogged and determined main character. But it’s a little bit different too. It’s a little bit darker, a little bit more gothic than some of my previous books. And although my love of Christie is still there, students of literature will probably be able to see a strong influence from Daphne du Maurier in the settings and some of the characters.

Tarot cards play a huge role in The Death of Mrs Westaway, have you ever had a tarot card reading?
I have now - but I only went for one about halfway through writing the book. Prior to that I’d never had a tarot reading, and before I started researching for the book, I knew almost nothing about the meaning of the cards. I am not sure why I’d never tried it - I’m not a very superstitious person, and I suppose I was worried about being sucked into something embarrassing or some kind of con. Actually it was very entertaining!

Your books are constantly compared to Agatha Christie's work, does she influence your writing style?
Not my writing style, I don’t think. But definitely my plotting. I strive to do what she does so well - arm the reader with all the information they need to solve the plot, but still surprise them.

What’s been your best moment as an author so far?
Oh wow, gosh. There are so many! Probably finding out that Reese Witherspoon had read and loved my first book.

What does your typical writing day look like?
I have school age kids so I get up, get them ready for school and walk the little one to class. Then I get home about 9.30 and (try to) write until I leave to pick them up around 3. I say “try to” because I have good days and bad days. Some days I sit right down and write all the way through until pick up. Other days there’s an awful lot of dallying on social media…

Do you have any advice for aspiring thriller/mystery writers?
Just read lots in the genre I think, and pay attention to what you enjoy and how the writers pull the wool over your eyes.

What books would you recommend to fans looking for stories similar to your own? 
I love Erin Kelly, Megan Abbott, Sarah Vaughan, AJ Finn, SJ Watson, Lisa Jewell…

Can you tell us a bit about what you’re working on next? 
Book five, obviously!

And lastly, what three words best describe The Death of Mrs Westaway? 
Dark, gothic, twisty!

If you'd like the chance to win a signed copy of The Death of Mrs Westaway and tarot cards head on over to Twitter to enter! 

⭐GIVEAWAY⭐
Win a signed copy of #TheDeathofMrsWestaway by @RuthWareWriter and a signed set of tarot cards!
RT & Follow @JessHeartsBooks to enter
UK only #bookbloggers #thriller #blogtour #giveaway #win https://t.co/UTQ04unNi3 @DeadGoodBooks @HarvillSecker pic.twitter.com/geHtqAn1RJ

— Jess Hearts Books (@JessHeartsBooks) June 29, 2018

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The Marriage Pact Blog Tour

Hello everyone and welcome to my stop on The Marriage Pact blog tour! Today I am giving 5 of my lucky readers the chance to win a copy of the book. In case this gripping thriller isn't on your radar yet here is a little bit about it...

"It's the perfect wedding gift. Newlyweds Jake and Alice are offered membership of a club which promises members will never divorce. Signing The Pact seems the ideal start to their marriage. Until one of them breaks the rules. Because The Pact is for life. And its members will go to any lengths to ensure nobody leaves..." 

 I'm so excited to read this book that has been praised by authors such as JP Delaney, Lisa Gardner and Gin Phillips.

 For your chance to win a copy of The Marriage Pact head over to Twitter 

⭐️GIVEAWAY⭐️
Win 1/5 copies of #TheMarriagePact
RT & Follow @JessHeartsBooks to enter
UK only #Giveaway #BookBlogger #Thriller #CrimeFiction pic.twitter.com/CsbRSc6wGn

— Jess Hearts Books (@JessHeartsBooks) July 30, 2017

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Mystery & Mayhem Blog Tour: Robin Stevens

Welcome to my stop on the Mystery and Mayhem blog tour! I'm delighted to be bringing to you a guest post from one of my favourite authors Robin Stevens on the origins of her short story The Mystery of Room 12.

The Origins of ‘The Mystery of Room 12’ by Robin Stevens 

Sometimes, stories just happen to you.

In spring last year I travelled to St-Annes-on-Sea for Storytellers Inc’s Midsummer Mystery festival. I knew I had a short story to write for a mystery anthology I was working on at Egmont, but I hadn’t been able to find inspiration for it yet. I wanted to challenge myself by creating something contemporary – after four books, the 30s felt dangerously comfortable, and I wanted to make sure I was actually capable of writing a detective story in a world with iPads and smartphones and Google. But where should I set it? And what could it be about?

It should have occurred to me that St-Annes-on-Sea was probably by the sea – but, somehow, what I found when I stepped off the train was a complete surprise. A miles-long expanse of beach and sky, beautiful but with a slightly eerie, off-season loneliness of it as the sun began to set, and one single donkey plodding along very slowly, far out on the sand. I stood and stared at it, and I thought to myself, this is a place that someone could get lost.

I wheeled my suitcase along the row of beachfront hotels until I found the one I’d been booked into. It was tall and white with elegant windows, like something from an episode of Poirot. And I suddenly realised that I wanted to set my story in a hotel, in a seaside town just like this one.

I went up the steps, and pushed open the front door. The hall was empty, the front desk lit by a big antique lamp with a fringed shade. I went up to the desk and rang the bell – and a gorgeously large and hairy dog leaped up out of nowhere, banged its front paws down on the wood of the desk and panted in my face. A hotel with a dog concierge! I thought. That sounds like the beginning of a story.

By the time I’d been shown to my room, at the top of a winding, narrow set of stairs, hung with paintings and lined by statues and figurines and china ornaments, lamps and tables and desks and drawers, the story was alive in my head. My detective would be a little boy called Jamie, who lived in a seaside hotel with his father and his pet dog. And the mystery, of course, would be a disappearing guest. Jamie would be a modern detective, with all of the gadgets of the 21st century at his disposal – but the mystery would still have to be all about careful observation and clever deductions, with three suspects and one bewildering question: what happened to the guest in Room 12?

The idea sat in my head for a month, and then I finally wrote it in August last year. Writing a short story turns out to be very different to writing a novel. A book is a marathon – slow and steady’s the way to go. But short stories are one sprinting burst of inspiration. It took me less than twenty-four hours to write 4,000 words of it – and it turns out that I love writing short stories. You can test yourself, try new things and explore ideas without the pressure of 60,000 words ahead of you. Trying to create a totally new character, too, was harder than I’d expected – I had to make Jamie seem real instantly, and different enough from Hazel, the narrator of my Murder Most Unladylike Mysteries, to be believable.

I hope Jamie and his story works – and, from reading the 11 other stories in the collection, I know that it’s in great company. The stories of Mystery & Mayhem are smart, funny, strange and gruesome. I never knew what to expect – and I hope that, when you read them, you’ll feel just as fascinated and delighted by them as I did.

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