Eight years ago, the Theakston’s Old Peculier Crime Writing Festival changed my life.

My first Mick Herron book! It was just after this that Mick taught me to remove the word 'just’ from my vocabulary. (I’d said I was ‘just a reader’ and he told me off. (Nicely, of course!)

Sounds a bit hyperbolic, doesn’t it? Except that’s exactly what happened. If I hadn’t attended, despite not knowing a single person in real life, my life would look very different now. I wouldn’t have a career I love and am passionate about. I wouldn’t have met some of my very best, lifelong friends who I cannot imagine being without today. And I certainly would not have met and become friendly with some of my favourite authors.

Seven years ago, I embarked on a six-hour train journey from the south coast to Harrogate. (I remember I read a whole book; these days train journeys are for work!) After I arrived at my hotel and unpacked, I stopped in the bar for a nerve-settling gin and tonic and then made my way over to the Old Swan Hotel, hoping I would bump into someone I knew from Facebook quite quickly.

I can remember walking up the driveway and seeing Mark Billingham and Mark Edwards standing outside the main entrance. The were chatting, just like normal people; not at all like the literary superstars I believed them to be! I learned very quickly, this was perfectly normal, and that weekend I met authors whose books I had been reading for years. (Some of them even know my name now!)

It took me ages to warm up the courage to ask Ian for a photo!

Meeting some of my heroes and finding my tribe of humans were just two ways the festival changed my life. If that was all that had happened, I would still be eternally grateful to whoever it was who persuaded me to come along, but there was more to come.

I’m pleased to say, Abir has become a great friend and supporter.

One of the many people I met that first weekend was Betsy Reavley, director of indie publisher, Bloodhound Books. We drank together in the sunshine and whiled away a few hours chatting. From somewhere, probably the gin, the idea came that I should ask her for a job. (Very unlike me to be so bold at the time.) I’d heard all about being a commissioning advisor from another new friend, and I knew in my bones this would be a job I was good at.

Even more unusually for me, I followed up with an email when I got home. And then another after the summer holidays. By October of the same year, I could officially say I worked in publishing. Pinch me!

By Harrogate time the following year, I had left my very-well-paid career job and was retraining as an editor and proofreader. I was also working part-time for Bloodhound Books. I was literally reading books for a living.

I was living the dream, as they say.

Then life got even better. In 2022 I attended my fifth Harrogate only this time, I was a published author. The outpouring of love and support I received from my bookish friends, all of whom I had met and grown close to at book festivals, were there celebrating with me. It was an experience like no other and one I often look back on fondly.

HAD to have a pic with my first book baby, Open Your Eyes, on the big green chair!

You see, the crime fiction book world is the most supportive community I have ever come across. These last seven years have been the first time in my life I have felt like I truly fit in: like I have friends who are loyal and will support me no matter what. People are so willing to take time out of their day to help, if they can. There is no jealousy between writers; so at odds with the competitiveness I have experienced in other jobs.

Some of my absolute faves in this picture! (I believe Richard Osman had just bought the whole tent a drink!)

Every now and then, I stop and look back on everything that’s happened over the last few years, and I pinch myself. These days I am General Coordinator for the Crime Writers’ Association, I write books, and I help authors polish their own work. I have my dream job.

So yeah – Harrogate really did change my life.

I’ve not been on a panel at Harrogate – yet! – but I did host a table at the author dinner in 2024, and that’s almost the same thing!