Jennifer Thomson's Blog, page 12

Hooray, Vile City is on BookBub today 99c 99p for a limited time

I'm delighted to announce that Vile City is featuring on the awesome BookBub today. You'll be able to get the eBook in a variety of formats (for a limited time) for the discounted price of 99 cents or 99p. 






So, if you haven't read Vile City already, why not give this twisty tale of office worker Shelley Craig's fight to stay alive so she can make it home and Inspector Duncan Waddell's relentless attempt to find her, a go? 

It'll cost you less than a cup of coffee.

You might just find another crime series to enjoy. Book 2 Cannibal City and 3 Vigilante City are already written. Book 4, Romeo City is well on its way.

Vile City - coming to BookBub July 6th

I'm delighted to announce that Vile City will be listed on the awesome BookBub on Thursday July 5th. You'll be able to get the eBook in a variety of formats (for a limited time) for a discounted price.

So, if you haven't read Vile City already, why not give this twisty tale of office worker Shelley Craig's fight to stay alive so she can make it home and Inspector Duncan Waddell's relentless attempt to find her, a go? It'll cost you less than a cup of coffee.

You might just find another crime series to enjoy. Book 2 Cannibal City and 3 Vigilante City are already written. Book 4, Romeo City is well on its way.

What happens after abducted Shelley Craig wakes up in Vile City?

What happens after Shelley Craig wakes up in Vile City after she's been abducted and her boyfriend left for dead? 

Here's an extract -
When Shelley came to, her throat was raw. Water. She needed water. With one hand, she groped for the glass she always kept on the bedside table.Damn, it wasn’t there. Must have moved it. She pulled herself into a sitting position. When she moved her head it was as though a part had broken off inside. She flopped back down. What had she done last night to get into this state? She hadn’t changed out of her work clothes; she was wearing her work trousers that pinched at her calves because Stuart hadn’t noticed the ‘dry clean only’ label and they’d shrunk in the wash. Trying to dredge up the last thing she remembered made her head hurt. Her disorientation wasn’t helped by being unable to see properly because her eyes were stuck together by the glue of sleep. She must have forgotten to take her contact lenses out.Wherever she was, it wasn’t at home. She was lying too low down and the place smelt of unwashed laundry and mould. Maybe she was sleeping on some pal’s floor after one cocktail too many. That had to be it. Think, damn it, think. When some light permeated the darkness, the jolt it gave her was a bolt of electricity to her brain. Stuart. He’d been attacked. Was he okay? A sob wracked her body as she forced herself to sit up. This wasn’t the time to get hysterical. She could do that later when she was safely at home.She rubbed her eyes with her fingers, picking away the sleep until she could see clearly. She was on a bare mattress on top of a rusty old bed frame, in a strange room with torn wallpaper and flaking paint on the wall. The bed creaked whenever she moved and she wanted to tell it to shut the hell up. She didn’t want him to hear. She remembered his voice in her ear, saying he’d kill Stuart unless she cooperated. Had he hurt him? That thought made her sob.He’d know she was awake and then what would he do – rape her? She didn’t think he’d done it already. Surely, she’d be able to tell, wouldn’t she?***TO BE CONTINUED***------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Vile City is available now -Amazon UKhttps://www.amazon.co.uk/Vile-City-Detective-thrilling-turner-ebook/dp/B06XG99CLW
Waterstones https://www.waterstones.com/book/vile-city/jennifer-lee-thomson/9781910720738
Amazon .com https://www.amazon.com/Vile-City-Detective-thrilling-turner-ebook/dp/B06XG99CLW
Amazon Canadahttps://www.amazon.ca/Vile-City-Detective-thrilling-turner-ebook/dp/B06XG99CLW
Amazon Australiahttps://www.amazon.com.au/Vile-City-Detective-thrilling-turner-ebook/dp/B06XG99CLW

What happens after abducted Shelley Craig wakes up in Vile City

What happens after abducted Shelley Craig wakes up in Vile City? Here's an extract - 



When Shelley came to, her throat was raw. Water. She needed water. With one hand, she groped for the glass she always kept on the bedside table.Damn, it wasn’t there. Must have moved it. She pulled herself into a sitting position. When she moved her head it was as though a part had broken off inside. She flopped back down. What had she done last night to get into this state? She hadn’t changed out of her work clothes; she was wearing her work trousers that pinched at her calves because Stuart hadn’t noticed the ‘dry clean only’ label and they’d shrunk in the wash. Trying to dredge up the last thing she remembered made her head hurt. Her disorientation wasn’t helped by being unable to see properly because her eyes were stuck together by the glue of sleep. She must have forgotten to take her contact lenses out.Wherever she was, it wasn’t at home. She was lying too low down and the place smelt of unwashed laundry and mold. Maybe she was sleeping on some pal’s floor after one cocktail too many. That had to be it. Think, damn it, think. When some light permeated the darkness, the jolt it gave her was a bolt of electricity to her brain. Stuart. He’d been attacked. Was he okay? A sob wracked her body as she forced herself to sit up. This wasn’t the time to get hysterical. She could do that later when she was safely at home.She rubbed her eyes with her fingers, picking away the sleep until she could see clearly. She was on a bare mattress on top of a rusty old bed frame, in a strange room with torn wallpaper and flaking paint on the wall. The bed creaked whenever she moved and she wanted to tell it to shut the hell up. She didn’t want him to hear. She remembered his voice in her ear, saying he’d kill Stuart unless she cooperated. Had he hurt him? That thought made her sob.He’d know she was awake and then what would he do – rape her? She didn’t think he’d done it already. Surely, she’d be able to tell, wouldn’t she? ***TO BE CONTINUED***
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Vile City is available now -
Amazon UK https://www.amazon.co.uk/Vile-City-Detective-thrilling-turner-ebook/dp/B06XG99CLW

Waterstones https://www.waterstones.com/book/vile-city/jennifer-lee-thomson/9781910720738
Amazon .com https://www.amazon.com/Vile-City-Detective-thrilling-turner-ebook/dp/B06XG99CLW
Amazon Canada https://www.amazon.ca/Vile-City-Detective-thrilling-turner-ebook/dp/B06XG99CLW

Amazon Australia https://www.amazon.com.au/Vile-City-Detective-thrilling-turner-ebook/dp/B06XG99CLW

Missing presumed murdered: The tragic case of Renee and Andrew MacRae

The last picture of Renee and little AndrewUsually when a child goes missing they don't have either of their parents with them. But in the case of the longest open missing persons case In Britain's history, 3-year-old son Andrew was with his mother Renee MacRae when he disappeared along with her, way back in 1976.
Renee was separated from her husband Gordon and dropped her oldest son Gordon who was 9-year-old off at her husband's in Inverness. She was meant to be going to see her sister in Kilmarnockand she was heading that way in her BMW when she was last seen.

The burning car

12 miles away that very same night, a train driver spotted a burning car in an isolated lay-by. It turned out to be Renee MacRae's car.
No trace of either her or the little boy was found. All that police found was a rug stained with blood that was tested and matched MacRae's blood type.
What happened to Renee and little Andrew?

So, how did a car carrying a mother and her child end up on fire and more importantly, where were Renee and little Andrew? Despite an intensive search no trace of either them was ever found.
The Sightings

Witnesses spotted a man dragging what looked like a dead sheep along the road where the mother and child were last spotted driving along. Renee MacRae was wearing a sheepskin coat when she was last seen.
Other witnesses saw a man with a pushchair near the quarry. Could it have been the little boy's?
The Theories

Unbeknown to her husband Renee had been having an affair with a married man called Bill MacDowell who worked for her husband. According to Renee's best friend  she'd been going to see him that night and not her sister as she claimed. What's more she confided in her friend that wee Andrew was her lover's son. This friend claimed that Renee was planning to start a new life with her lover.
If that was true, Renee never got the chance of happiness. Her little boy never got the chance to enjoy his childhood.
Whatever happened to the pair that night it seems certain that they were murdered. Will their bodies ever be found so they can rest in peace?
Some hope

The man in charge of the search, Detective Sergeant Cathcart was convinced he'd found Renee and Andrew in a quarry after removing the topsoil and being hit with the stench of what he believed to be corpses. He hired a bulldozer, but was ordered to stop digging by a senior officer because the vehicle had to go back to the contractors due to lack of money.
Over twenty years later, the quarry was dug up again but there were no sign of any bodies. Had they been removed? We'll never know.
Could the tragic pair be buried beneath this motorway?
The prime suspect

Bill MacDowell, Renee's lover was the main person of interest. At one stage he went into a police station to make a statement, but was dragged out by his wife.
Had he been about to confess? He denied any involvement in Renee and Andrew's murder.
The prevailing theory appears to be that mother and child were killed and buried under the A9 motorway that was being upgraded. If that is this case, maybe one day future roadworks will give all unearth the tragic pair.
Update - See "Suspect in MacRae case fled to US http://www.scotsman.com/news/suspect-in-macrae-case-fled-to-the-us-1-4383307

Vile City gets reviewed by Bibliophile Book Club

Thanks to Ellen for her review of Vile City on the Bibliophile Book Club blog https://bibliophilebookclub.com/2017/06/09/blog-tour-vile-city-by-jennifer-thomsonellens-review/
Here's a wee taster -
"There is a particularly repulsive character in Vile City – no spoilers but they made my skin crawl and got my hackles up.Females have a lot of strong roles of varying backgrounds and personalities; glamorous receptionist, sophisticated psychotherapist, local newspaper journalist and the latest victim Shelley Craig. It was refreshing to see this in a crime thriller although nothing (and no-one) is straight forward and I wouldn’t have known who to trust."
You'll need to read the book to find out more.
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Book Links -Amazon UK https://www.amazon.co.uk/Vile-City-Detective-thrilling-turner-ebook/dp/B06XG99CLW

Waterstones https://www.waterstones.com/book/vile-city/jennifer-lee-thomson/9781910720738
Amazon .com https://www.amazon.com/Vile-City-Detective-thrilling-turner-ebook/dp/B06XG99CLW
Amazon Canada https://www.amazon.ca/Vile-City-Detective-thrilling-turner-ebook/dp/B06XG99CLW
Amazon Australia https://www.amazon.com.au/Vile-City-Detective-thrilling-turner-ebook/dp/B06XG99CLW

Vile City in the news

I'm in the Daily Record newspaper talking about Vile City and what inspired me to write the crime thriller.

Id you'd like a wee read, just click on READ IT HERE below the picture to be taken to the piece on the website☺


READ IT HERE 

Vile City (Detective in a Coma book 1) blog tour

Thanks to for this awesome The Book Review Cafe graphic
Detective Inspector Duncan Waddell and his comatose pal Detective Constable Stevie Campbell, is going on a blog tour.
They'll be extracts from the mystery crime thriller, author interviews and reviews. I'm really looking forward to it.


∞∞∞The stops (and I'll be updating the links as they come)∞∞∞
Day one - The Quiet Knitterer  Day two - The Book Review Cafe Day three - Novel Deelights Day four - Novel Gossip Day five - Damppebbles Day six - Ronnie Turner Day seven - By the Letter Book Reviews Day eight - Keeper of Pages Day nine - Bibliophile Book ClubDay ten - My Chestnut Reading Tree 
Thanks to all these amazing blogs for featuring Vile Cityand Noelle and Kate at Thick as Thieves Promotion for all their hard work.
May the sun shine on you all, you lovely people. Vile City is available as a paperback and an eBook from - Waterstones Amazon UKAmazon.comAmazon.ca
Amazon Kindle (link takes you to your local site)iTunes 

The Vile City book launch at Waterstones

Setting upSo, how did the book launch for Vile City go, eh?

Quite a few people have asked me that and I've given a few sentences in reply.

Here's how the night went -
A quivering wreck and squinting through one eye because I couldn't see out of it because it was blurred with hayfever, I headed into Waterstones in Glasgow's famous Sauchiehall Street (its a nightmare for non-Scots to say and is pronounced Saw-kie-hall Street).

Before I went there, a few people mentioned this was Scotland's biggest bookstore - no pressure there then.

On the way there, I was contemplating doing a runner because I was so nervous, but my partner John kept reassuring me it would be okay. He had a speech prepared and I wouldn't need to do a thing except for signing books.



Sounded simple enough, but I suffer from agoraphobia (a crippling fear of people and open spaces (see my
We arrived at the store at 6pm for the 7pm launch, which seemed a bit early but as it turned out, I needed that extra hour.

The events manager Frankie, the most enthusiastic person I've ever met, talked us through what would happen at the event and laid out the cakes we'd brought with mini book covers made out of rice paper by an amazing cake designer.

Frankie talked us through how to use the microphones. Vital if like me you are useless with anything more technologically advanced than a shoebox tied with rope.

John was thankfully going to do all the talking standing at a lectern so in the end my microphone could be switched off.

After Frankie gave me tips on where to sign the book and what to write, it was 7pm and time to roll.

Lynsey Adams from the wonderful There's Been a Murder blog  came early and brought me a lovely, thoughtful gift and so did my brother, Ian. Then a few of John's good friends and my other brother Jamie, so at least my dream of nobody showing up proved unfounded. And everybody seemed to be enjoying the cakes!


Where was everybody? Panic sets in.
But 7pm and ten past 7 came and went and nobody else had arrived. Finally the stragglers, otherwise known as my family arrived fifteen minutes late - they'd got lost).

My partner made his amazing speech and everybody loved it and then it was book signing time, which I thoroughly enjoyed especially when asked questions about writing or my characters.

Would I have a book launch again? Probably, if Waterstones will have me again as they were wonderful to deal with (thanks go to events' manager James and Ben, as well as the amazing Frankie).

Next time (if there is one) I'll know exactly what to except.

For starters, most people who say they'll come won't, especially if Take That are in town and its a sunny day.

Your nearest and dearest will turn up late or not at all, or to a completely different venue (Glasgow has two Waterstones in the city centre alone and they are five minutes away from each other).

Footnote - There was one major downside to having a launch. After picking what I thought was an amazing letter dress to wear and nice boots that I didn't think I'd look terrible in, I later saw the pictures of the night and realised I looked like a walking tent, so it's diet time for me.
All that sitting about writing has given me writer's bottom and middle age spread has added to it.
Wish me luck on my diet. Maybe you'll see the svelte new me at the next book launch?

Yipee! Vile City is published today

Happy dance time
Vile City was published today and soon I'll be leaving for my book launch at Waterstones. Its on the 2nd floor of the Sauchiehall Street branch, kicking off at 7pm if you fancy stopping by. There will be cake.

Although there's happiness in my heart that at long last the novel that won the Scottish Association of Writers' Pitlochry Quaich for a first crime novel in 2011 is being published, there's fear too. The kind of fear that gnaws at your heart like you're being eaten from the inside.

Doubt is every writer's worst enemy.


It's nail biting time

Will anybody want to read your book? Will the reviews be scathing like knives through your heart?

Whatever the reception you get, being a writer means putting yourself out there. You have to expect and accept that people won't like your writing. But that doesn't make it any easier.


Even Benjy looks worried
But there is joy too in seeing your book on sale. Of knowing that your hard work has paid off.

In the case of Vile City (Detective in a Coma Book 1), I've been working on it trying to get it published for 6 years. In that time, it's gone through so many different versions.

Why Detective in a Coma? 
DC Stevie Campbell, the detective of the title who's in the coma, came to life after he started speaking to me. Initially he was a bit character, but he became much more. So, I thought wouldn't it be interesting to see what would happen if this friend who is meant to be in a coma started to talk to my main character DI Duncan Waddell? That would make anybody question their sanity, wouldn't it?

Vile City tells two parallel stories -
Shelley Craig who's been taken and who will do anything to make it home and DI Duncan Waddell's attempts to find her.

Shelley is an amalgamation of every strong woman I know. She's not a victim. No, she's a survivor.




Anyway, I better go now. Some cakes with book cover toppers and my book launch are waiting. Maybe I will see you there.

Wish me well.

Useful info 
You can read the start of Vile City for free here

Vile City is available in paperback and in eBook -
Amazon UK
Amazon.com 
Amazon.ca