Jacqueline Ward's Blog, page 14

Random Acts of Unkindness Review Tour

I’m very pleased to announce the Random Acts of Unkindness Review Tour, organised by Faye Rogers PR.

From the 18th to the 24th July Random Acts of Unkindness will be reviewed by book bloggers and their reviews posted on their book blogs.

If you haven’t already, go along to the book blogs and check out the recommendation – my eyes have been well and truly opened to some great fiction over the past weeks. I know that I find reviews useful in deciding what to read and my to-be-read pile has increased substantially!

Watch out for the Random Acts of Unkindness Review Tour and, if you’ve read it, please join in and leave a review of your own.

 

 

The post Random Acts of Unkindness Review Tour appeared first on Jacqueline Ward .

Missing People Charities

I’m pleased to tell you that, for every paperback copy of Random Acts of Unkindness sold, I’ll be making a donation to charity. The charities I will be donating to are:

Missing People – a lifeline when someone disappears

and

The Salvation Army – reuniting families

Both these organisations help to find missing people and to help the families of missing people to cope with their loss.

I’m donating to these charities because I have first-hand and research experience of these organisations and the dedication and professionalism they apply to their work. All the families of missing people I spoke to had some help from at least one organisation and you only have to read the testimonies on their website to see how they offer practical and emotional help from the missing and those missing them.

So I’d like to give something back.

If you would like to make a personal donation please click the links and choose the ‘DONATE’ button on the website.

The post Missing People Charities appeared first on Jacqueline Ward .

Random Acts of Unkindness launched 21st June 2016

I am very pleased to announce Random Acts of Unkindness was published by Kindle Press on 21st June 2016! The people who nominated on Kindle Scout have already received their free copy and the reviews are coming in. For anyone who hasn’t got their copy yet, I’m posting the first chapter – if you enjoy it please order it!

CHAPTER ONE

 I look a little closer and instinctively back away.

Her eyes are hollow holes where the birds have pecked away at her skull and she’s covered in tiny soft feathers and greying bird shit. Fragments of silvered hair lie on her shoulders, pulled out at the roots and exposing pinprick follicles made bigger by beaks. Her mouth is set in a wry smile showing yellow teeth, as if somehow, despite the torn skin and the deeply painful twist of her body, she’s having the last laugh.

The shock is so deep that it hurts more than it should, and tears threaten as I gaze at her. A human life ending in such a terrible, lonely way. It hits me with sadness so intense that I take a moment to sit with her, to tell her broken shell of a body that someone cares. Then fear oozes through the sadness, pushing it under and reminding me of why I’m here. Where are you, Aiden? Where is my son?

I slump onto a brown box sealed with Sellotape that’s sitting next to a small blue suitcase. It looks like this old woman was going somewhere. Somewhere she never got to.

Bessy Swain, by the looks of post on the doormat. A couple of bills and some takeaway menus. A letter from social services that arrived too late to make any difference.

As well as the boxes there are piles of newspapers and scrapbooks stacked up against ancient peeling sepia wallpaper. From the state of the house this woman has been suffering for a while. Poor Bessy.

Outside, starlings perch on the windowsill, quietly watching, judging me as I put off the inevitable phone call. Through the open kitchen door I can see a couple of blackbirds standing on the shed roof, and I can hear their song of accusation. I know I need to call this in and get Bessy some dignity, but I also need to finish what I came here to do.

The day job kicks in and I pull my scarf around my nose and mouth to protect my senses from the rancid fumes I hadn’t even noticed until now. My phone starts to ring, forcing me into the here and now.

I look at Bessy’s body and then at the flashing screen. Shit. It’s Mike. My partner in crime. Crime solving, that is. Like me, he’s a Detective Sergeant  working on Special Operations.

‘Jan. Where the hell are you?’

I pause. How am I going to explain this? I take a big breath and then pull down my scarf.

‘Right, yeah. I was just . . .’

‘Looking for Aiden. Come on, you’re going to get us both sacked. You’re supposed to be in Lytham Road, attending the Operation Prophesy briefing.’

On the worn kitchen worktop that separates the lounge from the kitchen a dead starling stares at me, its dried eyes condemning me from the pits of death.

A small metal toaster holds the remains of two slices of bread, which have been pecked right down to the toaster elements. The dead bird is lying close to the toaster, its feathers puffed from electrocution.

How many birds are there in here?

In my hurry to get inside I hadn’t registered anything apart from needing to know if Aiden was here. But now, sitting here with my mobile hot against my cheek, I realise I am sitting in a house covered in bird feathers and faeces.

The back door slams shut in a gust of wind. A few stray starlings are flying about in the kitchen, but most of the birds are now outside, my entrance breaking open their jail. What I can’t understand is why the windowsills are covered in them, their wings and curled up feet scratching at the dirty glass.

Then I realise they want to get back in.

‘Jan? Jan? Are you there?’

I nod at my mobile phone.

‘Yep. Look, I’ll just finish off here. I got a tip off about there being a funny smell coming from a house and I thought . . .’

Mike sighs deeply.

‘I know exactly what you thought. But this has to stop. Or you have to do it in your own time. It’s not just your own life you’re fucking up here. I’m your partner and I’ll back you up, but there’s a line. There’s a fucking line. Where are you anyway?’

The secure safety net I have in Mike has started to fracture recently and it shatters a little more now with the pain in his voice. I desperately want to put it right, but I can’t. Not yet. I have to deal with this.

‘57 Ney Street, Ashton.’

‘Connelly’s rented houses, aren’t they? I’m telling you, you’re heading for trouble.’

I end the call there. He’s right. I’m heading for trouble. But put any parent in my position and try telling me they’d do differently. I have a good reason. Mike knows that, but he also knows that everyone else’s lives are moving on and he’s trying to drag me on with him.

I push the phone into my bag and I pull my scarf back up against the smell. It’s invaded my hair, clothes  and skin, but the action gives me a bit of comfort and control.

There’s a sudden noise from upstairs and my heart skips. The memory of Aiden calls me back and overpowers the sensible part of my brain urgently screaming that maybe poor Bessy wasn’t alone after all. Maybe someone killed her. Maybe I shouldn’t be here on my own. Maybe I shouldn’t be here at all. Maybe, maybe, maybe.

I tread the worn stair carpet and creep up, nudging open the first door on the right. It’s a boy’s bedroom, all red and white, Manchester United. So she has children. Or grandchildren? But no one is in here now.

Slowly I move on to the next door and there’s a flash of feathers. Two starlings fly past and circle the landing. Another flies at me as I step inside, hitting the side of my head. It’s a dull thud on the temple that causes a slight flash, then turns into a sickening stinging sensation. The shock bursts the tears that have been waiting to be shed since I found Bessy and not Aiden. I slump on an old double bed and touch my forehead, feeling for the dampness of blood, but luckily there is none. I shift my weight onto a pretty pink quilt and pillows for respite.

Suddenly, sitting alone in the empty house, I feel so very small and wish someone would tell me what to do next. Tell me how to find my son.

The thought that he could be captive, suffering, or dead suffocates me, and I feel my body begin to panic. Large hands squeezing my lungs. And then there’s another bird flapping, this time in a large wooden wardrobe. Sounds loosen the squeeze and I can breathe again. I need to finish this.

I open the double wardrobe door and duck out of the way this time as the bird escapes onto the landing, joining the others.

‘How did you get in there, little guy?’

They fly round and round, looking for a way out, some kind of escape, and I know how that feels. This release calms me somehow and I take an enormous breath and find raw comfort from the material of my scarf as it sucks into the crevices of my mouth.

There’s a chest lodged at the bottom of the wardrobe, like a forgotten treasure. It’s against regulations, it’s against everything I thought I stood for, but I open it anyway. I need to find out more about Bessy.

Inside, there’s another box and some papers, on top of a rolled-up baby shawl. Pink. She must have a son and a daughter.

I’m not sure what I’m searching for. A way to avoid it happening to me? What not to do. How to not die alone.

I open the inner box and there are bundles of twenty-pound notes. My fingers trace the smooth paper and lines of thick rubber bands. It isn’t often you see money like this, all rolled up and waiting for something important. My thoughts switch back to Aiden.

I remember his dark hair and angry teenage skin. I remember that I will do anything to get him home. And somehow, at this moment, the realisation of something happening to my son makes me stoop down and contemplate the unknown territory of stealing.

I’ve worked in the police force for almost two decades; I know how criminal minds work. I know that whoever has Aiden could come knocking any second, minute, hour, day now demanding money. I’m surprised they haven’t already. Time I have, but money I don’t and, as I realise the weight of a potential ransom, an intense panic prickles in my fingers. Before I can refuse this primal urge, I push the notes into my deep shoulder bag, along with the papers.

I know it’s wrong, of course; even as I’m doing it I sense my own desperation. I’m a member of the police force. I’m the most honest person I know, committed to catching the scum who do this sort of thing. Yet I can’t help myself. This is different. This is for Aiden. This could be the only way I will ever see my son again.

I’ve been involved in missing person cases before and I’ve looked at the mother, desperate and determined, and wondered how far you would go to find your child. Now I know. All the way Aiden, I’ll go all the way to find you, son.

I unravel the pink shawl, hoping I will, for a moment, lose myself inside someone else’s memories or pain instead of my own. No such luck. My hand touches fragile bone, and a tiny skeletal hand falls into mine.

I almost scream, but aren’t I Detective Sergeant Janet Pearce, Surveillance Specialist? Aren’t I hard? Tough? Impenetrable? I close the lid with shaking fingers and replace the box, hurrying now, fighting back tears. This is all wrong. It’s all too much and I rush downstairs.

My phone rings just as I’m standing in front of poor Bessy. Mike. Again.

‘Jan? Have you left there yet? You need to be here. We’re starting the briefing in half an hour and if you don’t make this one . . .’

The bag is heavy on my shoulder and pinching at the skin under my cotton T-shirt. I need to get it to my car before I ring this in, but now I have no choice. If I don’t say anything to Mike someone will suspect further down the line. I check my watch. I’ve been here ten minutes.

‘OK. I’ll be there. But I need to ring in a suspicious death.’

There’s a silence for a moment. I can hear him breathing. Mike knows what I’m going through. He gets it. He’s probably my best friend in the whole world right now. He speaks again.

‘Not . . . ?’

‘No. An old woman. Looks like natural causes, but a bit gruesome. Anyway. That’s what I found when I got here. I’ll wait until someone arrives, then I’ll be right with you.’

I sound composed, professional, but I’m still shaking. I hang up. He’ll be pleased, because I’ve got a legitimate excuse to miss the briefing. I hurry through the kitchen, out the door, and through the yard. The birds scatter then regroup on the telephone wires above.

My car’s in the back alleyway. I take the money and push it under the front seat. I push the letters into the elasticated pocket on the side of the door and pull my bag back onto my shoulder. Oh my God. What am I doing? I know this is so fucking wrong and I try to tell myself again that it’s necessary. But away from the drama of the house sense creeps in. If there was going to be a ransom from Connelly wouldn’t it have come weeks ago?

No. I can’t do it. I can’t. I pull out the money and push it back into my bag and hurry back to the house. What was I thinking? This isn’t me. The birds just sit there, their heads turning as they watch me rushing around. I try to shoo them away, because they are witnesses to my uncharacteristic misdemeanour, but they won’t go.

I move past Bessy, running now, and toward the narrow stairs, silently apologising for disturbing her secret.

But it’s too late. I see a blue flashing light against the darkness of the room and hear the back door open. Two uniformed police officers appear and someone is banging on the door.

Hugging my bag and shame to my chest, I fumble with the lock and open it. DS Jack Newsome, one of my opposite numbers in the regional police, pushes past me, followed by two uniformed officers.

‘Jesus Christ. That’s awful. How long’s it been here?’

I don’t like Jack. He hasn’t got a compassionate bone in his body. I find myself moving protectively between him and Bessy.

‘She, Jack, she. This is a person. A woman. She deserves a little respect.’

The word sticks on my tongue, heavy with mockery. Respectful, unlike me, who has just stolen her life savings. I’ve never felt guilt like this before, and I wonder how people can live with it. He smirks.

‘Right, Jan. She. How long has she been here?’

I see Bessy with fresh eyes. As Jack does, as any policeman would. Her faded dress is sagging in odd shapes against the decomposition of her body, and brown lace-up shoes sit the wrong way round, her ankles ballooning awkwardly in the crossed position they must have rested in as she died.

‘I don’t know, Jack. But I arrived fifteen minutes ago. Had a tip off about a bad smell and was just passing.’

He’s nodding and grinning. Yet underneath I can see his annoyance as he sighs and wipes his hand through his dark hair, then wipes tiny beads of perspiration away from his forehead. And, of course, the giveaway twitch at the corner of his eye that always tells me when Jack thinks he’s onto something.

‘Just passing, were you? A little bit out of town, isn’t it? Away from your usual place of work? So who was the tip off from?’

I smile now and wonder if it covers up my devastation.

‘Member of the public. In a public place. Just on my way to Ashton Market buying some bacon for the weekend when I heard two women talking about this property and the smell. Simple as that.’

He’s shaking his head.

‘OK, Jan, if that’s how you want it. I suppose all’s well that ends well.’

We look at Bessy. She’s someone’s mother. Like me.

‘Not for her, though. Which is why we’re here, not to find out the ins and outs of my shopping habits. No?’

Jack turns away now. He’s looking toward the kitchen. As he approaches the door, I hear a flutter of wings and beaks tapping on glass.

‘What the bloody hell? Get those birds out of here. And search the house. Get forensics down here, and we need a coroner’s wagon for the old bird here. Cover her up, John. She’s giving me the creeps.’

So the police machine swings into action. I stand there for a moment, wondering if there is a way for me to put the money back, but the two uniformed officers are upstairs now, battling with angry starlings.

I don’t mention that they will need two coroner’s vehicles, one for poor Bessy and one for the tiny baby. God only knows why she’s got a dead baby in her wardrobe. That poor woman must have had a terrible life if the state of this place is anything to go by. Without a word I leave by the front door and walk around to the back alley.

The houses are well maintained and I feel a little easier now the neighbours are out and I have a reason for being here. I get in my car and, with the bag still over my shoulder, drive off. In my rearview mirror the birds still watch, their heads cocking.

Two streets away, I pull up outside an old peoples’ home. I know this is a safe spot away from CCTV. My phone hasn’t even got a signal here. I’m a surveillance expert, latterly of the Communications Department, more lately promoted to DS in Special Operations. It’s my job to know these things.

Even so, guilt overwhelms me, and I remember when I first became a police detective; so full of goodwill and always on the side of the person who had been harmed. I spent hours poring over mind maps and evidence boards, midnight sessions in the operation room and endless visits to witnesses.

Sometimes when I lie awake at night thinking about Aiden, I wonder if I would have shuffled events in a different way this wouldn’t have happened. That always leads to me swearing that from now on I’ll do the right thing, be good, anything, as long as I get him back. Holding myself bolt upright, smiling, being polite, saying thank you; are they all little combinations to finding out what has happened?

In the clarity of daylight it all seems different. No hippy thinking will get me through the day. Action is needed. And, after all, in this game it’s almost impossible to be good all the time. The deeper you get into something, the more complex the relationships, the situations. Everyone’s got something on someone, and they’re going to use it at some point. Until now I’d kept my fingers out of the till, been good as gold. But this is different. This is personal.

I count the money. There’s forty-four thousand pounds. Jesus. I automatically scan the horizon for the signs I know are there, at the root of my suspicions of where my son is. Connelly. I see the scarves and shoes hanging from the telephone wires, silent messages in an unspoken world and my heart turns back to stone.

I push the money under the seat, still distraught that I took it, more distraught that I couldn’t put it back, and seeing no way to return it now. I decide that, in return for it, I’ll do what I can to see Bessy Swain’s case resolved. I’ll do what I can to find out why she had to hide a baby. Someone owes her that, at least.

Read more of Random Acts of Unkindness

The post Random Acts of Unkindness launched 21st June 2016 appeared first on Jacqueline Ward .

Excerpt from new gripping crime fiction novel Random Acts of Unkindness…

Only 2 days before Random Acts of Unkindness is published by Kindle Press! The people who nominated on Kindle Scout have already received their free copy and the reviews are coming in. For anyone who hasn’t got their copy yet, I’m posting the first chapter – if you enjoy it please pre-order and it will arrive on your kindle on Tuesday!

CHAPTER ONE

 I look a little closer and instinctively back away.

Her eyes are hollow holes where the birds have pecked away at her skull and she’s covered in tiny soft feathers and greying bird shit. Fragments of silvered hair lie on her shoulders, pulled out at the roots and exposing pinprick follicles made bigger by beaks. Her mouth is set in a wry smile showing yellow teeth, as if somehow, despite the torn skin and the deeply painful twist of her body, she’s having the last laugh.

The shock is so deep that it hurts more than it should, and tears threaten as I gaze at her. A human life ending in such a terrible, lonely way. It hits me with sadness so intense that I take a moment to sit with her, to tell her broken shell of a body that someone cares. Then fear oozes through the sadness, pushing it under and reminding me of why I’m here. Where are you, Aiden? Where is my son?

I slump onto a brown box sealed with Sellotape that’s sitting next to a small blue suitcase. It looks like this old woman was going somewhere. Somewhere she never got to.

Bessy Swain, by the looks of post on the doormat. A couple of bills and some takeaway menus. A letter from social services that arrived too late to make any difference.

As well as the boxes there are piles of newspapers and scrapbooks stacked up against ancient peeling sepia wallpaper. From the state of the house this woman has been suffering for a while. Poor Bessy.

Outside, starlings perch on the windowsill, quietly watching, judging me as I put off the inevitable phone call. Through the open kitchen door I can see a couple of blackbirds standing on the shed roof, and I can hear their song of accusation. I know I need to call this in and get Bessy some dignity, but I also need to finish what I came here to do.

The day job kicks in and I pull my scarf around my nose and mouth to protect my senses from the rancid fumes I hadn’t even noticed until now. My phone starts to ring, forcing me into the here and now.

I look at Bessy’s body and then at the flashing screen. Shit. It’s Mike. My partner in crime. Crime solving, that is. Like me, he’s a Detective Sergeant  working on Special Operations.

‘Jan. Where the hell are you?’

I pause. How am I going to explain this? I take a big breath and then pull down my scarf.

‘Right, yeah. I was just . . .’

‘Looking for Aiden. Come on, you’re going to get us both sacked. You’re supposed to be in Lytham Road, attending the Operation Prophesy briefing.’

On the worn kitchen worktop that separates the lounge from the kitchen a dead starling stares at me, its dried eyes condemning me from the pits of death.

A small metal toaster holds the remains of two slices of bread, which have been pecked right down to the toaster elements. The dead bird is lying close to the toaster, its feathers puffed from electrocution.

How many birds are there in here?

In my hurry to get inside I hadn’t registered anything apart from needing to know if Aiden was here. But now, sitting here with my mobile hot against my cheek, I realise I am sitting in a house covered in bird feathers and faeces.

The back door slams shut in a gust of wind. A few stray starlings are flying about in the kitchen, but most of the birds are now outside, my entrance breaking open their jail. What I can’t understand is why the windowsills are covered in them, their wings and curled up feet scratching at the dirty glass.

Then I realise they want to get back in.

‘Jan? Jan? Are you there?’

I nod at my mobile phone.

‘Yep. Look, I’ll just finish off here. I got a tip off about there being a funny smell coming from a house and I thought . . .’

Mike sighs deeply.

‘I know exactly what you thought. But this has to stop. Or you have to do it in your own time. It’s not just your own life you’re fucking up here. I’m your partner and I’ll back you up, but there’s a line. There’s a fucking line. Where are you anyway?’

The secure safety net I have in Mike has started to fracture recently and it shatters a little more now with the pain in his voice. I desperately want to put it right, but I can’t. Not yet. I have to deal with this.

‘57 Ney Street, Ashton.’

‘Connelly’s rented houses, aren’t they? I’m telling you, you’re heading for trouble.’

I end the call there. He’s right. I’m heading for trouble. But put any parent in my position and try telling me they’d do differently. I have a good reason. Mike knows that, but he also knows that everyone else’s lives are moving on and he’s trying to drag me on with him.

I push the phone into my bag and I pull my scarf back up against the smell. It’s invaded my hair, clothes  and skin, but the action gives me a bit of comfort and control.

There’s a sudden noise from upstairs and my heart skips. The memory of Aiden calls me back and overpowers the sensible part of my brain urgently screaming that maybe poor Bessy wasn’t alone after all. Maybe someone killed her. Maybe I shouldn’t be here on my own. Maybe I shouldn’t be here at all. Maybe, maybe, maybe.

I tread the worn stair carpet and creep up, nudging open the first door on the right. It’s a boy’s bedroom, all red and white, Manchester United. So she has children. Or grandchildren? But no one is in here now.

Slowly I move on to the next door and there’s a flash of feathers. Two starlings fly past and circle the landing. Another flies at me as I step inside, hitting the side of my head. It’s a dull thud on the temple that causes a slight flash, then turns into a sickening stinging sensation. The shock bursts the tears that have been waiting to be shed since I found Bessy and not Aiden. I slump on an old double bed and touch my forehead, feeling for the dampness of blood, but luckily there is none. I shift my weight onto a pretty pink quilt and pillows for respite.

Suddenly, sitting alone in the empty house, I feel so very small and wish someone would tell me what to do next. Tell me how to find my son.

The thought that he could be captive, suffering, or dead suffocates me, and I feel my body begin to panic. Large hands squeezing my lungs. And then there’s another bird flapping, this time in a large wooden wardrobe. Sounds loosen the squeeze and I can breathe again. I need to finish this.

I open the double wardrobe door and duck out of the way this time as the bird escapes onto the landing, joining the others.

‘How did you get in there, little guy?’

They fly round and round, looking for a way out, some kind of escape, and I know how that feels. This release calms me somehow and I take an enormous breath and find raw comfort from the material of my scarf as it sucks into the crevices of my mouth.

There’s a chest lodged at the bottom of the wardrobe, like a forgotten treasure. It’s against regulations, it’s against everything I thought I stood for, but I open it anyway. I need to find out more about Bessy.

Inside, there’s another box and some papers, on top of a rolled-up baby shawl. Pink. She must have a son and a daughter.

I’m not sure what I’m searching for. A way to avoid it happening to me? What not to do. How to not die alone.

I open the inner box and there are bundles of twenty-pound notes. My fingers trace the smooth paper and lines of thick rubber bands. It isn’t often you see money like this, all rolled up and waiting for something important. My thoughts switch back to Aiden.

I remember his dark hair and angry teenage skin. I remember that I will do anything to get him home. And somehow, at this moment, the realisation of something happening to my son makes me stoop down and contemplate the unknown territory of stealing.

I’ve worked in the police force for almost two decades; I know how criminal minds work. I know that whoever has Aiden could come knocking any second, minute, hour, day now demanding money. I’m surprised they haven’t already. Time I have, but money I don’t and, as I realise the weight of a potential ransom, an intense panic prickles in my fingers. Before I can refuse this primal urge, I push the notes into my deep shoulder bag, along with the papers.

I know it’s wrong, of course; even as I’m doing it I sense my own desperation. I’m a member of the police force. I’m the most honest person I know, committed to catching the scum who do this sort of thing. Yet I can’t help myself. This is different. This is for Aiden. This could be the only way I will ever see my son again.

I’ve been involved in missing person cases before and I’ve looked at the mother, desperate and determined, and wondered how far you would go to find your child. Now I know. All the way Aiden, I’ll go all the way to find you, son.

I unravel the pink shawl, hoping I will, for a moment, lose myself inside someone else’s memories or pain instead of my own. No such luck. My hand touches fragile bone, and a tiny skeletal hand falls into mine.

I almost scream, but aren’t I Detective Sergeant Janet Pearce, Surveillance Specialist? Aren’t I hard? Tough? Impenetrable? I close the lid with shaking fingers and replace the box, hurrying now, fighting back tears. This is all wrong. It’s all too much and I rush downstairs.

My phone rings just as I’m standing in front of poor Bessy. Mike. Again.

‘Jan? Have you left there yet? You need to be here. We’re starting the briefing in half an hour and if you don’t make this one . . .’

The bag is heavy on my shoulder and pinching at the skin under my cotton T-shirt. I need to get it to my car before I ring this in, but now I have no choice. If I don’t say anything to Mike someone will suspect further down the line. I check my watch. I’ve been here ten minutes.

‘OK. I’ll be there. But I need to ring in a suspicious death.’

There’s a silence for a moment. I can hear him breathing. Mike knows what I’m going through. He gets it. He’s probably my best friend in the whole world right now. He speaks again.

‘Not . . . ?’

‘No. An old woman. Looks like natural causes, but a bit gruesome. Anyway. That’s what I found when I got here. I’ll wait until someone arrives, then I’ll be right with you.’

I sound composed, professional, but I’m still shaking. I hang up. He’ll be pleased, because I’ve got a legitimate excuse to miss the briefing. I hurry through the kitchen, out the door, and through the yard. The birds scatter then regroup on the telephone wires above.

My car’s in the back alleyway. I take the money and push it under the front seat. I push the letters into the elasticated pocket on the side of the door and pull my bag back onto my shoulder. Oh my God. What am I doing? I know this is so fucking wrong and I try to tell myself again that it’s necessary. But away from the drama of the house sense creeps in. If there was going to be a ransom from Connelly wouldn’t it have come weeks ago?

No. I can’t do it. I can’t. I pull out the money and push it back into my bag and hurry back to the house. What was I thinking? This isn’t me. The birds just sit there, their heads turning as they watch me rushing around. I try to shoo them away, because they are witnesses to my uncharacteristic misdemeanour, but they won’t go.

I move past Bessy, running now, and toward the narrow stairs, silently apologising for disturbing her secret.

But it’s too late. I see a blue flashing light against the darkness of the room and hear the back door open. Two uniformed police officers appear and someone is banging on the door.

Hugging my bag and shame to my chest, I fumble with the lock and open it. DS Jack Newsome, one of my opposite numbers in the regional police, pushes past me, followed by two uniformed officers.

‘Jesus Christ. That’s awful. How long’s it been here?’

I don’t like Jack. He hasn’t got a compassionate bone in his body. I find myself moving protectively between him and Bessy.

‘She, Jack, she. This is a person. A woman. She deserves a little respect.’

The word sticks on my tongue, heavy with mockery. Respectful, unlike me, who has just stolen her life savings. I’ve never felt guilt like this before, and I wonder how people can live with it. He smirks.

‘Right, Jan. She. How long has she been here?’

I see Bessy with fresh eyes. As Jack does, as any policeman would. Her faded dress is sagging in odd shapes against the decomposition of her body, and brown lace-up shoes sit the wrong way round, her ankles ballooning awkwardly in the crossed position they must have rested in as she died.

‘I don’t know, Jack. But I arrived fifteen minutes ago. Had a tip off about a bad smell and was just passing.’

He’s nodding and grinning. Yet underneath I can see his annoyance as he sighs and wipes his hand through his dark hair, then wipes tiny beads of perspiration away from his forehead. And, of course, the giveaway twitch at the corner of his eye that always tells me when Jack thinks he’s onto something.

‘Just passing, were you? A little bit out of town, isn’t it? Away from your usual place of work? So who was the tip off from?’

I smile now and wonder if it covers up my devastation.

‘Member of the public. In a public place. Just on my way to Ashton Market buying some bacon for the weekend when I heard two women talking about this property and the smell. Simple as that.’

He’s shaking his head.

‘OK, Jan, if that’s how you want it. I suppose all’s well that ends well.’

We look at Bessy. She’s someone’s mother. Like me.

‘Not for her, though. Which is why we’re here, not to find out the ins and outs of my shopping habits. No?’

Jack turns away now. He’s looking toward the kitchen. As he approaches the door, I hear a flutter of wings and beaks tapping on glass.

‘What the bloody hell? Get those birds out of here. And search the house. Get forensics down here, and we need a coroner’s wagon for the old bird here. Cover her up, John. She’s giving me the creeps.’

So the police machine swings into action. I stand there for a moment, wondering if there is a way for me to put the money back, but the two uniformed officers are upstairs now, battling with angry starlings.

I don’t mention that they will need two coroner’s vehicles, one for poor Bessy and one for the tiny baby. God only knows why she’s got a dead baby in her wardrobe. That poor woman must have had a terrible life if the state of this place is anything to go by. Without a word I leave by the front door and walk around to the back alley.

The houses are well maintained and I feel a little easier now the neighbours are out and I have a reason for being here. I get in my car and, with the bag still over my shoulder, drive off. In my rearview mirror the birds still watch, their heads cocking.

Two streets away, I pull up outside an old peoples’ home. I know this is a safe spot away from CCTV. My phone hasn’t even got a signal here. I’m a surveillance expert, latterly of the Communications Department, more lately promoted to DS in Special Operations. It’s my job to know these things.

Even so, guilt overwhelms me, and I remember when I first became a police detective; so full of goodwill and always on the side of the person who had been harmed. I spent hours poring over mind maps and evidence boards, midnight sessions in the operation room and endless visits to witnesses.

Sometimes when I lie awake at night thinking about Aiden, I wonder if I would have shuffled events in a different way this wouldn’t have happened. That always leads to me swearing that from now on I’ll do the right thing, be good, anything, as long as I get him back. Holding myself bolt upright, smiling, being polite, saying thank you; are they all little combinations to finding out what has happened?

In the clarity of daylight it all seems different. No hippy thinking will get me through the day. Action is needed. And, after all, in this game it’s almost impossible to be good all the time. The deeper you get into something, the more complex the relationships, the situations. Everyone’s got something on someone, and they’re going to use it at some point. Until now I’d kept my fingers out of the till, been good as gold. But this is different. This is personal.

I count the money. There’s forty-four thousand pounds. Jesus. I automatically scan the horizon for the signs I know are there, at the root of my suspicions of where my son is. Connelly. I see the scarves and shoes hanging from the telephone wires, silent messages in an unspoken world and my heart turns back to stone.

I push the money under the seat, still distraught that I took it, more distraught that I couldn’t put it back, and seeing no way to return it now. I decide that, in return for it, I’ll do what I can to see Bessy Swain’s case resolved. I’ll do what I can to find out why she had to hide a baby. Someone owes her that, at least.

Read more of Random Acts of Unkindness

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Excerpt from Random Acts of Unkindness…

Only 3 days before Random Acts of Unkindness is published! The people who nominated on Kindle Scout have already received their free copy and the reviews are coming in. For anyone who hasn’t got their copy yet, I’m posting the first chapter – if you enjoy it please pre-order and it will arrive on your kindle on Tuesday!

CHAPTER ONE

 I look a little closer and instinctively back away.

Her eyes are hollow holes where the birds have pecked away at her skull and she’s covered in tiny soft feathers and greying bird shit. Fragments of silvered hair lie on her shoulders, pulled out at the roots and exposing pinprick follicles made bigger by beaks. Her mouth is set in a wry smile showing yellow teeth, as if somehow, despite the torn skin and the deeply painful twist of her body, she’s having the last laugh.

The shock is so deep that it hurts more than it should, and tears threaten as I gaze at her. A human life ending in such a terrible, lonely way. It hits me with sadness so intense that I take a moment to sit with her, to tell her broken shell of a body that someone cares. Then fear oozes through the sadness, pushing it under and reminding me of why I’m here. Where are you, Aiden? Where is my son?

I slump onto a brown box sealed with Sellotape that’s sitting next to a small blue suitcase. It looks like this old woman was going somewhere. Somewhere she never got to.

Bessy Swain, by the looks of post on the doormat. A couple of bills and some takeaway menus. A letter from social services that arrived too late to make any difference.

As well as the boxes there are piles of newspapers and scrapbooks stacked up against ancient peeling sepia wallpaper. From the state of the house this woman has been suffering for a while. Poor Bessy.

Outside, starlings perch on the windowsill, quietly watching, judging me as I put off the inevitable phone call. Through the open kitchen door I can see a couple of blackbirds standing on the shed roof, and I can hear their song of accusation. I know I need to call this in and get Bessy some dignity, but I also need to finish what I came here to do.

The day job kicks in and I pull my scarf around my nose and mouth to protect my senses from the rancid fumes I hadn’t even noticed until now. My phone starts to ring, forcing me into the here and now.

I look at Bessy’s body and then at the flashing screen. Shit. It’s Mike. My partner in crime. Crime solving, that is. Like me, he’s a Detective Sergeant  working on Special Operations.

‘Jan. Where the hell are you?’

I pause. How am I going to explain this? I take a big breath and then pull down my scarf.

‘Right, yeah. I was just . . .’

‘Looking for Aiden. Come on, you’re going to get us both sacked. You’re supposed to be in Lytham Road, attending the Operation Prophesy briefing.’

On the worn kitchen worktop that separates the lounge from the kitchen a dead starling stares at me, its dried eyes condemning me from the pits of death.

A small metal toaster holds the remains of two slices of bread, which have been pecked right down to the toaster elements. The dead bird is lying close to the toaster, its feathers puffed from electrocution.

How many birds are there in here?

In my hurry to get inside I hadn’t registered anything apart from needing to know if Aiden was here. But now, sitting here with my mobile hot against my cheek, I realise I am sitting in a house covered in bird feathers and faeces.

The back door slams shut in a gust of wind. A few stray starlings are flying about in the kitchen, but most of the birds are now outside, my entrance breaking open their jail. What I can’t understand is why the windowsills are covered in them, their wings and curled up feet scratching at the dirty glass.

Then I realise they want to get back in.

‘Jan? Jan? Are you there?’

I nod at my mobile phone.

‘Yep. Look, I’ll just finish off here. I got a tip off about there being a funny smell coming from a house and I thought . . .’

Mike sighs deeply.

‘I know exactly what you thought. But this has to stop. Or you have to do it in your own time. It’s not just your own life you’re fucking up here. I’m your partner and I’ll back you up, but there’s a line. There’s a fucking line. Where are you anyway?’

The secure safety net I have in Mike has started to fracture recently and it shatters a little more now with the pain in his voice. I desperately want to put it right, but I can’t. Not yet. I have to deal with this.

‘57 Ney Street, Ashton.’

‘Connelly’s rented houses, aren’t they? I’m telling you, you’re heading for trouble.’

I end the call there. He’s right. I’m heading for trouble. But put any parent in my position and try telling me they’d do differently. I have a good reason. Mike knows that, but he also knows that everyone else’s lives are moving on and he’s trying to drag me on with him.

I push the phone into my bag and I pull my scarf back up against the smell. It’s invaded my hair, clothes  and skin, but the action gives me a bit of comfort and control.

There’s a sudden noise from upstairs and my heart skips. The memory of Aiden calls me back and overpowers the sensible part of my brain urgently screaming that maybe poor Bessy wasn’t alone after all. Maybe someone killed her. Maybe I shouldn’t be here on my own. Maybe I shouldn’t be here at all. Maybe, maybe, maybe.

I tread the worn stair carpet and creep up, nudging open the first door on the right. It’s a boy’s bedroom, all red and white, Manchester United. So she has children. Or grandchildren? But no one is in here now.

Slowly I move on to the next door and there’s a flash of feathers. Two starlings fly past and circle the landing. Another flies at me as I step inside, hitting the side of my head. It’s a dull thud on the temple that causes a slight flash, then turns into a sickening stinging sensation. The shock bursts the tears that have been waiting to be shed since I found Bessy and not Aiden. I slump on an old double bed and touch my forehead, feeling for the dampness of blood, but luckily there is none. I shift my weight onto a pretty pink quilt and pillows for respite.

Suddenly, sitting alone in the empty house, I feel so very small and wish someone would tell me what to do next. Tell me how to find my son.

The thought that he could be captive, suffering, or dead suffocates me, and I feel my body begin to panic. Large hands squeezing my lungs. And then there’s another bird flapping, this time in a large wooden wardrobe. Sounds loosen the squeeze and I can breathe again. I need to finish this.

I open the double wardrobe door and duck out of the way this time as the bird escapes onto the landing, joining the others.

‘How did you get in there, little guy?’

They fly round and round, looking for a way out, some kind of escape, and I know how that feels. This release calms me somehow and I take an enormous breath and find raw comfort from the material of my scarf as it sucks into the crevices of my mouth.

There’s a chest lodged at the bottom of the wardrobe, like a forgotten treasure. It’s against regulations, it’s against everything I thought I stood for, but I open it anyway. I need to find out more about Bessy.

Inside, there’s another box and some papers, on top of a rolled-up baby shawl. Pink. She must have a son and a daughter.

I’m not sure what I’m searching for. A way to avoid it happening to me? What not to do. How to not die alone.

I open the inner box and there are bundles of twenty-pound notes. My fingers trace the smooth paper and lines of thick rubber bands. It isn’t often you see money like this, all rolled up and waiting for something important. My thoughts switch back to Aiden.

I remember his dark hair and angry teenage skin. I remember that I will do anything to get him home. And somehow, at this moment, the realisation of something happening to my son makes me stoop down and contemplate the unknown territory of stealing.

I’ve worked in the police force for almost two decades; I know how criminal minds work. I know that whoever has Aiden could come knocking any second, minute, hour, day now demanding money. I’m surprised they haven’t already. Time I have, but money I don’t and, as I realise the weight of a potential ransom, an intense panic prickles in my fingers. Before I can refuse this primal urge, I push the notes into my deep shoulder bag, along with the papers.

I know it’s wrong, of course; even as I’m doing it I sense my own desperation. I’m a member of the police force. I’m the most honest person I know, committed to catching the scum who do this sort of thing. Yet I can’t help myself. This is different. This is for Aiden. This could be the only way I will ever see my son again.

I’ve been involved in missing person cases before and I’ve looked at the mother, desperate and determined, and wondered how far you would go to find your child. Now I know. All the way Aiden, I’ll go all the way to find you, son.

I unravel the pink shawl, hoping I will, for a moment, lose myself inside someone else’s memories or pain instead of my own. No such luck. My hand touches fragile bone, and a tiny skeletal hand falls into mine.

I almost scream, but aren’t I Detective Sergeant Janet Pearce, Surveillance Specialist? Aren’t I hard? Tough? Impenetrable? I close the lid with shaking fingers and replace the box, hurrying now, fighting back tears. This is all wrong. It’s all too much and I rush downstairs.

My phone rings just as I’m standing in front of poor Bessy. Mike. Again.

‘Jan? Have you left there yet? You need to be here. We’re starting the briefing in half an hour and if you don’t make this one . . .’

The bag is heavy on my shoulder and pinching at the skin under my cotton T-shirt. I need to get it to my car before I ring this in, but now I have no choice. If I don’t say anything to Mike someone will suspect further down the line. I check my watch. I’ve been here ten minutes.

‘OK. I’ll be there. But I need to ring in a suspicious death.’

There’s a silence for a moment. I can hear him breathing. Mike knows what I’m going through. He gets it. He’s probably my best friend in the whole world right now. He speaks again.

‘Not . . . ?’

‘No. An old woman. Looks like natural causes, but a bit gruesome. Anyway. That’s what I found when I got here. I’ll wait until someone arrives, then I’ll be right with you.’

I sound composed, professional, but I’m still shaking. I hang up. He’ll be pleased, because I’ve got a legitimate excuse to miss the briefing. I hurry through the kitchen, out the door, and through the yard. The birds scatter then regroup on the telephone wires above.

My car’s in the back alleyway. I take the money and push it under the front seat. I push the letters into the elasticated pocket on the side of the door and pull my bag back onto my shoulder. Oh my God. What am I doing? I know this is so fucking wrong and I try to tell myself again that it’s necessary. But away from the drama of the house sense creeps in. If there was going to be a ransom from Connelly wouldn’t it have come weeks ago?

No. I can’t do it. I can’t. I pull out the money and push it back into my bag and hurry back to the house. What was I thinking? This isn’t me. The birds just sit there, their heads turning as they watch me rushing around. I try to shoo them away, because they are witnesses to my uncharacteristic misdemeanour, but they won’t go.

I move past Bessy, running now, and toward the narrow stairs, silently apologising for disturbing her secret.

But it’s too late. I see a blue flashing light against the darkness of the room and hear the back door open. Two uniformed police officers appear and someone is banging on the door.

Hugging my bag and shame to my chest, I fumble with the lock and open it. DS Jack Newsome, one of my opposite numbers in the regional police, pushes past me, followed by two uniformed officers.

‘Jesus Christ. That’s awful. How long’s it been here?’

I don’t like Jack. He hasn’t got a compassionate bone in his body. I find myself moving protectively between him and Bessy.

‘She, Jack, she. This is a person. A woman. She deserves a little respect.’

The word sticks on my tongue, heavy with mockery. Respectful, unlike me, who has just stolen her life savings. I’ve never felt guilt like this before, and I wonder how people can live with it. He smirks.

‘Right, Jan. She. How long has she been here?’

I see Bessy with fresh eyes. As Jack does, as any policeman would. Her faded dress is sagging in odd shapes against the decomposition of her body, and brown lace-up shoes sit the wrong way round, her ankles ballooning awkwardly in the crossed position they must have rested in as she died.

‘I don’t know, Jack. But I arrived fifteen minutes ago. Had a tip off about a bad smell and was just passing.’

He’s nodding and grinning. Yet underneath I can see his annoyance as he sighs and wipes his hand through his dark hair, then wipes tiny beads of perspiration away from his forehead. And, of course, the giveaway twitch at the corner of his eye that always tells me when Jack thinks he’s onto something.

‘Just passing, were you? A little bit out of town, isn’t it? Away from your usual place of work? So who was the tip off from?’

I smile now and wonder if it covers up my devastation.

‘Member of the public. In a public place. Just on my way to Ashton Market buying some bacon for the weekend when I heard two women talking about this property and the smell. Simple as that.’

He’s shaking his head.

‘OK, Jan, if that’s how you want it. I suppose all’s well that ends well.’

We look at Bessy. She’s someone’s mother. Like me.

‘Not for her, though. Which is why we’re here, not to find out the ins and outs of my shopping habits. No?’

Jack turns away now. He’s looking toward the kitchen. As he approaches the door, I hear a flutter of wings and beaks tapping on glass.

‘What the bloody hell? Get those birds out of here. And search the house. Get forensics down here, and we need a coroner’s wagon for the old bird here. Cover her up, John. She’s giving me the creeps.’

So the police machine swings into action. I stand there for a moment, wondering if there is a way for me to put the money back, but the two uniformed officers are upstairs now, battling with angry starlings.

I don’t mention that they will need two coroner’s vehicles, one for poor Bessy and one for the tiny baby. God only knows why she’s got a dead baby in her wardrobe. That poor woman must have had a terrible life if the state of this place is anything to go by. Without a word I leave by the front door and walk around to the back alley.

The houses are well maintained and I feel a little easier now the neighbours are out and I have a reason for being here. I get in my car and, with the bag still over my shoulder, drive off. In my rearview mirror the birds still watch, their heads cocking.

Two streets away, I pull up outside an old peoples’ home. I know this is a safe spot away from CCTV. My phone hasn’t even got a signal here. I’m a surveillance expert, latterly of the Communications Department, more lately promoted to DS in Special Operations. It’s my job to know these things.

Even so, guilt overwhelms me, and I remember when I first became a police detective; so full of goodwill and always on the side of the person who had been harmed. I spent hours poring over mind maps and evidence boards, midnight sessions in the operation room and endless visits to witnesses.

Sometimes when I lie awake at night thinking about Aiden, I wonder if I would have shuffled events in a different way this wouldn’t have happened. That always leads to me swearing that from now on I’ll do the right thing, be good, anything, as long as I get him back. Holding myself bolt upright, smiling, being polite, saying thank you; are they all little combinations to finding out what has happened?

In the clarity of daylight it all seems different. No hippy thinking will get me through the day. Action is needed. And, after all, in this game it’s almost impossible to be good all the time. The deeper you get into something, the more complex the relationships, the situations. Everyone’s got something on someone, and they’re going to use it at some point. Until now I’d kept my fingers out of the till, been good as gold. But this is different. This is personal.

I count the money. There’s forty-four thousand pounds. Jesus. I automatically scan the horizon for the signs I know are there, at the root of my suspicions of where my son is. Connelly. I see the scarves and shoes hanging from the telephone wires, silent messages in an unspoken world and my heart turns back to stone.

I push the money under the seat, still distraught that I took it, more distraught that I couldn’t put it back, and seeing no way to return it now. I decide that, in return for it, I’ll do what I can to see Bessy Swain’s case resolved. I’ll do what I can to find out why she had to hide a baby. Someone owes her that, at least.

Read more of Random Acts of Unkindness

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Random Acts of Unkindess is on pre-order!

http://www.jacquelineward.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/Raou-Final-Hd-720-1.m4v

Exactly thirteen weeks after first submitting it to Kindle Scout, Random Acts of Unkindness is on pre-order with a release date of 21st June, 2016. It will be available in ebook and paperback.

Everyone who nominated the novel on Kindle Scout has already received their free ebook copy and if you are one of those people, thank you very much. I hope you will enjoy it and leave a review.

I’ll be counting down to publication with blog posts and, in July, I’ll be on a blog tour. I will release the sequel to Random Acts of Unkindness, and a standalone crime thriller later in 2016, if you would like to know more about these please sign up in the sidebar – I promise I won’t spam you, just news about new releases.

I would love to hear from anyone who has any questions about Random Acts of Unkindness or my writing, and thank you again for your outstanding support.

 

 

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My Kindle Scout Experience by Monte Dutton

How did I stumble across Amazon’s KindleScout program? Well, the verb is accurate.

“Stumble.”

I could write that I “lucked out,” but I hate using a noun as a verb. People who do so I call “verbers.” Wild, maniacal verbers, intent on world domination. “Stumble” could be a noun turned verb, too. Or it could be a verb turned noun. It’s hard to say.

My first two novels, The Audacity of Dope and The Intangibles, were published by a small house. I felt as if I needed to move on but didn’t know where. I brooded about it while writing a novel called Crazy of Natural Causes, begun as a farce but growing ever less farcical as I edited, polished and revisited its plot. I continued to brood for a while after I deemed it ready. I love writing. I don’t like selling. I want someone else to do that.

If only it were a perfect world.

I found the KindleScout program in a Google search, or some other search. I gave it a shot because it offered a small stipend up front for those selected. Another belief of mine is that if a publisher has no investment in me, it has no incentive to sell my work. I posted a sample of Crazy. I asked friends and known readers of my work to nominate it for publication. It won. Yip-yip-yippee.

Crazy was an ebook. I didn’t have to do book signings because Kindles have little room for inscriptions. I’d done lots of signings with the first two books. I read from my work. I played songs on guitar. I didn’t make much money on them. Bookstore owners are as desperate as writers. For every book I sold, they made twice as much money as I did. I don’t mind them getting their fair share, but, on principle, why, I wrote the damn book.

Crazy of Natural Causes was released at the end of July 2015. A print edition is now available but was published only recently. I enjoy book signings. Maybe I’ll do some more. I’m thinking about it.

That went all right, so I entered my next novel again in the KindleScout selection process. An outrageous crime novel, full of politics, corruption, sex in several forms, drugs, murder, lawless kids and thuggish cops, called Forgive Us Our Trespasses won, too. It was released on March 29, eight months and eight days after Crazy of Natural Causes, and I took this as a good omen because eight is my lucky number. Having gotten the hang of CreateSpace by self-publishing a collection of short stories called Longer Songs, the print edition of Trespasses hit the Amazon shelves that weren’t electronic on April 29.

Now, grudgingly and against the fiber of my being, I’m trying to learn how to sell all this fiction better. That, in fact, is the focus of the upcoming weekend, that and lawn care, laundry, and sports on TV.

The usual.

Amazon gives me exposure that isn’t enough to make me world-famous, but it has given me a boost. As much as I’d like to do nothing but finish off my next one — the first draft has been sitting in this laptop, 95 percent complete, since CreateSpace and income taxes interceded on the literary life – it’s not quite time.

The literary life is getting better, though. Life is not a bowl of cherries. It’s more a box of chocolates.

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Crime writing and how I arrived here…

With the success of my crime novel, Random Acts of Unkindness, several people have asked me lately how I arrived at crime writing.

Like most people, I started writing at school. Then I didn’t give up later on. Likewise, reading began at around five years old and I continued. So when I decided to write novels I thought I had a fairly good grounding. How difficult could it be? Not so easy, it turned out.

I began writing short stories for publication around 1995 and had some success with women’s magazines. So the natural next step was to write something longer. I’d been thinking about a story I heard about my great grandmother and I began to write that, with some autobiographical details thrown in. Bound to be a winner, wasn’t it? I sent it to the Romantic Novelists Association as an entry to one of their competitions. The main thrust of the feedback was that I had spelt ‘whether’ as ‘wether’ wrongly the whole way through the manuscript conjuring up the image of a castrated male sheep for the reviewer. Then I sent it to a couple of agents (with corrected spelling), and it was rejected.

Around that time I had been working with a group of young people at a youth project and I began to realise that there was more to storytelling than meets the eye, that rather than just being a source of entertainment, it’s how people construct and understand their life experiences. So I went to study it academically for many years and came out on a very different trajectory than I entered at – I was a narrative psychologist with a successful non-fiction book!

But I still wanted to write fiction. In fact, I couldn’t stop writing fiction. I read a lot of women’s fiction and decided I would write fiction for women. Seemed entirely reasonable. I didn’t plan to write formula fiction, rather stories about lives, wherever that took me. The first two novels exorcised my own life out of the stories, leaving my set to write a third story free from my emotional shackles. My third novel was the first one I had been completely pleased with and excited about. However, when I sent it out I soon realised that it was considered mixed genre.

In between writing the third novel and revising it, I wrote a speculative fiction story and briefly wondered if I was meant to veer off in this direction. Then I started another women’s fiction book that again had dark undertones.

By this time I had detected a pattern – these women’s fictions books were all set against a landscape of the peaks and troughs of lives and how people dealt with loss and various emotions. I’d learnt about Freytag’s pyramid by this time, and about comedy, quest and tragedy stories. I’d learnt about seed words and thematic questions. Some time early last year I realised that I my thematic questions were about crime and mystery and I was trying to squash them into a women’s fiction shaped container.

I love my characters, so much that I dream about them. I was and still am committed to strong characters who, like real people, have their own nuances, flaws and ticks. So as well as the confusion over genre, I was trying write a character led novel with an equally strong plot. This led to a slow pace – I was trying to do everything at once.

It wasn’t until my work attracted the attention of agents and I received their feedback that I realised I was a crime writer. I’d had some requests for full manuscripts from agents who represented crime and thriller authors, and I came to realise that this was what the darkness in my writing had been – underlying tones of dreadful things in women’s lives. I had also been writing strong women characters and some of the critique from beta readers mentioned that they were perhaps a little too quirky for women’s fiction. I told myself that they were quirky because of their horrendous life experiences, but never wrote about the horror. It was almost as if I had been resisting writing what I wanted to in an effort to get myself to a point where I wasn’t writing about surface issues.

Writing about crime and mystery has made me develop my writing in a way that I had never been able to before. My interest in characterisation extends to the characters surrounding the crime and affected by it, as well as the antagonist and protagonist, and this has given me an opportunity to use my psychological knowledge to understand the dynamics.

Having described my journey so far, it sound like I have a master plan, all plotted out somewhere. Yet when I start writing all of the above is in there somewhere, driving the core of the story as the characters provide a canvas for it. It’s still difficult, and a challenge. But the joy from the creative process make it worthwhile. That, and imagining my novel published and read.

So crime writing is for me. It always was, right from the first novel when I took imaginary revenge on the man who left my great grandmother alone with a child. I just had to recognise it. Now it’s difficult for me to imagine writing anything else. Although who knows where this writing journey will take me next?

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Random Acts of Unkindness – more about the story

Now that Random Acts of Unkindness is in production for a June publication I can share more about the story and how I came to write it.

Like most stories, it started with a conversation. I was discussing phobias with a friend, recalling how, as a child, I became afraid of dustbin men, only to find out decades later from my mother that the police had visited our house and searched our dustbins and cellars for victims of the Moors Murders.

I researched this terrible crime and realised that most of the reporting around it was almost obsessively concerned with the lives of the murderers with little focus on the families of the children who were murdered.

Random Acts of Unkindness explores the ripples of despair that crimes such as this cause for everyone involved. In one strand of the novel we meet Bessie, whose son Thomas is missing in the 1960’s. Bessie’s life is taken over by the search for her son in the era of the Moors Murders.

The location for the novel is in the area where I grew up so I was able to work with real locations such as Ashton-Under-Lyne, Oldham, Manchester and Saddleworth Moor. I was also able to create the fictional world of Northlands Estate. Whilst researching around the real location and talking to people about the Moors Murders, I detected a sense of reluctance to talk about them, something so terrible that it couldn’t be spoken about, and I hope I have conveyed this through Bessie’s character.

Another strand of the story features DS Jan Pearce. Jan is a hard working, single mother juggling her police work with raising a child. Jan polices on hard facts and instinct. She sees patterns everywhere and pieces together puzzles. Her unique policing skills come into their own when her own son is missing.

Jan and Bessie are opposites in many ways, but they have one thing in common – their unwavering devotion to finding their missing children.

In the run up to publication I’ll be posting photographs from the locations and part of my research in to the Moors Murders. I’ll also be posting about how I pieced the story together and the motifs I used.

I’ll also be organising a blog tour – please get in touch if you would like me to talk about Kindle Scout or publication on your blog, or if you would like to review Random Acts of Unkindness.

The post Random Acts of Unkindness – more about the story appeared first on Jacqueline Ward .

Random Acts of Unkindness is selected for Kindle Press publication

As most of you will probably know by now, my crime novel, Random Acts of Unkindness, was selected to be published by Kindle Press.  

I would like to thank everyone who nominated it as the nominations helped the Scout Team to notice it.  This means that everyone who nominated will receive a free ebook copy when it’s published.

The book will be published this year by Kindle Press and will be available in ebook form through Amazon and also in paperback through Amazon.

The decision to submit to Kindle Scout was an easy one for me. For a while now I’ve been thinking about self publishing, but the marketing and promotions side has seemed difficult. I noticed that other authors published through Kindle Scout were receiving marketing from Amazon as part of their deal, and hoped that I could too.

I did learn a lot about marketing during my campaign, and it would be fair to say that even though I will now receive those services from Amazon, I will be conducting my own marketing campaign as well!

To be honest, I’m in shock. This is a big deal for me and I’m absolute thrilled that Bessie and Jan will finally see the light of day. The story means a lot to me and I’ve worked hard to make it the best it can possibly be – I hope that you agree when you read it.

All that is left is to say thank you again. I’ll write more when the good news has settled in.

 

 

 

The post Random Acts of Unkindness is selected for Kindle Press publication appeared first on Jacqueline Ward .