Nailing The Murder Scene with Sara Jayne Townsend #MIU #mystery
Today’s visitor is Sara Jayne Townsend, a mistress of suspense from MuseItUp Publishing. Her debut novel DEATH SCENE follows the adventures of actress and amateur sleuth, Shara Summers. Shara’s heart-pounding journey continues November 25th with the release of DEAD COOL.
So what do you have to do to bring death and mayhem to life? Read on to find out…
A SENSE OF PLACE
By Sara Jayne Townsend
The crime fiction market is a crowded place indeed. It has many sub-genres, and its fans are avid and discerning readers. Which all make it rather difficult for a new author to break into this very established market. There are many, many outstanding writers in the field of crime fiction. How does an unknown find a place for herself amongst the footsteps of so many giants?
As a reader of crime myself, one of the things that always stands out for me is a strong sense of place. It’s not enough just to have a strong character, a victim, a motive, a method. None of these things are enough on their own if the location is not descriptive enough to be a background character all of its own. Many crime authors write about real-life places, with enough description to make the reader feel they know the place, even if they’ve never been there. I’ve never visited Chicago, but Sara Paretsky (my all-time favourite crime writer) brings it to life so well in her VI Warshawski series that I feel I actually know the place. Ian Rankin’s famous detective Rebus walks the streets of Edinburgh. The city of Amsterdam has been put on the map of late because of a number of Scandinavian crime writers, and even Dublin has become trendy in the world of crime fiction – with ‘Emerald Noir’ inspiring a generation of Irish detective inspectors.
Of course, if you’re going to create a convincing sense of place in your novels, you either have to do a lot of research or pick a place you’ve actually been to several times. I’m not a big fan of research but I’ve done a lot of travelling, and I decided I could use that.
My amateur sleuth Shara Summers became a Canadian in England because my own background is rooted in the two places. I am English, and live in England, but spent eight years of my life in Canada when my family emigrated there. I visit Toronto on a regular basis, and that is where Shara resides at the beginning of DEATH SCENE. New York City also has a cameo role in this novel – at the start of the story, my actress amateur sleuth is filming in Central Park. I love New York City and have visited many times. One such trip inspired me so much I went walking around Central Park drinking in the atmosphere and taking copious notes, so I could write a scene set there. The thing about Central Park is, you can do something like that and not look in the least out of place.
But most of the action in DEATH SCENE takes place in and around London, and the place where I have been living for the last twenty years. Many of the streets mentioned are real places. You can’t pinpoint any of the residences featured in the novel to an actual address, but I know where they all are. Most of the action in the second Shara Summers book, DEAD COOL, takes place in a hotel just off Tottenham Court Road. The hotel doesn’t actually exist, but I could take you into central London and point out the exact spot where that hotel stands.
My plan with the Shara series when I first conceived it was to take Shara all over the world in her adventures. I’ve travelled to many wonderful places, and I’d like to share them with readers through Shara. In fact, I might run out of murder victims before I run out of locations.
But more immediately, I do have plans to take Shara back to New York City in a future book. This is such an amazing place I feel I’m not done with it yet.
Much thanks to Sara Jayne for taking time to visit with us. Intrigued? Then go forth and pick up your copies of DEATH SCENE and DEAD COOL today!
Sara-Jayne Townsend is a UK-based writer of crime and horror. She was born in Cheshire in 1969, but spent most of the 1980s living in Canada after her family emigrated there. She now lives in Surrey with two cats and her guitarist husband Chris. She co-founded the T Party Writers’ Group in 1994, and remains Chair Person.
The first book in her amateur sleuth series about Canadian actress Shara Summers, DEATH SCENE, is now available, with the sequel, DEAD COOL, released on 25 November and available for pre-order. Visit the MuseItUp Publishing book store to buy both: http://museituppublishing.com/bookstore/index.php/our-authors/70-our-authors/authors-t/420-sara-jayne-townsend
You can learn more about Sara and her writing at her website at http://sarajaynetownsend.weebly.com or her blog at http://sayssara.wordpress.com.
