The place had a gravity that held whatever was dropped where it fell. That included the people.
One of the many amazing things crime fiction can do is shine a light on social issues. What crimes are committed, who commits them, and why – these are all questions to which the answers can tell you a great deal about the power structures and inequalities within a society. And, of course, a police detective has the unique ability, because of their job, to interact with people from many different backgrounds and circumstances. Pound for pound, I reckon there is probably no genre better placed to address many of the pressing real world concerns we all find ourselves facing.
That said, I have never been that kind of crime writer. For one thing, I don’t really think of my books as being set in any particular place. For another, I’m not confident I know enough about certain issues to address them effectively and sensitively in my stories. I tend to focus on the psychological, as that feels more universal to me.
But social issues inevitably creep in, and I think that even if Gritten in The Shadows is a fictional location, we all know places like it in the real world. Towns and cities that have been left behind through the collapse of industry and the lack of investment. Areas where it’s difficult to find work, where the people don’t feel valued, and which feel impossible to escape from. Places in which the mention of “social mobility” might elicit a hollow laugh at best. And Gritten doesn’t have to be based on anywhere specific, because there are too many of those places, aren’t there?
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