Return to Harrogate

As I reported on this page a few weeks ago, England’s 2007 Harrogate Crime Writing Festival was a wonderful affair, and next year’s event, scheduled for July 17-20, looks exciting as well, so be sure to mark your diaries accordingly.

Meanwhile, I received the following note from this last summer’s Harrogate events organizer, the talented writer (A Greater Evil) and former British Crime Writers’ Association chair Natasha Cooper:

In only five years the Theakstons Old Peculier Crime Writing Festival has become the biggest and most glamorous in the UK, if not the world. And if everything goes according to plan it will get bigger and better every year.

These plans require very special people to chair the programming committee. When it was time to choose the 2008 chair, we had the obvious candidate staring us in the face: Simon Kernick.

I first met Simon at lunch with his editor before a crime-writing festival in Manchester several years ago. His first novel had just been published. I hadn’t had a chance to read it by then, but it was obvious from our short meeting and his subsequent panel that he was going to be a crucial member of the crime-writing world for a long time to come. He has gone from strength to strength, bringing energy and wit to his novels, as well as to every festival and convention he attends.

He is not afraid to experiment or change direction, but he knows where he wants to go and where his readers want him to take them. His great skill at providing the thrills and entertainment they most enjoy has seen him shoot to the top of the bestseller lists with his latest novel, Relentless, which was picked by those unmatched arbiters of the book trade, Richard & Judy, in the summer of 2007.

Simon is fantastically good company, as his many fans and fellow thriller-writers will attest, and he brings to the Harrogate programming committee a wealth of talents. His plans include a lot of writers we haven’t yet seen at the festival and panel topics to get the ideas humming and the blood thumping. His special guests, Tess Gerritsen, Robert Crais, Sam Bourne, Peter Robinson and Jeffery Deaver, bring all the excitement of international bestsellerdom with them.

I loved working on the 2007 festival, both in the planning and the execution, but I must say I am seriously looking forward to enjoying myself without any of the responsibility at Simon’s Harrogate in 2008. I know it’ll be the most enormous fun.

Meanwhile, I’ve heard that space is already becoming limited at the Crown Hotel, the venue for the 2008 Harrogate festival, so it’s best to reserve your place. Call the reservations hotline ([0044] 1423 562303) or visit the event’s Web site.