Blog
The Road to Publication – guest post from What Falls Between the Cracks author Robert Scragg
4 October, 2017
We are delighted to welcome Robert Scragg to the Allison & Busby blog today. We will publish his debut crime novel, What Falls Between the Cracks, next April, but read on for an insight into the road to publication and an early sampler of the book… A severed hand is found in the freezer of […]
Writing What You Know & What You Don’t! Guest post with Sylvia Hunter
21 September, 2017
Today we’re excited to welcome Sylvia Hunter, author of The Midnight Queen trilogy to the blog. As the books are released in paperback this autumn, with book two, Lady of Magick, out today, Sylvia shares some of her inspiration for the series. 1. On Code-Switching I was raised by multilingual people with linguistics degrees, so […]
Three Crime Series to Try
15 September, 2017
Today, September 15th, is Agatha Christie’s birthday! Here at the A&B offices, we’re big fans of the queen of crime. To mark the occasion, we wanted to share three crime series which you can get stuck in to right now. The Amory Ames series, by Ashley Weaver Thrilling and stylish, Christie fans will love these. […]
34 Songs for a Road Trip: Guest Post from Jessica Brockmole
8 August, 2017
Today we’re thrilled to welcome author Jessica Brockmole to the blog. Her latest book, Woman Enters Left, is out today! It follows two women making road trips across America, and in honour of that, Jessica shares a road trip playlist. Some days I give myself a theme song. Really good writing days deserve Pat Benatar’s […]
The Bigger Picture – a guest post from Jill McGivering
24 June, 2017
Today we’re welcoming Jill McGivering to the blog, to discuss some of the inspiration behind her latest book, Daughters of India, which came out this week. When I was based in India as a journalist some years ago, a visiting British colleague told me a story. She’d just been to the office of an Indian […]
Writing What You Know – a guest post by Susanna Bavin
20 June, 2017
We’re delighted to welcome to the blog author Susanna Bavin, whose debut saga novel The Deserter’s Daughter is released this week! Researching family history can cause weird feelings. Not long ago, I found a discussion about my great-great-grandmother Charlotte on an online message-board. It was wonderful – I found out one or two things that […]
The Memories on a Bookshelf
5 June, 2017
Many bibliophiles have books which always remind them of a particular place or time. As I moved house recently, packing up then unpacking my shelves, I was reminded of some of mine, and since this is my first blog post since joining the team, I thought it would be a good introduction! I could list […]
A love of letters – Guest Post by Menna van Praag
4 April, 2017
Dear Readers, We are delighted to welcome author Menna van Praag onto the A&B blog today. If you share a passion for letters and stationery, read on. For the rest of April, Menna’s latest letter writing-inspired novel, The Lost Art of Letter Writing, is just 99p on Kindle UK. Why not treat yourself! Yours sincerely, […]
From Heroic Protectors to ‘Facebook Mums’: the Greatest Literary Mothers of All Time
21 March, 2017
Agatha Christie once wrote that ‘A mother’s love for her child is like nothing else in the world. It knows no law, no pity, it dates all things and crushes down remorselessly all that stands in its path.’ Across time, this powerful and boundless maternal love that Christie describes has been captured by writers in […]

The Cinderella Service on iPlayer
21 March, 2017
Author Julia Stoneham was inspired to write Muddy Boots and Silk Stockings after writing the radio series The Cinderella Service. We’re very excited that the BBC have recently aired the series again and you can listen to it on iPlayer now! You can find the first episode (of three) here. Devon, England, 1943: Alice […]
He Kills Because He Cares: Guest Post from author Peter Laws
9 March, 2017
We’re delighted to welcome author Peter Laws to the A&B blog for a glimpse inside the mind of the murderer… There are lots of ways to dispatch somebody. Guns and knives are incredibly popular, and efficient too, but let’s be honest: they’re a little passé. You’ve seen (or read) them a thousand times. Dropping a […]
Travels to America – guest post from author David Hingley
19 January, 2017
We’re delighted to welcome to the blog author David Hingley, especially as it is publication day for the paperback edition of his debut historical crime novel Birthright (currently a Book of the Month with £2 off!) and its follow-up Puritan in hardback. If you’re in the mood for some adventure, travel and mystery, why not join David’s heroine Mercia Blakewood now… It […]
Writing about the past – guest post from author June Tate
1 December, 2016
We’re delighted to welcome June Tate onto the blog today to give us some insight into how she constructs an authentic sense of period in her novels. To coincide with this post we’re also offering her ebooks The Reluctant Sinner, Born to Dance, Brides of War and The Docklands Girls at the special price of […]
You can’t judge a book by its cover – especially if you’re a robot.
23 November, 2016
The robots are going to rise up and take our jobs, yes? Well no, maybe not. At least when it comes to book cover design. I was looking through The Guardian‘s book section and came across an article about an algorithm created to predict a book’s genre by its cover. Designed by academics at Kyushu University […]
And behind door number 1 is…
17 November, 2016
Does anyone else think it’s beginning to feel a lot like Christmas? I don’t usually get the urge to deck the halls quite so early, but I’m going to blame the surge in ‘grown-up’ advent calendars that I’ve seen around recently. Tea, make-up, gin*: there’s something for everyone. And then I spotted this rather jolly […]
Honoured and remembered
10 November, 2016
Today (10th November), renowned children’s author Michael Morpurgo will be presented with the J. M. Barrie Award for his contribution to children’s literature. Having written children’s literature since the 1970s, Morpurgo’s work continues to inspire new generations of young readers. Myself, I remember reading The Butterfly Lion while at primary school; a beautiful book about […]
Book Vote
2 November, 2016
There’s an election coming up in America, maybe you’ve seen a bit about it in the news? Yes, well, the less said about that I think the better. I have certainly needed a bit of distraction from my wails of ‘What is the world coming to?’ and have done what I do best: stick my […]
The creepiest place on the internet
26 October, 2016
The internet is a crazy place, full of cat memes, avocado on toast and, it seems, excellent scary stories. Courtesy of Emerald Street‘s latest newsletter, I came across a Reddit forum called NoSleep where a community of horror writers keep the tradition of ghost stories alive. There are strict rules about what tales can be published: no […]
Adaptation Autumn
20 October, 2016
Like many others, the news that a beloved book is to be made into a feature-length film provokes a mixed reaction: torn between excitement at seeing the characters brought to life and a lingering dread of what will inevitably be changed. Recent months have seen a string of literary adaptations from The Girl with all […]
For she’s a jolly good fellow – 70 years of Woman’s Hour’s Radio Girls
11 October, 2016
I am always listening to the radio. I listen in the mornings while dragging myself out of bed and into the waking world. I listen to one of my favourite radio show’s podcasts while travelling to work. I listen while cooking, while cleaning and, far too often, while not sleeping in the wee hours. So […]
The Espresso Book Machine
14 September, 2016
Technology never ceases to amazes me. Especially technology that helps revive a struggling bookshop. The Librairie des Puf, a bookshop in the Latin quarter of Paris, is a strange kind of place because there are no books. Instead, there are tablets and an Espresso Book Machine; the combination of the two lets you print a book of […]