Monday, October 8, 2018

SPOTLIGHT w/INTERVIEW - The Love Detective (A Clarry Pennhaligan Mystery, #1) by Angela Dyson

The Love Detective

A Clarry Pennhaligan Mystery, #1
by Angela Dyson

Publication Date: September 28th 2018
Publisher: Matador Books

Genre: Chick-Lit, Thriller, Women’s, Contemporary Fiction








"Pacy, funny and exciting. Cynical yet romantic at heart, Clarry is a girl that you can't help but like - and root for...." – Independent Reviewer



BLURB
“He’d thought himself the hunter, that I was easy prey but what he hadn’t bargained for, was contending with a woman who hadn’t eaten a square meal in twenty-four hours. I get mean when I’m hungry.”

Clarry Pennhaligan, low on ambition but high on energy, can’t seem to come up with a proper grown-up plan to kick-start her life. Planning really isn’t her thing. But then she happens upon her true vocation: Snooping.  Discovering other people’s secrets and getting paid for it. What could possibly go wrong? Well……as it turns out, just about everything and soon Clarry finds herself in real danger.

The Love Detective is the first in a series due for release in September 2018. The second book will follow in late spring 2019.


Author Angela Dyson Reads from The Love Detective

Read an Excerpt Here:

Read a Steamy Excerpt Here:






Author Info
Angela Dyson ditched her London life and downsized her home to move to the sticks in Surrey, to follow her dream to become a professional author. She loves to write but to pay the bills (Angela soon discovered that utility companies, bank managers and landlords aren’t known for their generosity and understanding natures,) she had to squeeze the writing in with working for a living. Some of the jobs to which she only gave half her attention have included working for a recording studio and a record label, running a building maintenance company where pretty much the only upside was getting to boss a lot of men about all day, doing a bit of plus size modelling (strictly clothes on) and, for one memorable summer, making a living reading palms on a Greek Island.

The Book Junkie Reads . . . Interview with Angela Dyson

How would you describe you style of writing to someone that has never read your work?:
It’s been described as having the comedic elements of Janet Evanovich and the tension of Sue Grafton. Which, as The Love Detective is a chick-lit thriller, I will take any day of the week!
I enjoy creating a blend of humour and warmth mixed with the thrill and pace of adventure. In The Love Detective some of the adventures experienced by my heroine, Clarry Pennhaligan, are fun and exciting but others are extremely threatening and dangerous. It’s in the different challenges that they raise that the reader gets to know what my leading lady is made of!

What mindset or routine do you feel the need to set when preparing to write (in general whether you are working on a project or just free writing)?
This is a question that I have often asked myself: How can I best prepare? What setting/time of day/state of mind encourages me to create a piece of writing? And my answer? I wish it was a straightforward one, but it isn’t! Often, I wake up and my head buzzes with ideas and I know I’ve got to get them down.
The morning I find, is a very good time for generating ideas. And then, over the day, I eliminate some of them as complete non-starters but slowly develop the others by expanding and editing. But for me it’s the evening where I suddenly experience a break-through. Something that kicks the ideas I’ve been working with onto a different level.
And state of mind? Well, when I’m happy in myself, my writing has a strong comedic aspect and when I’m feeling low, my work takes on a darker and melancholy edge. And I often find that what I’ve written reinforces my mood.  

Do you take your character prep to heart? Do you nurture the growth of each character all the way through to the page? Do you people watch to help with development? Or do you build upon your character during story creation?:
I don’t think out my characters before I start to write. I find that it’s best to let them develop organically and then they end up speaking for themselves – which may sound a little weird! And I’m definitely a people-watcher. Always have been. As a child I used to imagine the lives of people I saw on the bus or in the street. There are stories all around us.

Have you found yourself bonding with any particular character? If so which one(s)?:
Absolutely! My heroine, Clarry Pennhaligan in The Love Detective, I am so fond of (and sometimes exasperated by) Clarry that I felt compelled to create a series of novels featuring her adventures as an amateur detective. She’s very real to me. Probably because she’s not stereotypical of a chick-lit novel. She’s funny but flawed. I find her extremely likeable. She’s my friend.

Do you have a character that you have been working on that you can't wait to put to paper?
Yes. A lot of them. But because I find it doesn’t work for me to have more than one writing project on the go at a time and I don’t want to lose sight of them, I write a monologue from that character’s point of view. It can be about anything, but it means that I then know essentially who they are, and they will be available to me when I’m ready to introduce them to the world.

Have you ever felt that there was something inside of you that you couldn't control? If so what? If no what spurs you on to reach for the unexperienced? :
Oh… yes. I write out of a need for escapism. Real life can be wonderful, full of joy, excitement and adventure. And of course, inevitably, spread out across the years, there are times of great sadness and loss. There are also moments of sheer dull routine! And so, in all seasons and in all moods, I feel that reality is heightened by fiction and that by writing I create new worlds to explore not just for my readers… but for myself.


PS: I just wanted to say that I very much enjoyed answering these questions – they really made me think!


Twitter: https://twitter.com/AngelaDysonAuth
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