Where women writers talk about their crime craft.
Multi-award-winning Sydney author, Hayley Scrivenor, spoke to Sisters in Crime’s Jacq Ellem For the November Murder Monday. Hayley’s debut, Dirt Town, was a number-one bestseller in Australia and won several awards, including the UK Crime Writers’ Association New Blood Dagger Award, the ABIA for General Fiction Book of the Year, a Lambda Literary Award and Sisters in Crime’s Davitt Award for best debut book in 2023. Her latest novel is Girl Falling.
Award-winning Sydney author, Natalie Conyer, is the subject of this Murder Monday. As ever, interviewed by Jacq Ellem.
Veteran cop Schalk Lourens is back in Shadow City. Now suspended and thinking of emigrating to Australia, whilst visiting his daughter in Sydney Lourens is swept up into a minefield of deceit and manipulation by an enemy more powerful and depraved than is imaginable. She talks about how she writes.
For the September Murder Monday, Sisters in Crime’s Jacq Ellem spoke to Jane Sullivan, crime author, and the literary columnist for Nine Newspapers. She has been a judge for Sisters in Crime’s Davitt Awards several times. Jane is the author of three novels, Little People, The White Star, and Murder in Punch Lane, her first crime novel, plus a memoir, Storytime. Murder in Punch Lane is set in Melbourne in 1868, and inspired by real events and people.
For the August Murder Monday, Sisters in Crime’s Jacq Ellem spoke to Liz Evans, British journalist, author, former psychotherapist, and academic with a PhD in Creative Writing. Luckily, for us, she has moved to Australia. She has been awarded two Varuna Residential Fellowships and the Katharine Susannah Prichard Fellowship, as well as an Arts Tasmania grant for an Education Residency. Her debut novel is the wonderfully titled Catherine Wheel (Ultimo Press).
For the July Murder Monday, Sisters in Crime’s Jacq Ellem spoke to Sherryl Clark, the prolific author who has published more than 70 children’s and YA books, including novels, chapter books, picture books and award-winning verse novels. And now lots of crime. Sherryl has recently moved from Australia to New Zealand (Aotearoa). Sherryl will be talking to Sisters in Crime in Melbourne on Friday 26 July.
For the June Murder Monday, Sisters in Crime’s Jacq Ellem spoke to Yrsa Sigurdardottir, the best-selling author who has helped put Icelandic crime writing on the world map. Yrsa Sigurðardóttir has authored a successful award-winning crime series of books based around the central character of Thora Gudmundsdottir, who is a lawyer and single mother of two children. She has also written, to critical acclaim, several stand-alone thrillers and horror novels.
For the May Murder Monday, Sisters in Crime’s Jacq Ellem spoke to WA regional author, Fleur McDonald who has more than 20 novels to her credit and has sold more than 850,000 copies. All of Fleur’s novels are set in regional Australia and she’s often called the “Voice of the Outback”. She was writing rural noir before it was a concept. Fleur’s storylines draw inspiration from having lived and worked on farms for much of her life and she now owns 4050ha farm east of Esperance.
Sisters in Crime’s Jacq Ellem spoke to Melbourne author Kylie Orr for the April Murder Monday. Kylie has two much-praised novels to her credit – Someone Else’s Child, and now The Eleventh Floor which has a fabulous tagline, “The view is a killer…”.
For the March Murder Monday, Sisters in Crime’s Jacq Ellem spoke to Ovidia Yu, one of Singapore’s best-known and most acclaimed writers. Ovidia has had over thirty plays produced and is the author of the Aunty Lee Singaporean Murder Mysteries series and the Crown Colony Crime series, which has been optioned for TV by Poisson Rouge Pictures.
For the December Murder Monday, Sisters in Crime’s Jacq Ellem spoke to Hannah Richell, dual citizen of the UK and Australia, and author of four international bestselling novels – Secrets of the Tides (2012), The Shadow Year (2014), The Peacock Summer (2019) and The River Home (2020). Hannah’s latest novel is The Search Party (out very soon with Simon & Schuster).