Tag Archives: thriller

Interview a Writer ~ Victoria Gemmell *yes, me

Posted on by vgemmell


This week I’m doing something a bit different on the blog to fill a gap for a planned post (which will be coming soon…). I thought about just having a week off, but then decided to ask my husband to fire some questions at me last night, with the resulting interview posted below.

Author Biog (taken from my About Me page) :

Where do you get your inspiration for your books?

Headlines and articles in the news acted as a catalyst for the plots within all three of my YA Mystery/Thrillers. I imagined what would happen if fictional teenagers were placed at the centre of dark situations, (unexplained teen suicides in Follow Me; possible miscarriage of justice in a media obsessed teen murder case in Promise Me; the unveiling of an elite group who kidnap young people from the care system to extract their pure plasma to stay young in Young Blood) My teen protagonists start to uncover hidden truths that adults have been oblivious about, endangering themselves in the process. It’s not until my characters start to form, that the full story will start to unfold.

What do you do to get into a ‘creative headspace’?

Once a book starts to take shape I like to create a playlist for it on Spotify, choosing music which fits the ‘mood’ of the story. To this day there’s one particular Silversun Pickups album that I just need to hit play on and it takes me right back to the emotions I felt when I started to write Follow Me. Finding the right tone and ‘voice’ for a book can be challenging, and music helps me switch off the over-thinking part of my brain. When I’m thinking too much about a story I know it’s not working yet. You need to feel it.

What new book are you working on?

I’m attempting to write a middle-grade magic realism type story. I also have an idea for an adult thriller which might start to take over, so who knows which one I’ll finish first. At this rate it’ll be neither.

What do you think about the concept of AI written books?

Honestly I find it infuriating and worrying. About three years ago we started to talk about AI in work (in my day job as a careers adviser) and the impact it might start to have on certain careers. The topic was brought up on a regional staff day online and a colleague in another region flippantly said, ‘My friend has just written a children’s book with AI and is now selling it on Amazon’. I had to hold myself back as he was actually boasting about it; like it was an amazing achievement. There’s a lot of people out there who I think love the idea of writing a book, and saying they have done so, and love the idea of making money from it (ha, they’ll soon learn). The magic of writing for me is when your brain unlocks almost a super-power you don’t understand yourself; when characters form, ideas and words flow, and it all somehow connects together into a story. Often stories fall flat and don’t work out, and that’s important too. Trying, shaping and learning, and re-writing, and tapping in to your imagination. We’re already being brain-washed by algorithms and dopamine rewards online, which is disrupting our attention spans and the ability to feel ok being bored or at peace…and that’s when we do our best daydreaming and tap into our imagination. (I don’t think it’s a coincidence that I do some of my best thinking these days in the shower or bath!). I don’t want AI to steal our imaginations. It kind of feels like something from the plot of the Never Ending Story when Fantasia is threatened by ‘The Nothing’.

What do you find difficult subjects to tackle?

I shy away from writing anything which involves high-concept epic world-building (think space sci-fi series where characters have unpronounceable names.) I get bored reading this kind of thing, so I know I’d get bored writing it too, and I’d be really bad at it.

What do you enjoy writing about?

I love writing mysteries where I often don’t really know what has happened so I enjoy seeing the plot unfold as my characters develop. That’s the best kind of writing, where you feel like you’re the reader and the plot master rolled into one, and it’s amazing how much you can trust your subconscious to fill in blanks you haven’t even seen. (It’s often why I need to go back to re-write my endings as my characters take over and take me by surprise).

Where can we find your books? (click on highlighted links)

Young Blood: Amazon (paperback and kindle) on worldwide Digital platforms Order into: Waterstones Foyles

Promise Me: Amazon (paperback and kindle) on worldwide Digital platforms Order into: Waterstones Foyles

Follow Me – please contact me direct for a signed copy

Happy 1 year book-versary to Young Blood

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This time last year I released my Young Adult crossover thriller Young Blood out into the world so I thought I’d do a post to mark the milestone.

This week I am also running a give-away alongside Ornate Alchemy on Instagram, where you can win one of their beautiful custom-made Bloodstone pendants , and a signed copy of Young Blood. If you live in the UK head over to our Instagram pages to enter: @victoriagemmellauthor @ornatealchemy You have until 5pm Friday!

It always feels strange once a book reaches publication. You spend years perfecting the story, (I’ve not yet mastered a quick turn-around), pouring a lot of heart and soul into the pages, spending hours with the characters in their world, and then suddenly it’s not just in your head anymore; it’s out there on paper for anyone to read. And then you go through a mix of emotions when you realise people are buying the book and actually reading it. What will they think? Will they enjoy it? Will they get past chapter one? Will they like that character as much as you enjoyed writing them? Will they get angry and emotional in the right places? It always delights me (and fills me with relief), when someone tells me they finished my book and loved it. This happened actually at the weekend when a friend’s mother-in-law told me how much she enjoyed Young Blood and was interested enough about the story to ask me about the inspiration behind it.

She said something along the lines of, ‘You write in a lovely way.’ These kinds of comments are so appreciated; I don’t think people realise how much writers need to hear this sometimes. Not to feed our egos, but to motivate us to keep going. I’m at the early stages of writing a new book just now and it always feels like a tricky stage, when nothing is fully formed and you are constantly questioning if this is any good or if it’s the most boring trite that you’ve ever attempted. The characters haven’t all appeared yet, and the ones who have, are still not showing you their true motivations; the setting is still taking shape, the plot has lots of holes and you’re not quite sure what’s next, but you are hoping if you keep writing all will be revealed.

In Scotland, where I live, we’re not very good at celebrating our achievements, often downplaying ourselves in self deprecating ways. Oh you enjoyed my 100,000 word novel, och that was nothing really. Just a little thing I did. Actually it was a big thing, and I locked myself away in a room by myself for hours on end to get the words just right and showed up, and didn’t give up, and saw it all the way through to the final end of being able to hold the finished copy in my hands…

Here’s some extracts from some favourite feedback and reviews I’ve received about Young Blood since it’s release. One of them was written by my Dad; you might think that’s embarrassing and a total faux pas to even mention, a bit like the bad example pitch emails to agents ‘My Mum told me this is the best thing she’s ever read in her life so I know this is going to be a best-seller.’ But actually my Dad hasn’t read much of my work over the years (no slight to him; he doesn’t read much teen fiction, believe it or not! And now he is retired he also has more time on his hands). I think he was maybe a wee bit surprised by how much he actually enjoyed Young Blood, and I was delighted that he did.

The standard of writing is superb, with excellent descriptions of characters and locations without becoming boring. As the mystery progresses you desperately want to find out what is going to happen. This thriller is a compelling read for the YA market and adults alike and I’m not just saying this because I’m Victoria’s Dad! Great Christmas Gift! (hey people get your Christmas shopping in early! – that’s me adding in this comment)

Wow!

Only 19% in and I was on tenterhooks and by half way through I was desperate to know what happened and took it to bed with me. Definitely not conducive for sleep but I just couldn’t put it down.
I loved the twists and turns that had me gasping. Credit for the author. I definitely recommend. A brilliant read!

Thrilling and involving, this is one not to miss.

Young Blood, the latest YA novel by author Victoria Gemmell is not a story for the faint-hearted….These characters are not cardboard cut-outs. They are richly developed, with flaws as well as virtues. Faced with almost impossible choices, a group of teenagers find the courage to challenge the powerful figures behind the conspiracy even though they know that their chances of winning are almost zero.

I was gripped by the story from the start- was a real page turner and was desperate to read on and discover how the plot developed! Can’t wait to read more from this author!

Captivating. This book is made for the big screen.

Great read! Really gripping and loved the character of Hope. Would make a fab film. (Hi, Netflix, are you reading?)

Loved it. Every bit as accomplished as a Good Girl’s Guide to Murder

Have I tempted you yet to take a chance on Young Blood?

If so here’s the links to Amazon to buy: and wider digital channels here: Order into bookshops here and here Abbey Books in Paisley might also still have a copy kicking about

(P.s It’s only £1.99 on kindle just now which is way cheaper than a nice coffee, and it will get your heart racing just as much as caffeine, and the buzz will last longer…)

Inspiration is Everywhere #Part 3 (blog post 6 of series

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Continuing with the theme of sharing where I find inspiration for stories, today’s post is about the inspiration behind my Young Adult books. I’m cheating a bit with this post and extracting a section from a blog post I wrote back in 2022, where I went into quite a bit of depth already about the inspiration behind my debut YA mystery, Follow Me, and my second YA mystery, Promise Me. You can read the full post ‘Stranger than Fiction’ here

My latest YA Thriller, Young Blood, was also inspired by an article I read in the press, so it fits nicely with the theme of paying attention to what you read in the news. Just like I talked about in last week’s ‘inspiration’ post, the best stories can be formed from things that catch your attention in ‘real- life’, if you add in the ‘What if’ question, and let your imagination run wild…

News headlines often catch my eye and act as a catalyst. When my imagination takes over, and characters start to form, a story of fiction then unfolds, where I imagine what would happen if fictional teenagers were placed in these situations I read about.

Numerous reports of the unexplained Bridgend suicides stayed with me for years .There were twenty-six known suicides in the town between 2007-2008, and most of those who lost their life were young adults. I remembered opening newspapers at the time, wondering what on earth was going on in that town.

In my book Follow Me my 17-year-old protagonist, Kat, begins a desperate search for answers and explanations, after her twin, Abby, is the sixth in their small Scottish town to die by apparent suicide.

A big theme of my YA mystery, Promise Me, is the way in which press coverage and social media has the power to portray a certain narrative during high profile, emotional murder cases. One of the inspirations of the story was my memory of the sensationalist press coverage of convicted Scottish teen Luke Mitchell from many years ago. From 2003-2005 there was lots of press coverage around his case. Demonising language and character assassination was often used in reporters’ narratives (With headlines like ‘Devils Spawn’ appearing on front page reports).

The headline ‘Boyfriend, 15, charged (with murder of schoolgirl Jodi Jones)’, was published in the Edinburgh Evening News, (2004) before said boyfriend (Luke) even went to trial. Everyone in their small-knit town knew he was ‘the boyfriend’.

The paper took things a stop further and named him. The Press and Journal, Aberdeen, also ran a similar story. They faced contempt charges but were cleared of breaching the Criminal Procedure (Scotland) Act, that states “no newspaper report of any proceeding in court should identify anyone under the age of 16.” (In Scotland this is now 18). They were cleared of charges because judges ruled that the story was not a report of court proceedings. This is just one troubling example of how a fifteen-year-old boy, (and throughout his trial when he was sixteen), dominated headlines. Numerous false ‘facts’ were published about the case, and tabloids delighted in running sensationalist reports about Mitchell’s apparent obsession with knives, drug-taking, lack of discipline in a single parent household, even linking his music tastes to the murder.

I read a lot about the case and it made me realise how easy it could be for a small community to spread rumours relying heavily on hearsay and perceptions of a local outcast boy’s ‘reputation’, and how this could influence local prosecution investigations, and a jury. Conversations I’ve had with legal people where I questioned how anyone could truly be impartial in such a high profile case said a judge would have ensured jurors had no local connections to the case. The trial took place in Edinburgh, less than half an hour away from where the murder took place. I was reading newspaper stories an hour away from where it all unfolded and still felt emotional reactions to the reports, even if I didn’t personally know anyone.

My book Promise Me is a work of fiction, set in an affluent fictionalised Scottish village, and not about the Mitchell case, but I hope it makes people think about how damaging media and indeed, court narratives can be, and the distorted perceptions that communities can sometimes have of young people who don’t quite ‘fit’. In my job I’ve undergone unconscious bias training and I really believe the police involved in this case let a lot of their own unconscious bias (and media pressure to get a conviction), influence their decision-making. If you have an interest in finding out more about this case I recommend the brilliant podcast Through the Wall by Naomi Channell.

My latest YA thriller, Young Blood, is a story about young people in the care system who are kidnapped and taken to a secret house to become exclusive plasma donors for an elite group of wealthy adults who want to stay youthful and healthy. It’s told from the perspective of two teenagers – Ana who is outside the house and dealing with the realisation her mum may have early onset dementia; and Hope who is captured and taken to the house.

Young Blood was inspired by an article I read about an American start-up company ‘Ambrosia’, founded by a medical school graduate in 2016 which sold ‘young blood transfusions’ (from young people into older people). Charging a large sum of money for these transfusions, they claimed a range of health benefits such as treatment for Alzheimer’s. In a pitch about Ambrosia at a self-enhancement conference in 2017 Karmazin said, “We’re a company interested in making you young again.” In my day job I work with vulnerable teenagers. I see how much instability and uncertainty young people in the care system in particular can face. This sparked off the idea of having a powerful doctor set up a premium club who can access pure plasma transfusions from a select group of young people who are easy to make ‘disappear’, whilst maintaining a super-controlled environment within ‘the house.’

Links to buy my Young Adult books are here

I often take along strange news headlines to creative writing workshops I deliver in schools and get the class to choose one as inspiration for a story. A popular headline lots of pupils chose last year was, ‘Girl discovers criminal living in her attic.’ I love hearing the ideas form, and characters that start to develop. It also shows that we can all start with a similar idea, but when you create your own unique characters a truly unique story also starts to take shape…

Why not spend the week looking up interesting headlines, and see if it sparks off any great story ideas!

Deviate from the plan

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I often say I know a book is working when my characters start to take over. This is why I believe you can plan a rough outline and key aspects of the plot, but you have to give your story and characters permission to deviate from the plan. Just like real life, you can try to plan ahead but often external factors will throw your plans into chaos, or often throw up something better/unexpected.

When creating fully formed characters, until you get to know them properly they’re not always going to fit into your plotlines. You’ll often see writers suggesting you construct ‘characters studies/profiles’ in advance – like what’s their favourite band, foods, key moments from their childhood, are they are a morning/afternoon person? Which can all be helpful, but until they turn up on your page and get stuck into the action of your story and start interacting with your other characters none of that is going to tell you much about where they fit in to the bigger picture of your plotlines.

For my first two YA mysteries my characters told me what was going to happen, meaning I had to deviate from my planned endings. Neither of the original endings felt right. They were both written in and left there for quite a while. I couldn’t quite figure out why the endings didn’t sit well with me until I asked myself ‘but would that character actually do that?’ And then I realised I hadn’t stayed true to them and as soon as I understood this and let go of my own pre-conceived ideas, and really listened to my subconscious, it was obvious they’d already laid out all of the clues for me. Yes, we writers really do have voices talking to us in our heads. An acceptable kind of madness, in this mad world of novel construction.

During the planning stages for Young Blood I always knew I would have two main teen protagonists, Ana and Hope. I wanted to have two contrasting personalities and two contrasting situations. Ana and Hope’s narratives run through alternate chapters. 16 year old Ana is part of a tight-knit family and hasn’t really faced many challenges in life, which gives her a bit of a self-absorbed naivety. The uncertainty of her mum’s potential early-onset dementia diagnosis really shakes up her world. She is also upset when her new friend Hope disappears, and tries to find out what happened to her.

When I first started to plan the story I always thought Ana would dominate as her determination to find out what happened to Hope is a key driver of the plot. But then when my character Hope started to take shape I think she took over a bit!

15 year old Hope’s world was torn apart when she lost her mum three years previously and she finds herself in the care system. Her experiences have been lonely and unsettling and Hope welcomes Ana’s friendship until she’s taken from school one day and finds herself in the ‘House.’

I found writing Hope’s character emotional and her strength and fire, along with her vulnerability, was something I tried really hard to capture throughout the book. Her close bond with Seb in the house, and other key characters inside, also helped to flesh out other aspects of her personality and I started to grow very fond of and protective of her. So far she is probably one of my favourite characters I have written.

Throughout the book Hope finds strength from her family’s tarot cards.

My sister-in-law who makes beautiful handmade silver jewellery (see ImiandtheDeer here) gave me great support with the structural edits of Young Blood (she is a former English teacher!) and half-joked about designing a necklace inspired by Hope as part of a new collection. I was blown away when she gifted me the beautiful ‘Hope’ pendant below at my book launch. The pendant is a one-of-a kind – a ruby set in the middle of a gold sunburst, inspired by the back of Hope’s tarot cards which have a ‘ruby red jewel in the centre of blazing suns burning bright.’

That’s me wearing it on a recent trip to Arran. It’s so lovely to have a piece of jewellery to wear inspired by one of my characters! It makes Hope seem even more real to me.

I’ll leave you with a longer extract from a scene with Hope below. Links to buy Young Blood are here

“A reassuring warmth flowed through my body as I was greeted with the familiar image of a lion with magnificent orange mane, a goddess with flowing fair hair gripping the chain wound around his neck. Strength: You have more strength, power, and courage than you know. I felt the tight knot of anger I’d been carrying around the past few weeks start to unravel as I remembered Mum’s instruction, any time she drew this card for me, tugging on my hair which matched the fire of the lion’s mane. You are the lion AND the goddess. You remember that.
I tucked the card into my schoolbooks for a good luck charm.
Tomorrow I was going to try to be both.”

Blog Feature

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I’m delighted to be featured on my Mum, Rosemary Gemmell’s blog today, which reveals a bit more about the inspiration and research behind Young Blood. You can read full the post here

I feel very lucky having the support from my mum. We both write and it’s great having someone to share work and writing experiences with. You can view the full range of books my Mum has written on her website above. Even although we write quite different things, with a different style, I always enjoy reading and editing her work, and really appreciate the feedback I receive on all of my work. Without the support with editing, technical advice and lots more, I don’t think Young Blood would ever have made it to the final stages!

Here’s a snippet below from the blog post, where I talk about the inspiration behind Young Blood:

What was the inspiration behind your new book?

My initial idea for Young Blood stemmed from an article I read, about an American start-up company ‘Ambrosia’ founded by a medical school graduate, Karmazin, in 2016 which sold ‘young blood plasma transfusions’ (from young people into older people).

Charging a large sum of money for these transfusions, they claimed a range of health benefits such as offering treatment for Alzheimer’s. In a pitch about Ambrosia at a self-enhancement conference in 2017, Karmazin said, “We’re a company interested in making you young again.”

This sparked off the idea of having a powerful doctor set up a premium club for wealthy individuals to access pure plasma transfusions, capturing young people from the care system to be the donors, maintaining a super-controlled environment within ‘the house’.

In my day job I work with vulnerable teenagers on a daily basis. I see how much uncertainty and instability young people in the care system can face and how depressingly easy it could be for them to ‘disappear’ and for powerful individuals in authority to cover this up

Charging a large sum of money for these transfusions, they claimed a range of health benefits such as offering treatment for Alzheimer’s. In a pitch about Ambrosia at a self-enhancement conference in 2017, Karmazin said, “We’re a company interested in making you young again.”

This sparked off the idea of having a powerful doctor set up a premium club for wealthy individuals to access pure plasma transfusions, capturing young people from the care system to be the donors, maintaining a super-controlled environment within ‘the house’.

In my day job I work with vulnerable teenagers on a daily basis. I see how much uncertainty and instability young people in the care system can face and how depressingly easy it could be for them to ‘disappear’ and for powerful individuals in authority to cover this up

If you continue to read through the interview you’ll see I have a dream director in mind if my books were ever made into films (we can all dream!!). I love the bold, quirky and eye-catching directorial style of Emerald Fennell (Promising Young Woman, Saltburn), so if you are reading this Emerald, get in touch 😉 I was delighted to see a crime writer I know share a photo of Young Blood on social media last week, saying it was a captivating read and that anyone commissioning films should check it out, so you never know! When I’m writing books I often see the story ‘playing out’ in my head like a film.

I had a great launch weekend last week for Young Blood. I’m going to post separately about that later in the week with some photos.

For now I will leave you with my book trailer

Launch day

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It’s Launch Day for Young Blood, my new Young Adult thriller! Thanks to my talented friend Dainty Dora for transforming my cover idea into the beauty below.

Today I’m doing an online celebration over on facebook. If you click this link you can view the posts on the Discussion page. I’m not doing a facebook live so anyone can drop in and out to view the posts at any point throughout the day https://www.facebook.com/share/RV6EhwXPKAUbmNHq/?mibextid=9l3rBW

I’m also busy getting organised for my in-person launch at the weekend where I’ll be selling signed copies. I’ll post more about that next week.

Links to buy the book are here

Digital 

https://books2read.com/u/mdADRE

Paperback 

Young Blood: A Young Adult Crossover Thriller

Order into Waterstones:

https://www.waterstones.com/book/young-blood/victoria-gemmell/9781739811020

The Blurb is below and when you click the Free Preview on the image above you can read the start of the book.

Creative adventures

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After what felt like a slow start to the year, Spring has raced forward at light speed (with some lovely sunshine along the way).

The past couple of months have been very busy for me as I’ve been working on final book edits, cover design chat, and more proofreads.

I also took part in the Paisley Book Festival Schools programme in April. This meant a lot to me as I lived in Paisley for many years and I wrote lots when I lived in the town. A couple of my flash fiction pieces were inspired by observations around town and I used to love sitting in cafes writing notes and reading and going wanders taking photographs of some of the beautiful buildings. I also wrote my first two books when I lived in Paisley.

Delivering creative writing workshops to a range of S1-S3 pupils was fun and I always love seeing what story ideas they come up with. As part of my sessions I had given the groups real-life news headlines for inspiration and the most popular one by far was ‘Girl finds criminal living in her attic.’ I really wanted to read the finished stories for that prompt!

School Workshop in action

After my workshops were over my husband and I headed across to the Isle of Arran, one of our favourite places to visit. We lucked out with the weather and it was so relaxing going walks along the beach and sitting outdoors for meals/drinks. I always think there is a real sense of calm on the Island and could happily spend weeks there writing and doing creative things (but sadly had to return home to my day job!!). Sometimes I dream about being successful enough to be a full-time writer and if it meant being able to spend more time hiding away on islands like this that would be the biggest motivator for me!

Beautiful Arran

Later this week I’m going to be doing a Cover Reveal for Young Blood, my new young adult crossover thriller and posting the trailer for this.

It’s always nerve-wracking releasing work out into the world but also exciting to see a project ‘come to life’ and now I can’t wait for the book to be published and story to be read.

What’s next?

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I’m sitting typing this on a dark, rainy afternoon thinking Autumn has truly arrived and on days like these it feels good to be indoors doing creative things. I’m still working on some final edits for my Young Adult thriller Young Blood. I don’t always talk much about books that aren’t out yet but I’m quite excited about this one and want to build up some momentum to the release (which will hopefully be in Spring). For Promise Me I did a launch online, two Octobers ago, when life still wasn’t quite ‘back to normal’, (whatever normal is these days!) and for Young Blood I’m hoping to have some fun organising a couple of in-person events.

I started working on this book a good few years ago, but it took me a while to settle on how to write it. The plot really started to take shape when I spent the weekend at the fantastic Chasing Time Writers’ retreat back in 2018, (which sadly is no more). I stayed in a big gothic style mansion dating back to the 1800s during the retreat, which was perfect as a similar house features in Young Blood and I found when I was there scenes started to jump into my head, helping me plot out the first eight chapters, which then gave me the momentum to really crack on with the book when I returned home. I finished my first draft in 2020 and then multiple rounds of edits took place. Last year I decided to give it some space, mulling over some further structural edits and now I’m nearly there with the final final draft. (Though I know there will still be lots of further proofreading and line edits!).

In the meantime here’s a short extract and blurb for the book:

“This place you’re taking me to, it sounds too good to be true. What’s the catch?”

She hesitated, lowering her voice, “It’s all true; the luxuries, the comfort…

All they want in return is one little thing.

Your blood.”

Held captive in a gothic house, kidnapped teenagers from the care system are exploited by a wealthy ring of powerful individuals for their ‘pure plasma’ blood transfusions. To cure illness and chase the dream of eternal youth, no price is too high.

When fifteen year old Hope goes missing, her friend Ana starts to unravel dark secrets that could lead to her rescue.

But then Ana has to make an impossible choice, receiving an offer that could mean curing her mum of early on-set dementia, at the cost of friendships and lives.

Would you betray your friends to save your Mum?

At the same time as focusing on this project, I have a new book idea taking shape in my head (and sometimes on paper!) I’ve got lots of short notes about characters and plot and scenes that randomly keep popping in to my head. I can’t wait to properly get stuck in to get some chapters down. It might even turn into a series, and even although it looks like the story will have another teen protagonist, it’s a teen with a difference (I’m not revealing anything about this one yet!) and the themes lend themselves more to an adult novel, so that will be an exciting new challenge.

On Instagram this month I noticed a fun creative challenge #writetober23 created by the author Annalise Avery (you can find out more about Annalise and her books here) We’re given prompts every day to provide insight into our creative process.

I’ve found it hard lately to nurture my creative brain so I’ve found posting daily about my writing process and taking time to put together some creative Instagram posts has been really helpful to keep me in the right frame of mind! If you’re on Instagram you should join in, there’s still plenty of days left in October to get going! You can find the prompts on Annalise’s acccount – @annaliseavery and you can find me on at @victoriagemmellauthor

On Friday afternoon I was invited along to chat to the Storytellers Society at the University of the West of Scotland. It was nice to see students creating a space to talk about books and writing in amongst their studying.

Next month I will be visiting Erskine Writers to deliver a workshop on writing flash fiction which is always a fun topic.

In the press & other adventures

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In a well timed run-on from my last post about social media allowing users their 15 minutes of fame, here is mine. You can follow this link to read a feature in my local paper, the Renfrewshire Gazette, where I talk about my YA mystery Promise Me and why I enjoy writing for teenagers.

Last month I was also delighted to be tagged in a great review for Promise Me. I’ve put an image of this below but it is worth visitng Rachel Sargeant’s site for other great thriller reviews here. Rachel’s thrillers are now on my TBR pile!

The past week I had a nice break from work, visiting St Andrews, Anstruther and Crail. The sun kept shining most of the time which was a bonus. Highlights were browsing in Topping and Company Books, having a wander round Crail Pottery and sampling the infamous Anstruther fish and chips (some photos below).

Now it’s back to reality and I’m trying to get words down for a new book I’m working on. Scenes keep popping in to my head, which is great, but none of them are in any logistical order, so I am wondering if I should deviate from my usual linear book writing process and just see where it all takes me!