In looking back over my books, it occurred to me that there’s a lot of me in there. Hopefully, the reader won’t notice but I have found it valuable to include many of my own experiences as being those of my hero, Mac Maguire. Besides giving him my disability, I’ve also shared my memories.

I didn’t really plan it this way but it seems that each new book sheds just a little more light on Mac and how he got to where he is. For instance, in my last book, Mac’s Christmas Present, he remembers a long ago Christmas when, for the first time, he was allowed to join the menfolk of his family in going to midnight mass. He remembers going down the dark empty streets of Small Heath on his way to church, his new boots clicking as he went, warm in the knowledge that he was now grown up. Of course, best of all, he got to open his presents as soon as he got home. Certain events just stick in your mind and this was one of them. I remember the route we took, the cold foggy air making our breath turn to smoke and, most of all, the glow I felt at being allowed to walk with the men in my family.

In my latest book, A Murdered Crow, (hopefully to be published later this year) Mac remembers an event from his past. He’s reviewing crime books as part of a case and he comes across the Sherlock Holmes stories. A vivid memory takes him back into his childhood. He had had pneumonia and after hospital and many needles he is looking forward to seeing all his schoolfriends and playing outside. As it was the start of winter, the doctor had told the school that he should not be allowed to play outside until the spring. And so, instead of playing with his friends he got to sit outside the teacher’s room, a dreary corridor, empty except for a bookcase. He could hear the children playing outside and he sulked for quite a while before boredom got the better of him. He tried some of the books, Lamb, Shakespeare, Pope, Dryden and found them as dry as dust. Then he picked up the Sherlock Holmes stories. He was suddenly in smoky Victorian London where there’s murder, blackmail and a host of other skullduggeries going on. It got so that he couldn’t wait until break time to find out what happened next.

Of course all of the above actually happened to me and I hope that it comes across as being authentic because of that. Those stories of the first great fictional detective inspired Mac to become a detective while, for me, they fed into my desire to write crime novels. We all have various experiences and memories that we think of as being mundane and uninteresting yet they are unique to you. Putting these into your stories should make your characters richer and more authentic.

Good luck with your writing!