Its mouth stretches and I can smell decay, and something vinegar sharp. “Aren’t you afraid, good Sir? It’s October after all, and though I hate to point it out, you’ve got a long drop if you lose your grip.” Its voice is low and deep, a matron’s voice.

My heart’s hammering fit to wake the dead now – too bad that someone already has – and I dig nails tighter into my precarious perch. Just in time. With a sudden whoosh of cold air, the ghost’s floating, its nose to mine. An ache spreads through my chest, like the winter chill. Suddenly, I’m glad I have my knife in my pocket.

She’s a woman. I can tell ‘coz she’s all in dusty white, her crinoline showing off full skirted splendour and lace at the bust. Her starched cotton gown is dry against my knuckles, dry as animal carcass salted within an inch of its life, and I kind of like it. Reminds me of that time Lucy let me stroke the triangle of stiff linen at her lap. Poor Luce married off to that drunkard, Willie. Free Willie, we call him, on account of his easy way with the young girls at his inn. She might be respectable now, all chignon buns and silks and furs and in a good strip of London where the posh toffs go but—Well, I was glad to leave her sitting at my kitchen this morning. I’d promised her I’d not make her go back, that she could stay with me as long as she needed, until she found her feet.

“Don’t you want to know why I’ve appeared?” The ghost lady asks politely. “I’m told most people do.”

I run through my worst transgressions as fast as I can. Until this job, I stole watches on the corner, pickpocketed coin while I boot-blacked, guarded a brothel.

“None of that,” she says, amused. “Petty, small things, and you needed to do them to survive. I’m no sanctimonious rich philanthropist in the House of Lords to lecture you.”

“Can’t say I do know then,” I say. “And if it’s all the same to you, I’d much rather you left.”

“I can’t do that,” she says. “You see, you’re a good man with a good heart.”

“What’s that got to do with anything?”

“You see those men scurrying away in the shadows?” She says.

I look down towards the dark park lined by brass fencing and see four of ‘em, top hats pulled over their heads, toiling away with a coffin on their shoulders.

“They’re grave-robbers and know full well you’re a watchman as much as a lamp lighter. They’d have stabbed you easy as winking afore your knife could flash.”

Cor, I could see she were right. If I’d have shimmied down a minute or so earlier, I’d have happened upon ‘em … “Here,” I say suspiciously. “Why d’ya care so much ‘bout my mortal coil?”

She’s crying now, clear tears sizzling as they hit the air and vanish. “I was William’s first wife. Ran away from a respectable home to be with him and he beat me until I died, a bloody pile of rags. Your Luce was smarter than me. She got away.”

I’m gaping. The ghost is already breaking up, wisping at the edges like a thread pulled loose. She won’t be with me much longer and still I can’t think of anything to say.

“You could try thank you,” she laughs, sounding faint as her mouth smudges out like chalk wiped from a blackboard.

“Thanks,” I whisper, thinking of what woulda happened to Lucy had I not come home.

But the ghost’s already gone.

1. How did you first discover the crime genre and what is it about crime writing that appeals to you?

I was about nine or ten, and someone introduced me to Sherlock Holmes. I love the complexity and the neatness of the genre, the way it sets up expectations and then perverts them. At its best, it’s a very anarchic genre.

What are your favourite crime reads?

Innocent Blood by PD James. The Collector by John Fowles. The Silence of the Lambs and Red Dragon by Thomas Harris. More recently, Fred Vargas’s Adamsberg series.

3. You write wonderful, and award winning, crime flash fiction, established the Flashbang competition, and support other flash writers. What is it about micro crime fiction that appeals to you?

The discipline and the wickedness: telling a story in the time it takes to smoke a cigarette; it shouldn’t work, but it absolutely can and does.

4. What advice do you have for aspiring flash fic writers?

Take us straight to the detail of the story. Think of those long zoom shots at the start of Hitchcock’s films – the cityscape, the street, the building, the room, the desk, the knife… Now jump-cut to the knife. But – and here’s the trick – do it without losing the story. You need to be a bit of a magician to pull it off. It’s why I admire stories like Iain Rowan’s Search History so much. Iain won the first ever Flashbang contest and his story is magnificent. Check it out: http://flashbangcontest.wordpress.com/2012/06/09/winning-story-2012/

5. Your debut crime novel, book one in the DI Marnie Rome series, comes out at the end of the month with Headline. I know that Someone Else’s Skin took a bit to get to print. How many years did it take from first draft to publication date and how many times did you rewrite your manuscript?

Twelve months, BUT I’d written four unpublished novels before that, so I’d put in my time earlier on. Now I usually take about three or four months to do a first draft then two or three months to get it to a second draft; so one major rewrite and then fine-tuning.

6. Your publication story is one that is proof of never giving up. What helped you to keep going when the writer’s road got tough?

Bloodymindedness and a dash of defiance. Oh and some really, really good friends. I think a writer’s ego is a strange beast – you have to lose almost all the arrogance you start out with, but not so much that you give up on the (crazy, mad, impossible) dream that you will be published. The iron has to enter your soul, but not at the expense of your imagination.

7. Someone Else’s Skin deals with complex forms of sexual violence around culture, race, gender and sexual preference. How much research was required for Someone Else’s Skin to make your story believable?

I think if you’re dealing with complex and sensitive issues than your research has to be up to scratch. But it also has to end somewhere, so that you can tell your story. I’m telling stories not writing non-fiction, so I would never over-emphasise the extent of my research. I hope I did enough for the story and its characters to have integrity and to move the reader enough to engage him/her with the subject matter.

8. Can you give us a teaser for Book Number Two? Maybe a cryptic clue?

I’ll give you a couple. Have you ever played Happy Families? Well, imagine if that was a matter of life or death. Now look around you and find the most innocuous object within easy reach. How could you turn that into a weapon and who would you use it against?

9. You have said before that you find characterization easier than plotting, yet Someone Else’s Skin juggles three different multi-layered plots. Was it hard to structure your book with these three plot lines and what’s your advice for people in search of a great story to match their great characters?

I didn’t structure the first draft in that way. It developed into the multi-layered plot as I added the detail. It looks like this is how I’ll do the second book too, so perhaps that’s my best advice: add layers once you have the spine of the story in place. I do think plot comes from character, not the other way around, although obviously the more plot you throw at your characters the more they grow and change, so it cuts both ways.

10. What’s a question about your writing/work that you’ve never been asked before and you’ve always wanted to be asked? Now answer it.

The question would be, “Marnie Rome is a strong female lead. Have you always written strong women?” And my answer would be No. All my early attempts at novels had heroes not heroines. I found it really difficult to write a female lead, partly I think because I was anxious about messing up, and partly because growing up, all my favourite books had heroes not heroines. But I’m over that now; I absolutely love writing Marnie. I love writing Noah and Ed too, but it’s all about Marnie for me.

Sarah Hilary lives in Bath, where she writes quirky copy for a well-loved travel publisher. She’s also worked as a bookseller, and with the Royal Navy. Her debut novel, Someone Else’s Skin, will be published in February 2014 by Headline in the UK and Penguin in the US. A second book in the series will be published a year later. Set in London, both books feature DI Marnie Rome, a woman with a tragic past and a unique insight into domestic violence.

You can find her at her blog Crawl Space, or on twitter Sarah_Hilary

And now for something completely different… Regular readers of my blog will know that I avoid crime fiction. It’s not that I don’t like mystery- in fact, I often have mystery in my fantasy novels- it’s just that I find crime that bit too unsettling. Especially good crime fiction. I once read Minette Walters and had nightmares. I’m a wuss and yet somehow it’s like fascinating creepy crawlies, once I start a crime novel I can’t look away, because crime is fascinating. It’s frightening to think that some people have certain relationships with other people that push them to murder. I would never have come across this stunning debut if I hadn’t of already known the author. I’ve known Sarah online for a few years and her prose is perfection. I knew that this debut would be one to watch for and I wasn’t wrong. If this doesn’t hit a best seller list and/or get made into a wonderful BBC crime drama I will be very, very surprised…

From the blurb:

Detective Inspector Marnie Rome: dependable, fierce, brilliant at her job. She’s a rising star in the ranks. Everyone knows how Marnie fought to come back from the murder of her parents, but very few know what is going on below the surface. Because Marnie has secrets she won’t share with anyone.

Now, if Marnie is going to find the truth she will have to face her own demons head on. Because the time has come for secrets to be revealed…

Someone Else’s Skin is definitely unsettling and confronting, but that doesn’t make it bad. Instead, this novel is an unflinching look at the multiple ways people bury parts of themselves deep down. In a way this theme reminded me of Dorothy Porter’s The Monkey’s Mask. DI Marnie Rome and DS Noah Jake both see what they want to see. By the time they realize this, it is almost too late.

This is a novel about sexual, cultural and youth violence. These are themes touched on quite often in crime fiction, but Sarah has found a way to make this theme her own. She discusses these complex issues by looking at them in fresh or rare ways. Violence against women by women, violence against men by women. Violence because of race and because of culture. Violence because of a broken home and because of cycles of violence. I found this to be interesting and sensitive. I thought that Di Marnie Rome’s back story also helped to make sense of the main plot. I have read some online reviews that indicated that people found the multiple story lines confusing. I suggest that you will find the multi-story arc rewarding if you look for the ways that each story is thematically linked. It is a novel about secrets and about masks and about complicated types of violent crime. All three crimes in the novel come back to this theme.

Sarah is an award winning flash and short fiction writer, and this came across in her assured prose. Each character, including minor characters, are fleshed out deftly with a few choice lines so that they feel real. Characters react in believable ways and clues don’t feel contrived, as sometimes happens in the crime fiction genre. Finally, a note on Sarah’s depiction of minority groups. I found her handling of both Ayana and Noah Jake to be superb. These two characters leapt and sparkled. Ayana’s story may or may not be done, but I look forward to reading more of Noah’s adventures.

Someone Else’s Skin: 4/5 inky stars

A review copy was provided by the author.

This book will be available online and at bookstores.

http://www.hachette.com.au/books/9781472207685/

https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/402166

From the blurb:

A eulogy and a verse novella. Grief, guilt, redemption. How do you go on in a world without your other half?

Think Ted Hughes Birthday Letters meets Dorothy Porter verse and you’d have My Heart’s Choir Sings. This is the story of Stewart Hinchcliffe, a writer and an artist who loses his lover and fellow creative in tragic circumstances. As he cleans out their old apartment, each new object brings back bittersweet memories. Throughout the 25 poem sequence, grief, guilt and anger color his memories. Who is to blame for what happened? Where did everything go wrong? And how on earth does Stuart move on from his past?

Email me at inkashlings@gmail.com if you’d like to go on the list for a signed print on demand copy.

Happy reading!!!

InkAshlings

xx

Two years ago, I fell in love with London. I began to write a sequence of connected poems telling the story of Stewart Hinchcliffe; a writer who loses his fellow creative in tragic circumstances. As he cleans out their old apartment, each new object brings back bittersweet memories. Throughout the 25 poem sequence, grief, guilt and anger colour his memories, so how then can he ever move on?

The poems were messy and confused. I gave up. And then one day I pulled them out of the dust drawer and started to edit them with fresh eyes. I sent a pdf out to some friends and they all told me how much they loved it but what was it all doing mouldering in silence on my desktop? Indeed.

I have Isobelle Carmody to thank for her 2013 Greylands ebook experiment. So many interesting people weighed in and deep down, I knew I wanted a turn too. So two years later here I am. On the 1st of February I am going to erelease My Heart’s Choir Sings to the world. Like the Facebook Page to come along for an experimental ride. Here I will discuss the trials and tribulations of ebook publishing, where I am at, and more importantly, why you should fork out the 99c and buy my collection come Feb.

To those people who have asked me for the past three years where they can buy my stuff officially, thank you, I love you, and this erelease is for you!

xx

Website: https://www.facebook.com/pages/My-Hearts-Choir-Sings/490774427698379
Twitter: https://twitter.com/InkAshlings
Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/14943418-maureen