Blogtour - Know Me Now by CJ Carver - Giveaway!

Today I'm honoured to join the blogtour for Know Me Now, the new book from CJ Carver, with a GIVEAWAY, Courtesy of the lovely people at Zaffre, I can offer not one but TWO copies of the book.

Just look:

A SUICIDE. A MURDER. A CONSPIRACY.
DIGGING UP THE PAST CAN BE DEADLY . . .

A thirteen-year-old boy commits suicide.

A sixty-five-year old man dies of a heart attack.

Dan Forrester, ex-MI5 officer, is connected to them both.

And when he discovers that his godson and his father have been murdered, he teams up with his old friend, DC Lucy Davies, to find answers.

C J Carver

But as the pair investigate, they unravel a dark and violent mystery stretching decades into the past and uncover a terrible secret.

A secret someone will do anything to keep buried...

'A top notch thriller writer' SIMON KERNICK

'Perfect for fans of Lee Child and Mason Cross' GUARDIAN

'CJ Carver is one of the best thriller writers working today' TOM HARPER

The book is out in e-book on 14 December and paperback on 11 January and will be available from your friendly local bookshop, including via Hive, or from other places such as here and here.



BUT if you're incredibly lucky and win the giveaway you can get your hands on one to read over Christmas!

All you have to do is to retweet my tweet announcing this post, or to comment below. I'll pick the winners next Friday (8th December) and the books will follow.

Blogtour! Tell me a Lie by CJ Carver

I'm welcoming CJ Carver to the blog, as part of the blog tour for her new book Tell Me a Lie which is published TOMORROW by Bonnier. It's the next gripping international thriller in her brilliant Dan Forrester series.

An aging oligarch in Siberia gathers his henchmen to discuss an English accountant...

It's Dan's wife...

As part of the celebrations, CJ has written some top tips on how to use a country’s culture in your writing. Today, she's covering how having an awareness of social systems thickens the plot.

Over to her...


First, the swearing.

Profanity is second nature to Australians. It’s regularly used to express frustration, for effect, or for humour. For example, “bastard” is usually a term of endearment in Australia and isn’t considered swearing.

I used the word “bastard” a lot in Blood Junction, and where I was commended by the Sydney Morning Herald on my authentic dialogue, the British press called it “strong.”

Secondly, the history.

I didn’t set out to write about what is now called the stolen generation, but when I sent my character, journalist India Kane, to Australia looking for her roots, this ugly history began to make itself known through an Aboriginal policeman who befriends her. I used it as a sub-plot to enrich the story and (hopefully) inform as well as entertain.

Thirdly, the xenophobia.

Not all Aussies are xenophobic – some are immensely proud of their melting-pot culture - but there are plenty who are. When I read about refugees interned in remote outback camps sewing their and their children’s lips together in protest at their treatment, I knew I had another rich sub-plot.

Each time I look at setting one of my books overseas, I start looking for profound aspects in the country I’m studying.

For example in Tell Me a Lie, the main plot is driven by Russia’s social system. The people’s need for a great leader even if he imprisons, exiles or executes millions of people without due process. Take President Putin. He’s a ruthless, cold-blooded, corrupt ex-KGB officer but the majority of Russian’s revere him for being a “strong man” thanks to being brainwashed by the media which is, needless to say, controlled by the government.

As I got to know Russia better, another sub-plot began to emerge. This one was to do with the psychology of its people. Russians are deep thinkers. They love to laugh, talk and share stories. They love to gossip about mutual friends when they’re not around. They can be blunt to the point of rudeness. But above all, Russians are passionate and fiercely loyal to their country. It was this immense and all inspiring devotion that helped drive the book to its finale.

The third thread I used was Russian spies. Ever since the Soviet era, organised, clandestine agents have operated in the West with daring and ingenuity. A top British intelligence official has recently warned there are now more Russian spies working in Britain than during the Cold war. What better story hook could I want than having a sleeper agent in Moscow demanding a face-to-face meeting with Dan Forrester, my hero?

© CJ Carver 2016

Tell Me a Lie | CJ Carver | Bonnier, 12 January 2012 | PB, 496pp

You can buy Tell Me a Lie from your local bookshop, or here, here or here. Next stop on the tour tomorrow is Crime Thriller Hound.

CJ Carver is the bestselling author of seven crime fiction novels including Blood Junction. She has won the CWA debut dagger and the Barry Award for Best British Crime Fiction.

CJ was born in the UK and grew up on one of the country's first organic farms, before a holiday in Australia at age 22 turned into a ten-year stay.

She has been a long-distance rally driver and is also the founding judge for Women’s World Car of The Year. Her mother, Mary Seed, set the Australian land speed record in 1957.

        

Spare me the Truth Blogtour: Guest post by CJ Carver

CJ Carver's new book Spare me the Truth is just out from Zaffre:

Dan Forrester, piecing his life back together after the tragic death of his son, is approached in a supermarket by a woman who tells him everything he remembers about his life - and his son - is a lie. 

Grace Reavey, stricken by grief, is accosted at her mother's funeral. The threat is simple: pay the staggering sum her mother allegedly owed, or lose everything. 

Lucy Davies has been forced from the Met by her own maverick behaviour. Desperate to prove herself in her new rural post, she's on the hunt for a killer - but this is no small town criminal. 

Plunged into a conspiracy that will test each of them to their limits, these three strangers are brought together in their hunt for the truth, whatever it costs...

CJ Carver (photo by Steve Ayres)

I'm excited that CJ herself has written a guest post in which she shares some of her secrets - so, over to CJ:

Five fundamentals that help me begin to write

(1) Know what the story’s about 

For some, it’s character first but for me, writing thrillers, I need to know what my book is about before I start tapping on the keyboard.  In Spare Me the Truth it’s a real-life drug that can wipe away single, specific memories while leaving other memories intact.

So, I had a memory erasing drug but who was I going to use it on?  I needed a metaphor for honesty and incorruptibility and this kick-started my search for my main character Dan Forrester.

I then asked: what does Dan want badly?  Everything he knows has turned out to be a lie, so who can he trust? Dan’s search for the truth became the real engine of the book.

(2) Get to know your protagonist

A character isn’t a human being - we read about them as if they’re real, but they are superior, larger than life and their motivation comprehensible; whereas people we know are difficult to understand.  We know characters better than we know our friends.  In fact, I know Dan Forrester better than I know myself.  Dan is taciturn and self-contained.  I’m neither.

(3) Get to know your protagonist’s opponent(s)

I have to know who my main character is up against before I can move further.  I need to know their adversary almost better than the protagonist himself and keep them in mind through every stage of the plotting process – what motivates them, how life has shaped them, and also what they want badly and how far they will go for it.

(4) Building the world(s)

Things start to get a little more detailed now, as I begin to dress my characters further.  Where they live, whether they’re married, have children, a dog.  Were they bullied at school or were they the bullies?  Teachers pets or rebels?  Or did they hide in the background?  I don’t write reams of biographies for them, but have a definite sense of each person.

I need to know the politics of my world.  What everyone does for a living.  What the values are. What the backstory is. All this takes time.  I don’t dream all this up and rush straight to the keyboard.  If it takes me nine months to write a book, six of those will be spent scribbling notes and mulling.

(5) Create a dramatic start to the story

This has to radically upset every aspect of the protagonist’s life.  As the story begins, the main character is living a pretty normal life but then an event occurs that turns everything upside-down.

For example, as the story starts in Spare Me The Truth, Dan is shopping for noodles in his local Tesco when a stranger approaches him saying he’s not who he thinks he is and that his family has been lying to him about how his baby son died.  He thinks the stranger’s crazy until he discovers they’re telling the truth.  His world as he currently knows it, suddenly ends.  Now, he has to react to it.  And that’s when the story starts and I can truly begin writing.

© CJ Carver 2016

Spare Me The Truth is out now and you can find it at your local bookshop or online here or if you must, even here.

The blog tour continues - see the poster below for the other venues!