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Ayo: What was the very first crime fiction book that you read and who introduced the genre?
Andrew: The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes. I was about eight. My father gave it to me with the words “I think you might enjoy this.

Ayo: When did you decide that you wanted to concentrate on writing novels and was there a pivotal event that persuaded you?
Andrew: Not so much a pivotal event as the gradual development of a fantasy. When I was in my late 20s I realised that if I didn’t try to put the fantasy into practice soon, I’d never do it. That was the pivotal moment really (one February lunchtime in 1980): the realisation that writers actually have to write.

Ayo: Who were your influences when you decided to start writing and what books influenced you as well.
Andrew: At the time I was reading a lot of Patricia Highsmith. The crime fiction I previously liked was by people like Allingham, Tey, Sayers and Crispin. So in a way Dougal was an unholy union of the two tastes.

Ayo: What other books are you drawn to?
Andrew: As a reader I’m omnivorous, at least as far as fiction is concerned. But the nineteenth century novel is a long-standing interest. Some non-fiction too – biography, history, anything I happen to be interested in or need to know about.

Ayo: Do you enjoy being part of the crime fiction community and the accompanying events? Which conferences do you always try and ensure that you attend and why?
Andrew: Yes. Writing full time can be a lonely life; so semi-professional socialising is highly desirable. As for conferences, the one I really enjoy is St Hilda’s, the summer crime fiction conference in Oxford, which is more like a weekend party than anything else. Only conference I know which features punts.

Ayo: Caroline Minuscule, which is the first in the Dougal series won the 1982 John Creasey Award and was also short-listed for an Edgar. Were you surprised about this? Did you feel that there was added pressure/expectation on you when you came to write your next book?
Andrew: I was completely shocked. I hadn’t even heard of the CWA until the secretary (then Marion Babson) phoned to tell me I’d won the Creasey. It was a wonderful boost, the sense that well-established crime novelists liked the book enough to give it a prize. It increased the pressure, but also my confidence in what I was doing. I was already writing the second book, which was always going to be difficult.

Ayo: Caroline Minuscule also introduced us to the amoral William Douglas. He reminds me of Patricia Highsmith’s Ripley. However, unlike Ripley William Douglas does become somewhat respectable. Was this intentional?
Andrew: There was never anything intentional about Dougal. I don’t think he’s particularly respectable either. But he has developed an idiosyncratic taste for justice over the years, not that it seems to stop him killing people if necessary. He’s loyal to those he loves, too.

Ayo: Have we seen the last of William Dougal?
Andrew: I hope not.

Ayo: You have also written a trilogy the Blaines Trilogy. These are actually espionage novels and not crime novels. fourth Lydmouth novel. What made you decide to write the trilogy?
Andrew: A publisher with a chequebook… this was in the Cold War, and everyone wanted espionage novels. It wasn’t conceived as a trilogy, but it turned out that way because characters (especially Blaines) and themes (especially how espionage affects the private lives of those involved) kept re-appearing. It learned a lot about narrative from those books, and also about research. The first of them, The Second Midnight, was essentially a historical novel, which pointed the way for the future.

Ayo: The Lydmouth series and The Roth Trilogy are the series that you are most synonymous with and in 2001 The Office of the Dead won the CWA Ellis Peters Historical Dagger. How surprised were you when you found out that you had won?
Andrew: Very.

Ayo: A unique feature of the Roth Trilogy is the fact that unlike most novels crime or otherwise they are composed of interlocking stories which can either be read independently or as one large novel. Was this your intention when you started to write the trilogy?
Andrew: Yes. The analogy in my mind was that of an archaeological dig: layer-by-layer the books uncover the secret histories around a murderer, starting in the present and moving backwards. I was also very interested in the way religious and secular ethical systems approach crime (and criminals) in such different ways. An engaging technical challenge was writing three very different types of novel: a psychological thriller; a parody of the Golden Age crime novel; and (in the first person) a gothic-flavoured woman-in-peril story. I had the characters, themes and setting before I started. But the detailed plotting was done during the writing. Somehow it all seemed to hang together.

Ayo: You have also written a number of books for children and teenagers, which are now sadly out of print. Is there any chance that they will be reprinted?
Andrew: Not that I know of – but here’s hoping.

Ayo: Have your children read them and if so did they give you any feedback about them?
Andrew: They’ve read one or two of them, but they are far too tactful to discuss their reactions with me.

Ayo: Which of your books would you suggest a novice reader should start with and why?
Andrew: Depends on the reader: there’s a lot of overlap, I’m glad to say, but each of series, etc., has its own adherents. I’m particularly fond of a stand-alone novel, The Barred Window.

Ayo: What’s the best thing about your life as a writer and can you sum that up? Andrew: When a novel is going well, it’s like nothing else: if you could package that feeling in powder form and arrange for it to be made illegal, you could make a fortune on the black-market.

Ayo: Characterisation or plot? Which do you think is more important?
Andrew: Characterisation.

Ayo: What were the last five books that you read?
Andrew: Working backwards: Unless – Carol Shields Mr Nice – Howard Marks A Question of Blood – Ian Rankin Medusa – Michael Dibdin Kingdom of the Mists - Jane Jakeman

Ayo: What do you enjoy doing when you are not writing?
Andrew: I’m not sure I want to answer this.

Ayo: If I am not mistaken, you used to be on the CWA panel that judged the Debut Dagger Awards. What was it like having to read so many manuscript? Andrew: I set up the CWA’s New Writing competition (now the Debut Dagger) in 1998 – partly because I think it’s vita for everyone to encourage new crime writers and partly for the CWA’s benefit. The response was staggering – over 500 entries in the first year, over 800 entries in the second. Reading them was hard work, though you could usually tell by the end of the first page whether an entry was worth taking seriously. Good writing is always a pleasure – and it’s nice to see so many entrants now taking their rightful places as published authors.

Ayo: Your latest book is The American Boy where did the story come from? Andrew: The starting point was the discovery that Poe had lived in London as a boy, from 1815 to 1820: the idea that the American founding father of crime fiction had lived in the same England as Jane Austen.

Ayo: And when did you know that you wanted to set The American Boy in the past?
Andrew: That came from the start; possibly the desire to write a novel in that period came before the Poe idea.

Ayo: What was it like to write The American Boy?
Andrew: Utterly absorbing. It’s a long book that required much research. By the end of it I felt more at home in the 19th c. than the 21st.

Ayo: How do you feel once you have finished writing a book? Do you normally have a great sense of elation that you have finished it or do you start worrying about how well it is going to be received?
Andrew: Relief; then I feel listless and flat; and I wait eagerly for first responses. A terrifying time in one way, but at least the book is done.

Ayo: You have been very supportive of Mystery Women since you joined. It is the very first group of its kind in the UK. Do you believe that there is enough support for crime writers in the UK especially female crime writers and do you believe that the support given today is much better than when you first started writing?
Andrew: I think there’s much more support available than there was when I started.

Ayo: Your website has a lot of information about you on it as well as a lot of pictures. What made you decide that you needed a website?
Andrew: I’ve been on –line for seven or eight years, partly because I wanted a website. It’s proved a window on the world, especially useful for readers and publishers abroad. Also – as you may have guessed from its primitive technical quality – I designed and maintain it myself, which has proved the perfect excuse for not working.

Ayo: What do you think of the state of contemporary crime writing today? Andrew: Varied and healthy: something for everyone. The authors who experiment, who refuse to be tied down to the familiar noir or cosy formulas, particularly encourage me.

Ayo: There are a number of authors whose works are becoming a lot better known. A good example is Mark Billingham whose third book Lazybones has brought him to the attention of a lot more readers. Who else would you suggest one should look out for?
Andrew: Almost anyone on the Creasey shortlists 1998-2002 (the years I happened to be a judge). They haven’t necessarily become commercially successful, though some have, but they all had something worth reading.

Ayo: You are also a member of The Unusual Suspects, which is a collective of crime writers. How do you feel about being the sole male member and how big an impact has your being a member of The Unusual Suspect made on your writing? Andrew: “the sole male member”: what a nice turn of phrase… Actually, I don’t think my colleagues notice I’m male any more. Suspects is/are a combination of promotional cooperative and professional comfort blanket. Not sure it’s affected the writing except in the sense that all experience is grist to the mill.

Ayo: I understand that the new Lydmouth novel is going to be called Call The Dying. Are you at liberty to tell us something about it?
Andrew: It’s set more than three years after the last one, Death’s Own Door. The main recurring characters have moved on, and so has Lydmouth. Among other things there’s an extremely sensitive episode involving a fish slice, which I stole directly from real life. I think it’s rather a dark novel.

Ayo: If you were planning a dinner party and could invite 10 people (five fictional crime characters) and five crime authors (dead or alive) whom would you invite and why?
Andrew: The living ones would be the other Suspects because I know it would be a lively occasion. As for the dead… Wilkie Collins, because I’d have liked to ask him about the mistresses; Margery Allingham, because she had a sense of humour; Chandler, ditto; Josephine Tey, because she perhaps needed more conviviality in life than she received; Highsmith, because she would be a challenge.

Ayo: Apart from the next Lydmouth novel, what else are you working on? Andrew: Another novel, probably set in the past, is bubbling somewhere in the back of the mind.

Our thanks to Andrew for taking the time out to talk to us.

Selected Books by Andrew Taylor