Episodes
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Best-selling thriller writer Lisa ("Then She Was Gone", "The Family Upstairs", "Watching You") shares clips that didn't make it into her books, and talks in fascinating detail about her unusually practical and no-nonsense writing technique.
Clips performed by: Beth Chalmers, Christopher Kent and Rachel Atkins.
Lisa Jewell is the Number 1 New York Times bestselling author of nineteen novels (shortly to be 20), including The Girls and The House We Grew Up In, as well as Invisible Girl and I Found You. Her first novel Ralph's Party, a book whose genre she describes as "flatmates and curry" was the highest selling debut novel of the year. She has written various other genres of fiction, and most recently she's topped the best-selling charts with her psychological thrillers.
So far her novels have sold over 5 million copies internationally, and her work has been translated into twenty-nine languages.
Episode show notes and more details: offcutsdrawer.com/lisa-jewell
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"Dublin Trilogy" novelist and former comedian Caimh (CK) McDonnell shares his sitcom set aboard a ferry, a pre-Fleabag Fleabag and a comedy about what happens when multiple timelines meet.
Offcuts performed by: Jake Yapp, Darrell Maclaine, Kenny Blyth, Lizzie Roper, David Monteith and Rachel Atkins.
This episode contains strong language.
Caimh McDonnell is the internationally bestselling author of the Dublin Trilogy which is set in his hometown. His debut novel 'A Man with One of Those Faces' – a darkly comedic crime thriller – was published in 2016 and nominated for best novel at the 2017 CAP awards. It went on to spawn the increasingly uncountable Dublin Trilogy (five books and counting) and the McGarry Stateside series, which have been translated into several different languages and optioned for television.
He also writes ‘The Stranger Times’ series of books under the name of C.K. McDonnell which has been described as "a celebration of how truth really can be stranger than fiction"
The former professional stand-up comedian and TV writer has performed all around the world, had several well-received Edinburgh shows and supported acts such as Sarah Millican and Gary Delaney on tour before hanging up his clowning shoes to concentrate on writing. His TV writing work has seen him work on some of the biggest topical comedy shows on British TV and has earned him a BAFTA nomination.
Episode show notes: https://offcutsdrawer.com/caimh-mcdonnell
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Episodes manquant?
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A rap musical set in a US prison based on a Noel Coward play, a sitcom about IVF and a story about JFK faking moon landings - just 3 of the offcuts from comedy writer and US showrunner Georgia.
Clips performed by: Desiree Burch, Beth Chalmers, Keith Wickham, Lizzie Roper and Jake Yapp. With additional music by Jake Yapp.
Warning: This episode contains strong language.
Georgia is a multi-award-winning comedy and drama writer, who has five Emmys, five Writers Guild awards, a Golden Globe, a BAFTA and a Producer’s Guild award. She is currently a writer and co-executive producer on HBO's critically acclaimed show, Succession, now in its third season. Georgia was the co-executive producer and writer on the HBO multi-Emmy winning show Veep, which ran for seven series.
Georgia is show-running The Shrink Next Door: an adaptation of the hit podcast, starring Will Ferrell, Paul Rudd and Kathryn Hahn, for Apple TV.
She wrote three episodes of HBO's Avenue Five, Armando Iannucci’s space comedy starring Hugh Laurie. Georgia has written extensively for Miranda Hart and Tracy Ullman and the shows Have I Got News for You, Smack the Pony, Not Going Out and The Thick of It. She created, wrote and show-ran 2DTV for ITV as well as Quick Cuts starring Doon Makichan, Feel The Force and three series of Life of Riley - starring Caroline Quentin for the BBC.
Georgia’s memoir My Mess is a Bit of a Life has just been published.
Episode show notes: https://offcutsdrawer.com/georgia-pritchett
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Raconteuse Miranda shares the bits of writing that didn't quite make it, along with tales of her former life as a sex worker, in a show that's definitely NSFW.
Clips performed by Chris Pavlo, Bhavnisha Parmar and Emma Clarke.
Warning: This episode contains strong language and explicit material.
Miranda Kane is a comedian, writer, and performer who garners inspiration from her previous career as a sex-worker and her more recent work in organising body positive events. She writes and stars in the Audible sitcom SLAVING AWAY, based upon her ‘utterly mundane life as a dominatrix’, which reached number one in the Audible charts and has had its third season recently released. She has also written sex blogs and co-hosts the ‘Good Sex/Bad Sex’ podcast for Metro.
She is a sex-worker rights activist, raising money for charities which support sex-workers. She takes part in debates and public speaking events to promote the decriminalisation of sex-work, and in 2017 she was a TedX speaker where her ‘idea worth spreading’ was that comedy and storytelling can help change the public’s opinion of sex-workers to allow them to work in safety and without fear of persecution or prosecution.
She currently runs Club Indulge – a range of Body Positive events aimed at providing a safe space for plus size people to enjoy being party animals.
Episode show notes: https://offcutsdrawer.com/miranda-kane
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This is not a normal episode of The Offcuts Drawer but a taster of the excellent podcast In Writing With Hattie Crisell.
Journalist Hattie visits the studies of writers of all kinds – novelists, screenwriters, poets, journalists and more – to find out how they write, why they write, and what they can teach us about doing it better and the special guest in this episode is Graham Norton.
The Offcuts Drawer will be back with a brand new episode later this week but in the meantime you can find more details about Hattie's podcast here:
https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/in-writing-with-hattie-crisell/id1490412801
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An investigation into the Mole-man of Hackney, standup material about pond-dipping and a bit of angst-filled teenage poetry are just some of the offcuts shared by Isy.
Clips performed by: Lynsey Murrell, Beth Chalmers, Darrell Maclaine, Shash Hira, Toby Longworth and Emma Clarke
Isy Suttie is a comedian, actress and writer who started performing stand up in 2002. She trained as an actress and has written for the GUARDIAN, the OBSERVER, RED and GLAMOUR, and is a regular writer and performer on BBC Radio 4, where her show PEARL AND DAVE won a Gold Sony Award in 2013. This led to two series of her musical story show set in Matlock, ISY SUTTIE’S LOVE LETTERS. Her TV acting credits include Dobby in PEEP SHOW and Esther in SHAMELESS, Ally in MAN DOWN and Nat in DAMNED, and she has been nominated for three British Comedy Awards.
She’s written 2 books – THE ACTUAL ONE, a comedy memoir which came out in 2016 and her first novel JANE IS TRYING has just been published in 2021.
Episode show notes with offcuts track listing and more details about Isy and the actors: https://offcutsdrawer.com/isy-suttie
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Scotland's "Queen of Crime" shares some stonking bits of early writing, including her attempt at a bonkbuster and the short story that prefigured her move into thrillers.
Clips performed by: Christopher Kent, Beth Chalmers, Leah Marks, Kenny Blyth, Emma Clarke and Rachel Atkins.
Val McDermid has sold over 17 million books to date across the globe and is translated into over 40 languages. She is perhaps best-known for her Wire in the Blood series, featuring clinical psychologist Dr Tony Hill and DCI Carol Jordan, which was adapted for television starring Robson Green and Hermione Norris. She has written three other series: private detective Kate Brannigan, journalist Lindsay Gordon and, most recently, cold case detective Karen Pirie. She has also published in several award-winning standalone novels, books of non-fiction, short story collections and a children’s picture book, My Granny is a Pirate.
As well as books she has also written for stage, radio and screen. In early 2017 Val’s latest BBC Radio 4 drama series, Resistance, aired to great acclaim. And in the last couple of years, she has returned to writing for the theatre with Margaret Saves Scotland as well as the primetime TV series Traces based on her original idea. ITV have subsequently announced the commissioning of a new drama Karen Pirie based on Val’s eponymous series character.
Episode show notes and more details: offcutsdrawer.com/val-mcdermid/
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The "Horrid Henry" creator gives us an out-take from her successful opera, unpublished articles and some other children's book ideas that despite her stellar international reputation still didn't get picked up.
Clips performed by: Beth Chalmers, Emma Clarke, Leah Marks, David Holt, Rachel Atkins and Keith Wickham.
Francesca Simon is universally known for the staggeringly popular Horrid Henry series. These books and CDs have sold over 22 million copies and are published in 29 countries. Horrid Henry and the Abominable Snowman won the Children's Book of the the Year award in 2008 at the British Book Awards. She is also the author of Costa-shortlisted The Monstrous Child for older readers, and Hack and Whack, her first picture book. To date she has published over 50 books for children of all ages including picture books, early readers and a young adult trilogy based on norse mythology.
Collaborating with composer Gavin Higgins, Francesca recently wrote the libretto for The Monstrous Child turning it into an opera which received rave reviews when it was staged at The Royal Opera House, London in 2019.
Episode show notes: https://offcutsdrawer.com/francesca-simon
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"Friday Night Dinner" writer Popper shares some truly bizarre offcuts including the fake CV that landed him his big break in comedy, a prank community woodland notice and a sitcom about a wasp.
Clips performed by: David Holt, Alex Lowe, Toby Longworth and Lizzie Roper.
Warning: This episode contains strong language.
Robert Popper is an award-winning writer, producer, performer, and bestselling author. He is the writer and producer of all 6 series of Channel 4’s Friday Night Dinner, he co-created and starred in BBC 2’s Look Around You with Peter Serafinowicz, produced the Bafta-winning Peep Show, wrote on season 14 of South Park, and script-edited British TV comedies The Inbetweeners, The IT Crowd and Him & Her. More recently he co-wrote several episodes of Channel 4's Stath Lets Flats.
Under his pseudonym, Robin Cooper, he wrote the bestselling The Timewaster Letters and the follow-up, Return of The Timewaster Letters, and an audio compendium of both has just been released on Audible read by Popper himself and featuring the voices of Serafinowicz and Dawn French.
Episode show notes: https://offcutsdrawer.com/robert-popper
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A grab-bag of television and film scripts that didn't quite make it including a drama about GI brides and a psychological mystery set in the Scottish Highlands from screenwriter Andrea.
Clips performed by: Kate O’Sulivan, Kenny Blyth, Lizzie Roper, Shash Hira, Emma Clarke, David Monteath, Rachel Atkins and Beth Chalmers.
Warning: This episode contains strong language.
Andrea Gibb is an award winning Scottish screenwriter who has worked extensively in both film and television. Her feature length screenplays for ‘Dear Frankie’ and ‘Afterlife’ won her the Scottish Screen Filmmaker of the Year award and the Women In Film and Television script award in 2005. Her adaptation of classic children’s novel ‘Swallows and Amazons’ (BBC Films) was released in cinemas in 2016 and won the Grand Jury prize at the New York Children’s Film festival and the family film award at Seattle Film Festival. She was nominated for the Carl Foreman award at the Bafta film awards for ‘Afterlife’ and has just been nominated for a Bafta television award and two Bafta Scotland awards for ‘Elizabeth Is Missing’, adapted from the novel into a single television film for STV starring Glenda Jackson. This film also won her the writer’s award at the 2020 RTS Scotland awards.
She has written four episodes of ‘Call The Midwife’ for Neal Street and the BBC and an episode of ‘Sanditon’ for Red Planet and ITV.
Episode show notes and more details: https://offcutsdrawer.com/andrea-gibb/
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The West End theatre version of TV's "The Good Life", the "Toys" musical that came *before* the film... Jeremy's selection of near misses covers both stage and screen.
Clips performed by: Alex Lowe, Lizzie Roper, David Holt, Beth Chalmers, Toby Longworth and Emma Clarke.
Warning: This episode contains strong language.
Jeremy Sams has written and created countless successful theatre shows including Amour (Broadway), Ghetto (National Theatre and Broadway), Chitty Chitty Bang Bang (West End and Broadway), and The Wizard of Oz (West End and tour). He's translated operas and plays such as Indiscretions (Broadway), The Miser and Mary Stuart (Royal National Theatre), The Rehearsal, Don Giovanni, Figaro’s Wedding, La Bohème, The Magic Flute, Wagner’s Ring Cycle (ENO), Die Fledermaus and The Merry Widow (New York), and he wrote and devised The Enchanted Island for the Metropolitan Opera of New York.
His directorial credits include Die Fledermaus (Metropolitan Opera), The Wizard of Oz (West End, Toronto, US tour), The King and I (Royal Albert Hall), The Sound of Music (London Palladium, world tour), 13 The Musical (Broadway), Donkey’s Years (Comedy Theatre), Little Britain Live, Noises Off (West End and Broadway), Passion (West End), Wild Oats (RNT), The Wind in the Willows (Tokyo, Old Vic) and Spend Spend Spend (Olivier-nominated - West End).
As a composer, he has written, arranged and directed music for over 50 shows for theatre, TV and film, including: The Wind in the Willows, Arcadia (RNT and Lincoln Center), The Mother (BBC), Enduring Love (Pathé), for which he won the Ivor Novello Award, Hyde Park on Hudson, Le Weekend and Persuasion (BBC Films) for which he won a BAFTA.
Episode show notes and more details: https://offcutsdrawer.com/jeremy-sams
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Creator of "Guilt" and "Eric, Ernie & Me" Neil showcases some other shows that didn't quite make it and shares what it's really like writing for American TV.
Clips performed by: Lynsey Murrell, Beth Chalmers, David Monteath, Kate O'Sullivan, Nigel Pilkington and Kenny Blyth.
Warning: This episode contains strong language.
Neil Forsyth is an author and television writer. In television he is a Royal Television Society Award winner, and has been nominated for a BAFTA, a Writer’s Guild Award, and a Broadcast Press Guild Award.
He is the author of seven books: Other People’s Money, the biography of Scottish credit card fraudster Elliot Castor, two well-received novels and the UK bestselling series of Bob Servant humour titles.
Neil adapted his series of books about Bob Servant for BBC Television, with the eponymous role played by Emmy Award winner Brian Cox. The TV show ran for two series, won the Royal Television Society Scotland Award for Comedy and was nominated for the Scottish Comedy BAFTA.
Neil has written four SKY Arts Playhouses and his one-off BBC4 drama Eric, Ernie and Me which told the story of Morecambe and Wise writer Eddie Braben was nominated for Best Short Form Drama in the 2018 Broadcast Press Guild Awards. His original 4 part series Guilt starring Mark Bonnar and Jamie Sives was broadcast on BBC 2 and BBC Scotland, received a best writer nomination for RTS Awards 2020 and a second series is currently in production.
Episode show notes and more details: https://offcutsdrawer.com/neil-forsyth
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A sweary Karen Carpenter tribute act, women's rugby and the first black female astronaut - actress/comedian Jackie reveals an interesting range of subjects in her offcuts.
Clips performed by: Lynsey Murrell, Beth Chalmers and Lizzie Roper.
Warning: This episode contains strong language.
Veteran of the British theatre Jackie Clune started out as a drama lecturer before achieving critical success in her first one-woman show about Karen Carpenter at the Edinburgh Festival. She went on to write six more shows, and to star in plays written by other writers - including Mamma Mia, Billy Elliott, Emilia and 9 To 5 - The Musical. She's played Julie Burchill on the West End stage in the one-woman play Julie Burchill Is Away and toured with the all-female Henry IV production that went to New York, and on TV her many credits include Eastenders, Ghosts, Motherland and Borderline.
As a writer she has contributed to sketch shows Smack The Pony and BBC Comedy Nation, she is regularly featured in magazines and newspapers such as The Guardian, The Mail, Red and Top Sante (where she has a regular column), and as an author she has written two books "Extreme Motherhood" and "Man of the Month Club" with her third book, the novel "I'm Just A Teenage Punchbag" published last year, and her fourth "Give A Little Love" due out in June 2021.
Episode show notes: https://offcutsdrawer.com/jackie-clune/
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Comedy, horror, Scottish football and a dog pooing in a bedsit are all to be found in the never-before-heard clips from best-selling thriller writer Chris.
Clips performed by: Christopher Kent, David Holt, David Monteath and Emma Clarke.
Warning: This episode contains strong language.
Chris was born in Glasgow and worked as a sub-editor at Screen International, the Scotsman and the Edinburgh Evening News before his first novel, Quite Ugly One Morning, won the First Blood Award in 1996 for the best first crime novel of the year. Twenty-three novels followed.
In 2006 he won the Bollinger Everyman Wodehouse Prize for Comic Writing. In 2005 he was named Glasgow University Young Alumnus of the Year and in 2007 he won the Glenfiddich Spirit of Scotland Award for writing. In 2016 his novel Black Widow won the inaugural McIlvanney Prize for best Scottish crime novel of the year. In 2017 it was named the Theakston’s Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year. His latest novel The Cut will be published imminently.
Also under the pseudonym Ambrose Parry, he has collaborated with his wife, Marisa Haetzman, to produce the historical crime novels The Way of All Flesh and The Art of Dying, which depict life at the cutting edge of Edinburgh medicine in the Nineteenth Century, and a third novel is in the works.
Episode show notes: https://offcutsdrawer.com/chris-brookmyre
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Michael Gove humiliating himself at university, a KGB-supplied sex manual and tales of derring-do in warzones around the world from foreign correspondent Luke.
Clips performed by: Christopher Kent, Lynsey Murrell and Nigel Pilkington.
Luke Harding is an award-winning British foreign correspondent with the Guardian. He has reported from Delhi, Berlin and Moscow and has also covered wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, Libya and Syria. Between 2007 and 2011 he was the Guardian's Moscow bureau chief; the Kremlin expelled him from the country in the first case of its kind since the cold war. He is the author of Mafia State and co-author of WikiLeaks: Inside Julian Assange's War on Secrecy, The Liar: The Fall of Jonathan Aitken (nominated for the Orwell Prize) and The Snowden Files and his latest book The Shadow State: Murder, Mayhem and Russia's Remaking of the West was published earlier this year.
Episode show notes: https://offcutsdrawer.com/luke-harding
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Presenter and columnist Jay knows about food. But he's an acclaimed novelist, journalist and musician too. Hear his unusual play with music, the novel that never was and his celebration of Welsh drag act Lady Ding.
Clips performed by: Keith Wickham, Toby Longworth, Christopher Kent and Rachel Atkins.
Warning: This episode contains strong language.
Jay Rayner is probably best known as being the regular food critic for the Guardian and Observer newspapers for the last 20 years. But he has also written extensively across the British and international media as both feature writer and columnist on everything from crime and politics, to the arts and fashion.
On radio he has presented BBC Radio 4's The Kitchen Cabinet since 2012, on television his many appearances include being a judge on multiple series's of Masterchef and the resident food pundit for The One Show, and he now presents his own podcast called Out To Lunch, in which he interviews celebrities in fabulous restaurants.
He's published 11 books to date, including 4 novels, and his latest work My Last Supper has just come out in paperback.
Episode show notes and more details: https://offcutsdrawer.com/jay-rayner
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A film script written with the young Hugh Grant (yes, that one), a TV show about The Sex Pistols and a romcom based on his real-life relationship - just 3 of the top notch offcuts from the writer/producer of the multi award-winning TV drama Unforgotten.
Clips performed by: Toby Longworth, Lizzie Roper, Christopher Kent, Leah Marks, Nigel Pilkington, Emma Clarke and Rachel Atkins.
Warning: This episode contains strong language.
Chris Lang has created over 100 hours of original prime-time television drama since he cut his teeth on established favourites like Soldier Soldier, Casualty and The Knock more than twenty five years ago. Most recently his projects have included Dark Heart – a 6 part series for ITV, The Hook-Up Plan (known as Plan Coeur in France) – a French 8-part romantic comedy for Netflix and Innocent – a 4 part drama whose 2nd series will start filming later this year. Other acclaimed dramas he’s been responsible for include: Amnesia (2004), Torn (2007), A Mother’s Son (2012) and Undeniable (2014) which was remade in France in as Quand Je Serai Grande Je Te Tuerai which was broadcast in France in late 2017 to an audience of seven million,
But it is for his multi-award winning detective drama Unforgotten, starring Nicola Walker and Sanjeev Bhaskar, that he is probably best known and after three highly acclaimed series its fourth will hopefully be returning to our screens soon.
Episode show notes and more details: https://offcutsdrawer.com/chris-lang
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Yes she's a writer of *breathes in* TV comedy series's (her own and other people's), drama, animation, children's books, memoirs, novels, programme guides and plays but she's also won Masterchef and Mastermind. And she has some very useful advice to writers starting out.
Clips performed by: Keith Wickham, Leah Marks, Emma Clarke, Beth Chalmers and Toby Longworth.
Emma Kennedy wears many hats. Having trained in and practised law (a hat she then discarded) she has gone on to be an actor, novelist, comedy writer, producer, playwright, presenter, winner of TV competitions and Queen of Lego. You will recognise her face from her roles in TV comedies such as The Smoking Room and Goodness Gracious Me, or from her work with Mel & Sue, or even from her presenting on Comic Relief. And you'll know her voice from countless Radio 4 shows and podcasts, in particular her work with Richard Herring.
Her second book The Tent, The Bucket And Me was turned into TV series The Kennedys. She's written 10 other books, including three for children that feature her character Wilma Tenderfoot. For children's television her writing CV includes episodes of Dangermouse, Strange Hill High and Waffle The Wonderdog, and after the success of her fiction thriller for adults The Things We Left Unsaid last year, a second novel, The Time Of Our Lives is due out next Spring.
Episode show notes and more details: offcutsdrawer.com/emma-kennedy/
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"Barry from Watford" and paranormalist "Clinton Baptiste" are just 2 of Alex's alter egos that you've likely met. But did you know he's written material for just about every comedy performer in the UK? Hear his story, and the worst impressions of Barack Obama and Tom Cruise ever.
Clips performed by: Chris Pavlo, Christopher Kent, Emma Clarke, Lizzie Roper and Beth Chalmers.
Alex first worked as an actor as a teenager when he co-starred with Kenneth Branagh in the West End theatre production of Another Country. Since then he has worked continuously in all genres, but is perhaps most well-known as the man behind comedy character Barry From Watford, a regular on Steve Wright's Radio 2 Show, Iain Lee's various radio shows, the Channel 4 TV series Cheap Cheap Cheap with Noel Edmonds, and numerous sell-out live shows and podcasts, the latest of which pairs him with fellow "character" Angelos Epithemiou. He also performs live round the country as the spoof paranormalist from Peter Kay's Phoenix Nights: Clinton Baptiste.
As a writer he's written for impressionists Alistair McGowan and Ronni Ancona, for Miranda Hart, Peter Serafinowicz, Watson & Oliver, Ned Sherrin and countless other sketch and comedy shows, as well as creating several pilots for TV and radio shows both as vehicles for himself and for other performers.
Episode show notes and more details: offcutsdrawer.com/alex-lowe
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From standup to multi best-selling crime novelist and screenwriter, Mark's own story includes hair-raising real-life encounters with gangsters and even serial killers. Among the TV show ideas and unpublished articles there's some standup material and even a song lyric which has yet to be performed by his band of fellow novelists The Fun Lovin Crime Writers.
Clips performed by: Keith Wickham, Chris Pavlo, Emma Clarke and Christopher Kent.
Warning: This episode contains strong language.
Mark Billingham is one of the UK's most acclaimed and popular crime writers. A former actor, television writer and stand-up comedian, his series of novels featuring D.I. Tom Thorne has twice won him the Crime Novel Of The Year Award as well as the Sherlock Award for Best British Detective and been nominated for seven CWA Daggers. His standalone thriller IN THE DARK was chosen as one of the twelve best books of the year by the Times and his debut novel, SLEEPYHEAD was chosen by the Sunday Times as one of the 100 books that had shaped the decade. Each of his novels has been a Sunday Times Top Ten bestseller.
A television series based on the Thorne novels was screened in Autumn 2010, starring David Morrissey as Tom Thorne and a BBC series based on the standalone thrillers IN THE DARK and TIME OF DEATH was shown in 2017. His latest novel CRY BABY, a prequel to the best-selling SLEEPYHEAD has just been published at time of broadcast.
Episode show notes and more details: https://offcutsdrawer.com/mark-billingham
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- Montre plus
