Jonathan Whitelaw, author of 'The Bingo Hall Detectives' - Cosy crime writer talks about getting things done early, being less picky with writing, the 2 page synopsis
Writer's Routine
Dan Simpson
4.9 • 599 Ratings
🗓️ 16 December 2022
⏱️ 67 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Jonathan Whitelaw worked as a journalist in Scotland, covering sport, politics, and everything in between. He's recently moved to the wilderness of Canada, and we talk about the move, and keeping in touch with colleagues and editors half the world away.
His newest novel is 'The Bingo Hall Detectives', which tells the story of Jason Brazel, an out of work journalist who tries to solve a local murder with his mother-in-law. We talk about the rise of cosy crime and why he wanted to write in the genre. You can hear how much he thinks through the puzzle aspects of the mystery, why he's too lazy to be a real plotter, and how the characters drag him away from the 2 page synopsis.
This episode is sponsored by Marthe Jocelyn's new novel, 'The Seaside Corpse'. It's the fourth in the 'Aggie Morton Mystery Queen Series', inspired by Agatha Christie, and set in 1903 Lyme Regis, when a couple of friends discover a body while looking for Dinosaur bones. It's the perfect present for any kids you want to get engaged in reading. Find out more at marthejocelyn.com
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Ahoy, hello and welcome to a brand new episode of writers' routine. |
| 0:13.0 | This week we're chatting to Jonathan Whitelaw. |
| 0:16.0 | He's worked as a journalist in Scotland, covering everything available, really, news, politics, spore, and recently he |
| 0:21.9 | moved out to the remote wild of Canada. Jonathan has published a cosy crime novel called |
| 0:27.9 | The Bingo Hall Detectives. We talk about his two-page synopsis, also what questions he's asking |
| 0:35.1 | before he starts writing, and why, through circumstance, his writing time has to be early and extremely full on. |
| 0:43.9 | It's an intense hour every single day that that's when I get to actually sit down and write. |
| 0:48.2 | And it means that because that time is now so precious to have to do something like this, it means I know absolutely |
| 0:55.8 | what I'm going to write in that one-hour session. So there's no dallying, there's no procrastination, |
| 1:01.1 | there's no sitting about, you know, with my Oscar Wilde smoking jacket on pretending to be some author from another bygone era. It's absolutely |
| 1:14.0 | intensive in that. As soon as that hour starts, I know exactly what I'm going to write. |
| 1:18.3 | There is more with Jonathan Whitelaw in this week's writers routine. |
| 1:31.1 | Yes, welcome to the show. |
| 1:34.5 | It's writer's routine where we take a look through an author's working day to see how they get stuff done, how they take an idea from their head, |
| 1:38.3 | get it down through the keyboard and hopefully published on shelves and massively successful. |
| 1:43.4 | My name is Dan Simpson. |
| 1:44.9 | Thank you for being there. |
| 1:46.2 | This week's show is brought to you by Martha Jocelyn. |
| 1:49.6 | Martha is an author who writes all kinds of books for young readers. |
| 1:53.8 | She's published 50 books from YA, young adult, to midgrade. |
| 1:58.9 | She's done picture books, even entire stories with one-syllable words. |
| 2:03.2 | You might remember that we spoke a couple of months ago, a full-on episode, to hear all about her |
... |
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