There is still a funny notion that women should not write violent fiction," she continues, clearly irritated, "and yet women more often than not are the victims of sexual violence. So what are we saying - that the ones most likely to experience it should not write about it?" From the ashes: defiant McDermid Ladies stand firm in the spotlight | Soccer | The Guardian". amp.theguardian.com . Retrieved 28 June 2022. McDermid divides her time between Manchester - where she shares custody of her six-year-old son with a former partner - and the picturesque village of Alnmouth in Northumberland, where she is treated as a local celebrity. She's been with her partner, the American publisher Kelly Smith, for three years, and last year they were married at the Alnmouth community centre - the first gay marriage in the village. It was there that Rankin danced his Scottish highland jig, alongside hundreds of other guests. Sally Rowena Munt (1994). Murder by the Book: Feminism and the Crime Novel. Routledge. p. 67. ISBN 0415109191. Confronting the worst of contemporary crime and struggling to unravel roots that lie deep in the tormented past of Nazi atrocities and Stasi abuses, Tony and Carol are forced to battle for survival against overwhelming odds. In this morass of doublecross and doubledealing, they have no one to trust but each other.

Ferguson, Brian (29 August 2022). "Val McDermid reveals 'Queen of Crime' legal threat from Agatha Christie estate". Edinburgh Evening News . Retrieved 29 September 2022. Val McDermid talks about the novels that have influenced her in the Guardian bookshop challenge, 7 June 2010. McDermid considers her work to be part of the " Tartan Noir" Scottish crime fiction genre. [10] In addition to writing novels, McDermid contributes to several British newspapers and often broadcasts on BBC Radio 4 and BBC Radio Scotland. [11] Her novels, in particular the Tony Hill series, are known for their graphic depictions of violence and torture.On 23 October 2016 McDermid married her partner of two years, Jo Sharp, a professor of geography at the University of Glasgow. [34] [35] Northanger Abbey by Val McDermid review – 'Austen for the Facebook age' ". the Guardian. 26 March 2014 . Retrieved 16 April 2022. RSE Welcomes 60 New Fellows" (Press release). Royal Society of Edinburgh. 15 February 2017 . Retrieved 28 March 2017.

Valarie McDermid, FRSE , FRSL (born 4 June 1955) is a Scottish crime writer, best known for a series of novels featuring clinical psychologist Dr. Tony Hill, in a grim sub-genre known as Tartan Noir. A book starts small for me - a remark someone makes, or a story in a newspaper," she says. On this occasion the idea came as McDermid was listening to Woman's Hour while on the M6. The show featured an item about cross-dressing men. "Something fizzed in my brain, and there it was," she says. "The idea for the central characters, the plot line, the victims, why they were being killed - everything. I pulled over on to the hard shoulder and started writing." The book won the Gold Dagger for the best crime novel of the year. "In writing that book I was exploring how society, police and the media respond when the victims are male," she says, "when, more often than not, women suffer sexual crimes."The Second Murder at the Vicarage in Marple, Twelve New Mysteries (2022) p.33-52, ( HarperCollins, New York, ISBN 978-0-06-313605-2) Forget about solving all these crimes; the signal triumph here is (spoiler) the heroine’s survival.