I’ve spent the summer looking at best-selling crime fiction. I started my career with six psychological thrillers, but one thing that a writer must appreciate is that the market changes: the readership changes, language changes, laws change, and technology. That’s especially important if you plan to have a character who is a police officer, for instance, or a forensic scientist perhaps. But people, the essential building blocks of any story, don’t change. Our lives are still dominated by our feelings and ambitions. The accepted theory is that there only 7 plots in the world, based on the 7 deadly sins. And of course, revenge.

I’d be interested to hear about your favourite authors in this sphere, and why you consider them talented.