In September I was delighted to get the call up to take part in the Bloody Scotland crime writing festival. I’d hoped, of course, to be able to make it up to Stirling and take part in the traditional England vs Scotland crime writers’ football match, too - but Covid-19 put a stop to that, and the festival moved online.
I was asked to interview American forensic psychologist Dr Katherine Ramsland about serial killers. Katherine has authored numerous books on the subject, perhaps most notably a biography of Dennis Rader (aka ‘BTK’) as well as consulting with the FBI and on many TV shows. I was given an advance copy of Katherine’s new book, How to Catch a Killer, which is a really interesting collection of case studies about how serial murderers were caught, and well worth a read.
We had a fascinating discussion around the psychological issues relating to serial murder, with the theme emerging that no one consistent factor can be found among these killers’ motivations. The video of our session is no longer available on YouTube, but Louise Cannon posted a write up of it on her Bookmarks and Stages blog.
The Bloody Scotland team did an amazing job curating and running the programme online, and it was incredible to share even a tiny bit of the bill with lots of my writing heroes, including Lee Child, Val McDermid and Mark Billingham. Fingers crossed we’ll be able to attend these amazing festivals in person in 2021.