Hi, I’m GB Williams, I write complex, fast-paced contemporary crime novels and didn’t realise they were hard-bitten till my publisher said so.  

Questions

Do you like to reflect a sense of place in your stories? If so, how/where?

I do try to.  My Locked Trilogy is odd in this respect, because I have been very careful not to state where they are set, not even a fake town name.  However, I think that they do have a sense of place.  “Locked Up” is set inside a prison and that sense of being shut in, how claustrophobic it can be, does come through in the writing.  “Locked In” is set during a bank raid gone wrong, so again there’s that feeling on being restricted, of knowing what’s there, including the stray cotton thread on the carpet.  “Locked Down”, releasing February 18^th, is much more wide-ranging location wise, and I’ve done my best to give a sense of where my characters are at all times. I try to do this through the senses, how places look, what the weather does, how it smells, I find smells most evocative, but most importantly, I try to show how the characters interact with the place. 

What’s your earliest writing memory?

I can’t remember a time when I didn’t write.  Clearly there was one, one doesn’t get born writing stories.  But I do remember some distinct moments when I knew I was a writer.  The first happened when I was very young, probably 4 or 5, my sisters and I were over my grandparents’ house, a weekly event back then. We were at the kitchen table and they’d given us some cardboard boxes and odd bits, sticky tape and pens, general art supplies. I think I’d made a shop, was pretending people were coming in and out, having conversations.  One of my sisters had a sulk on about how things weren’t fair because I always made up the best stories, had the best imagination.  I remember thinking that was because making up stories was what I wanted to do. When older I went on a youth hostel trip with the school and told stories in the dorm. They asked for horror stories, so that’s what they got.  Some complained next day they hadn’t slept because of my stories, so I did my job. The first time I wrote a play was aged 11, a class exercise. I was embarrassed as hell when the teacher held it up as the only one that actually worked as a play.  He told me I should give it to the Drama Department and see if they’d perform it.  I never did, and that’s pretty much my earliest writing regret.

Who are your main characters in your book(s): can you tell us something about them?

The three that matter are:

Ariadne Teddington; Life definitely happened while Ariadne was making other plans.  When her marriage broke up after SIDS claimed her daughter, she took the prison officer job because it was there, and she could.

Charlie Bell; all he ever wanted to be was a policeman, now the ex-Detective Sergeant is a rightfully convicted murderer. Charlie considers his failed relationships as proof he isn’t half the man his father was.

Mathew Piper; A career copper, there is little in DCI Piper’s professional life that he regretted, except failing to stop a gang lord and having to arrest his own DS for murder.  

What is their happiest memory/ies?

Ariadne: The birth of her daughter

Piper: The birth of his children, his twin daughters or his son, he couldn’t pick between the two, though he cried when he had a son.

Charlie: The realisation that Ariadne loved him, that he was a free man.

What is the biggest challenge they face?

Ariadne: Finding out what happened to her brother.

Piper: Walking the thin blue line.

Charlie: What comes next.

Biography:

GB Williams lives in her own private dungeon populated with all the weird and the wonderful she can imagine.  Some of it’s very weird, and the odd bits and pieces are a bit wonderful.  With a vivid imagination fuelled by a near death experience at the age of three, there was really no other choice for GB than to write, something she’s been doing her for as long as she can remember.  She’s tried not doing it, but it never works for long, her brain gets itchy if she hasn’t written anything for a couple of days.  GB is English by birth, but Welsh by choice, married a Welshman they have two fantastic children. They live with the world’s most imperious and demanding cat.  A DBA by day, a freelance editor and keen writer by night and weekend, she really needs to learn to sleep. 

Shortlisted for the 2014 CWA Margery Allingham Short Story Competition.  GB is also a feature writer and comic book reviewer. Crime novels are her stock in trade, but she has had success with a steampunk series of novels, and short stories in assorted genres.  

My Links:

Twitter:       @GailBWilliams (for crime) @ShadesOfAether (for steampunk)

Facebook:  @GBWilliamsCrimeWriter (for crime) @ShadesOfAether (for steampunk)

Blog:           thewriteroute.wordpress.com

Website:     www.gailbwilliams.co.uk

You’ll find my books on Amazon or at the various fairs I attend, there are links to all from my website.