Pauline Rowson discusses how she plans her crime novels

When starting a fresh crime novel (as I am now, having recently finished writing the ninth in the DI Andy Horton series) I have the basic idea in mind. I will start to flesh this out using spider grams and time lines to work up the basic plot lines and character outlines, working in pencil on recycled pieces of A4 paper.

Often I will create some characters who won’t appear in the novel at all because by the time I start to write the first draft they might no longer be relevant.

At this stage I don’t know how the novel will end or who the villain is, this will only become apparent as I write. I conduct some research,which in turn will spark even more ideas about the plot and subplots and
provide me with further ideas for characters.

Read more: Planning a crime novel:

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

If you like Peter James, John Harvey, Ann Cleeves and Peter Robinson you'll like Pauline Rowson's crime novels

Marvik is about to face his biggest challenge in mystery thriller FATAL DEPTHS, no 4 in the series.