Murder she wrote Val McDermid

Written by Mitchell Jordan

It is one of art’s great ironies that a woman known for concocting some of the darkest crimes in modern fiction should find inspiration through pop music.

“It helps to tap out all the other noise,” she says. “The music creates a world of my own.”

Her latest, Beneath the Bleeding, was heavily influenced by Swedish band Sigur Ros, though each book she writes has its own unique soundtrack. “The book I’m working on now is set in 1984 and the music from that era is just terrible!” she laughs.

If this habit comes as a surprise, then another is that, despite her penchant for populating the pages with brutal, sadistic killers, McDermid is an open, friendly woman. “I’m upbeat and optimistic,” she admits. “People often make the mistake of confusing the writer with what they write. Us crime writers are the party animals of the literary world.”

Despite being concerned with death, crime writing is still alive and well all over the world, according to McDermid. “We’re going through a golden age,” she says. “It’s continually reinventing itself.”

The police force has long been considered a homophobic institution, but McDermid features openly gay police officers in her books. “There’s been change, but there’s still a level of homophobia there,” she says. “There’s an assumption that if you’re a policewoman you’re either a lesbian or the station bike. I think it’s harder for gay policemen because of the culture of masculinity.”

Many writers have experienced the pain of having their work translated into a television program or film that is nothing like the book they have laboured over. In this, McDermid is lucky, and is full of praise for the creators of the Wire in the Blood series that screens on the ABC. (The good news for fans is that Beneath the Bleeding will be filmed as part of the new series).

“They make really high quality TV that seems like the world I write in and has brought more readers to my books,” she says.