Chris Brookmyre in Conversation at Theakston’s Old Peculier Crime Writing Festival
By Sarah Morgan, July 2026
There was once a time when people got a job on leaving school and they stuck to it pretty much for the rest of their lives.
These days, such an activity is a rare thing, particularly in an ever-changing world. However, when it comes to crime writing, longevity is a regular and applauded matter – just ask Chris Brookmyre.
The Glasgow-born author is currently attending Harrogate’s Theakstons Old Peculier Crime Writing Festival, where he’s celebrating 30 years as a published author.
“You never think when you start out about posterity or how long it’s going to last, so I’m really, really privileged to have been published all this time,” he grins.
Although he’d long harboured a dream to become a writer, his early efforts didn’t come to anything.
“It took an embarrassing amount of time to get to be the writer I was meant to be,” explains Chris. “I was writing what I thought publishers wanted. I wrote four novels before I got published.
“My natural instinct was always to try to be funny, but weirdly, I tried to be very serious about crime. The big thing for me was reading Carl Hiaasen, seeing him write about things he was passionate about, but with hilarity. That changed everything; that was when I found my voice.
“I wasn’t bothered about publishers by that point,” he continues. “I was basically writing for myself and my friends, see if I could make them laugh. Turns out it made a lot of people laugh.”
‘It’ was his debut novel, Quite Ugly One Morning, and it begins in unforgettable fashion – with a mutilated body and excrement on the mantelpiece.
“I realise in retrospect, if I was thinking of posterity, I wouldn’t have put a big ‘jobbie’ on the mantelpiece,” he laughs, “because no matter what, it’s what I’ll be remembered for!”
Chris Brookmyre on stage in Harrogate with fellow author, Mark Billingham
“I care about him more”
The book also introduced readers to journalist Jack Parlabane, his most regular character.
“I found this scurrilous satire that I could write, but I needed a character and I didn’t want to do a policeman because I don’t know much about that,” says Chris of Parlabane’s creation. “I was working in journalism and I liked the idea of someone who doesn’t have to follow lines of enquiry. And I wanted someone forthright who could deliver all those great one-liners you wished you’d said after arguments.
“He was also a bit of wish fulfilment in that he will do anything to get to the truth, although some people have described him as ‘slappable’.”
After a nine-year break, Chris has brought Parlabane back in his most recent novel, Quite Ugly One Evening: “I care about him more after this book because I’ve written about his background and his family. I think I’ve made him less slappable.”
As well as his solo work, Chris writes novels in collaboration with his wife, Dr Marisa Haetzman, under the name Ambrose Parry.
“If we’re both hugely passionate about something, that’s what drives us,” he says of the partnership and its subject matter. “We’ve written the start of a new series. I can’t say much, but it’s about the first women in CID. It’s all Mayfair mansions and jazz clubs and all that, but it’s not out for another 18 months.”
As for his own books, he doesn’t analyse where his ideas come from: “I’m never quite sure. Writers hate being asked because we don’t want to think about it in case they stop coming!”
What he does know is how different he is as a person than when he started out.
“I’m very conscious I don’t know everything anymore. When you’re in your twenties, you’re so full of piss and vinegar that you’re sure of yourself. I’m certainly not like that now.”
What he is sure of, however, is what he’ll be doing, God willing, in 2056: “I’ll be very happy if I’m still writing in 30 years time. I’ve no plans to retire, that’s the great thing about this job.
“But whether I’ll be writing about an octogenarian Parlabane is a different matter…”
images: Gerard Binks
Sarah Morgan studied film journalism at post-graduate level with the BFI and has been writing about TV and film for PA Media’s newspaper, magazine and new media customers since 1996. She’s also written for a wide range of other publications, both online and in print, including the book Offbeat and Intermission magazine, and is a regular contributor to the Talking Pictures TV podcast. When she isn’t watching movies, she’s collecting and reading vintage crime and horror paperback books or, for her sins, watching her beloved Sheffield Wednesday.
