My turn for the blog tour for Clare Chase's new book A Stranger's House today!
And you, my lovely readers, have an added bonus - a guest post from Clare herself!!
Review and guest post of A Stranger's House by Clare Chase - Five **
Blurb:
What if you were powerless to protect the person you cared about most?
When Ruby finds out that her partner has done the unforgivable, she has no option but to move out of their home. With nowhere else to go, a job house-sitting in Cambridge seems like the perfect solution.
But it’s soon clear the absent owner hurts everyone he gets close to, and Ruby’s faced with the fallout. As violent repercussions unfold, her instinct is to investigate: it’s a matter of self-preservation. And besides, she’s curious…
But Ruby’s new boss, Nate Bastable, has his eye on her and seems determined to put a stop to her sleuthing. Is he simply worried for the welfare of a member of staff, or is there something altogether more complicated – and potentially dangerous – at play?
From Death by Choc Lit - gripping edge of your seat reads.
Review:
Loved this book! It's not my usual genre but I trust Choc Lit implicitly so gave it a go.
I loved the characters - Ruby and Nate - and the chemistry between them. Damien made a wonderful villain....until he was murdered and then, of course Nate, as a PI and Roby as a nosy person have to look into his death.
The setting in Cambridge is lovely - and makes a nice change from a remote coastal town or a US city! It is a complicated plot, with several loose ends by the final chapter. I hope they are tied up in the next book!
Thoroughly enjoyed it - more please Clare!
I received an ARC in exchange for an honest review.
And now let's meet Clare - welcome!
Cambridge and Crime –
the perfect match
Thanks so much for having me on your blog today, Ann!
A Stranger’s House
is just out in paperback, and as it’s my first mystery set in Cambridge, and
the second,One Dark Lie, has just been
released as an eBook, I thought I’d write about why I think the city is such a
great setting for crime fiction.
Distinct boundaries
and plenty of connectivity
I’d categorise my books as classic (albeit contemporary)
mysteries,and for this type of crime novel a relatively close-knit, interwoven
community works well. Cambridge is perfect in this way: it makes for a lively,
colourful backdrop, as you’d expect from a city, but it’s also quite a small
place, so establishing unexpected connections between characters is believable.
And it has certain structures that reinforce this.
Cambridge’s University is just one example. It employs a
large number of residents and so there are all sorts of links between people
that you might not anticipate. Jobs range from college gardeners and
housekeeping staff to media-friendly professors in charge of multi-million pound
research grants. These networks mean secrets and gossip can travel fast and in
unexpected directions!
Cambridge’s housing stock contributes to this
interconnectedness too. The vast majority of the city’s streets are compact,
with lots of Victorian terraces, which means you’re very close to your
neighbours.It’s not uncommon for you to know each other’s business, whether you
want to or not! The older houses’ walls are only one brick thick, so raised
voices travel, and people often have a right of way through neighbouring
gardens too, so they can wheel their bins and bikes onto the street. If I want
one of my characters to witness something untoward, it’s easy to work that in.
Plenty to write about
It’s hard to overlook the fact that Cambridge is full of
contrasts in terms of wealth and circumstance, and that’s just one dynamic that
can lead to conflict and drive a plot.
The city is home to what’s become known as Silicon Fen, a
hotspot of hugely successful high-tech businesses. And the University is also
wealthy. According to Wikipedia it had an endowment of £5.89 billion in 2014,
and given that it’s over 800 years old, you can imagine how ingrained its
presence is here, and how unbreakable some of its traditions seem to be. It
makes a massive and valuable contribution to the economy and people’s wellbeing
through its research and spin-out companies, but there’s no doubt it engenders
jealousy and resentment in some quarters too.
At the other end of the scale, it’s common to see down and
outs and drug dealers on the city’s commons and you become very conscious of
the vastly different outcomes people can have in life for all sorts of reasons,
frequently beyond their control. Because Cambridge is only the size of a market
town, these inequalities can be quite striking, and you get people rubbing
shoulders who wouldn’t normally cross paths.
The city is also a place where the stakes are often high.
(We’re back to those multi-million pound businesses and high-flying professors again.)
And where people have a lot to lose, there’s potential to develop a crime plot.
What might someone do to protect their standing or their fortune?
An interesting backdrop
I find Cambridge very beautiful – from the architecture of
its colleges to the River Cam with its weeping willows. There’s also something
charming about the cattle that graze the city’s commons, right in the centre of
town. It’s the sort of environment that provides a stark contrast to an
unforgivable act in a crime novel.
I find it a nostalgic place too. Around a fifth of the
term-time population is made up of students, which means there’s a higher than
average proportion of young people here. I’m constantly reminded of the old
days and time passing, since I’m quite a lot more grown-up than they are!
And then there’s the local colour. Cambridge’s streets are packed
full of galleries, restaurants and coffee shops, which are fun to depict, and,from
a plotting point of view, make chance encounters believable. It’s also very
international. You get scholars and tourists travelling to the city from all
over the world, with the added interest and variety that brings.
But when I want to introduce a creepy note, there are plenty
of isolated spaces! The commons bordering the river can feel very lonely after
dark, as do the meadows going out of town – all useful for mystery fiction.
Personal knowledge
I’ve lived in Cambridge for over twenty years and used to work
at the University, which has definitely helped me with the content of my books.
I’ve also lodged everywhere from a palatial house in upmarket Newnham to
impressively grotty student digs, with mildew on the walls. At the time I
didn’t manage to feel kindly towards the slugs that shared my living space, but
now I can see it was all grist to the mill!
So that’s a flavour of the sort of things I pick up on in my
Cambridge mysteries. I really hope readers get as much out of the setting as I
do.
About the
author:
Clare Chase writes women sleuth mysteries set in
London and Cambridge. She fell in love with the capital as a student, living in
the rather cushy surroundings of Hampstead in what was then a campus college of
London University.
After graduating in English Literature, she
moved to Cambridge and has lived there ever since. She’s fascinated by the
city’s contrasts and contradictions, which feed into her writing. She’s worked
in diverse settings – from the 800-year-old University to one of the local
prisons – and lived everywhere from the house of a Lord to a slug-infested
flat. The terrace she now occupies presents a good happy medium.
As well as writing, Clare loves family time, art
and architecture, cooking, and of course, reading other people’s books.
She lives with her husband and teenage children,
and currently works at the Royal Society of Chemistry.
