crime fiction – Page 2 – Chris McTrustry

The Hazards of the Modern Writer-Postman, Episode 3

So. Below is the result after I told my postie-bike my latest writing news.

This is what happened: Its been a year since I was placed on the books of Australian Literary Management so On the anniversary of this significant event, I decided to contact my agent Lyn and report on the progress of my crime-novel-in-the-works, Burned. I emailed the opening 50 pages and she likes it! I’ve now passed the 60,000 word mark (the complete manuscript will run 75,000-80,000 words). I’ve just returned to my postie run after a week off and told my bike these pieces of news today. The picture above is its reaction. Shock. Surprise. Who knows?

Manuscript Existential Crisis

It had to happen. Just had to. It happens with every novel. A crisis of faith in the story and the characters. Self doubt. A dip in confidence.

This crisis was triggered when I realised I’d taken a wrong plot path – and followed it a very long way. Aargh!

But now I’ve picked my way back through the wilderness and found where I veered onto the wrong path. The good news is that I think I can use some of this material later in the manuscript.

The even better news is I do have confidence in this manuscript and characters and it will be back on track in no time.

But, oh, the darkness, the doubt, the fear. Be gone!

Aaah, that feels better. Okay, back to the keyboard. . .

Spring Clean

Spring is here in Australia and so I’ve embarked on my annual ‘clean up my desk’ adventure. Don’t try this at home kids! These are highly trained professionals at work. They may make it look easy – but it ain’t.

My crime-novel-in-progress Burned continues to ‘progress’ well. I’ve been in a writers group with respected and award winning author Bill Condon for many years. But with the advent of COVID 19 our meetings have been curtailed. Bummer. But, Bill and I meet up online weekly and critique and discuss the manuscripts we’re currently working on. It’s been very productive and a lot of fun. And I still feel very connected with Bill. It’s funny. I’m not seeing him in person but we’re both still a part of each other’s lives.

The Highlands continues to be out there in the publishing world. Two considered no’s so far. The last publisher said my main character was ‘refreshingly and complex’ in an ‘incredibly readable’ novel where I brought characters and setting to ‘life brilliantly’. And still a no. Aah, crime writing’s a tough gig.

Stay safe and well.

Writing Mechanics

And no, I don’t mean a person who repairs cars, trucks, tractors who writes. Although I’m sure there are mechanic-novelists out there. If you’re a budding novelist you have to make sure you can still pay the bills!

You can see what I mean by “mechanics“ below.

These pages are a literal chapter breakdown of my manuscript-in-progress called Burned. I’ve written fragments of a backstory for my protagonist and now I need to figure out where to slip them into the manuscript so the plot continues to unroll naturally and the reader can gain some insight (drop by drop – not massive info-dump) into the character without losing the momentum of the story. T’is a challenge . . .

Glory Days

I took a break from writing my novel and spent the afternoon watching my old football team. Back in the day, I was captain of the Figtree Titans and played for them for over 10 years. An added bonus for today’s game was that a bloke from work was playing for the opposition. The Titans prevailed 5-1. Yay!

The author flies through the air to make a powerful defensive header.

The photo above was taken at Coledale, a beachside northern Illawarra suburb.

Burned, my crime novel-in-progress progresses well.

The Journey Begins

Welcome to my website.

Where to begin . . . Well, I’m an Australian children/YA author and I’ve published about thirty books here in Australia as well in Asia, New Zealand, U.S.A and U.K. Short stories, too.

Oh, and once upon a time, I wrote scripts for Australian television dramas such as Neighbours and Home and Away.

But now, my writing is focused on crime fiction for adults. A while ago – a long while ago – I started a crime novel. Started but didn’t finish. Until eighteen months ago when, after encouragement from my wife, Patricia, I finished, edited and polished the manuscript . . . and sent it out into the world of publishing.

My manuscript, now called The Highlands landed me a chat with literary agent, Lyn Tranter of Australian Literary Management. I’m now on the books of ALM and my second crime manuscript Corruption is making itself known to Australian publishers. As they say in the classics, fingers crossed . . .

I’ll be keeping you up-to-date with my writing life, my reading life, my movie-watching life, my television-watching life, my life life and anything else that’s interesting.

Please feel free to comment – agree, disagree, expand and even, ahem, praise (I won’t discourage that!). Okay, that’s it for the introduction. Let the adventure begin!

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That’s me. On a mountain. In Switzerland. It’s much colder than it looks (yeah, I’m tough). And see in the background, those mountains are the Swiss Alps. We don’t have mountains like them in Australia. Oh no. Compared to The Alps our mountains are hills.

Okay. That’s it for now. But I will share more holiday snaps with you. Seeing photos of holidays past encourages me to write, so I can (hopefully) sell a book to a publisher and travel some more. And hey, I’m not just having fun all of the time, I’m researching, too. Research is very important to a writer. Very important.