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Procedural crime author, T.M. Payne joins us this week to chat about her debut novel 'Long Time Dead', her previous work in criminal justice and the ups and downs of her publishing journey.

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Transcript

Introduction and Patreon Announcement

00:00:00
Speaker
To listen without ads, head over to patreon.com slash rightandwrong.
00:00:04
Speaker
Ooh, a spicy question.
00:00:06
Speaker
I love it.
00:00:07
Speaker
Because the writing is sort of everything, right?
00:00:09
Speaker
You can fix plot holes, but if the writer... So some readers love that and some readers are like, but I wanted more of this.
00:00:15
Speaker
So it's kind of a gamble.

Welcome to the Right and Wrong Podcast

00:00:18
Speaker
Hello and welcome back to the Right and Wrong podcast.

Meet T.M. Payne: From Criminal Justice to Novelist

00:00:22
Speaker
Joining me today is a debut novelist who spent 18 years working in the criminal justice system and 14 of those as a police case investigator with the Domestic Violence Unit.
00:00:32
Speaker
The same day that this episode goes live, her first novel, Long Time Dead, will also be releasing.
00:00:39
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I'm delighted to welcome T.M.
00:00:40
Speaker
Payne.
00:00:41
Speaker
Hello.
00:00:41
Speaker
Welcome to the show.
00:00:43
Speaker
Thank you.
00:00:43
Speaker
Thank you for having me.
00:00:45
Speaker
It's such a pleasure.
00:00:46
Speaker
Let's jump in with the book, your debut novel, Long Time Dead.
00:00:51
Speaker
Tell us a little bit about it.
00:00:53
Speaker
Okay.
00:00:53
Speaker
Well, as you say, it's my debut.
00:00:54
Speaker
It's out on the 1st of April and it's the first of the D.I.
00:00:58
Speaker
Sheridan Holler series, which is set in Liverpool and on the Wirral.
00:01:02
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Basically, it's very hard to say this without giving anything away, but it starts off in 1997 with the shooting of two women outside a supermarket.

The Plot of Long Time Dead

00:01:15
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Now, one of these women is an off-duty police officer who is killed and the other is a local newspaper editor who survives.
00:01:24
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But she suffers a catastrophic head injury, which basically leaves her unable to communicate.
00:01:31
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Now, the main suspect in the shooting is a local sort of low-level drug dealer called John Lively, who after the shooting disappears and has never been found.
00:01:42
Speaker
We then move seven years on to 2004 and John Lively's body turns up in a cemetery in Liverpool in a grave where basically he does not belong.
00:01:54
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So the main character, Sheridan Holler, and her team have to open a murder inquiry into John Lively's death and reopen the original case where the two women were shot.
00:02:05
Speaker
So she's got two inquiries going on at the same time.
00:02:08
Speaker
There is another story that runs throughout the book and this will run throughout the series.
00:02:14
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And that is when Sheridan Holler was 14, her brother Matthew, he was 12 at the time, was murdered and his body was found in Birkenhead Park.

Sheridan’s Unsolved Murder Case

00:02:24
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Now his killer has never been caught.
00:02:26
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And so Sheridan sort of grew up thinking, I'm going to join the police force.
00:02:30
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I'm going to become a detective and I'm going to solve his case.
00:02:34
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So as Long Time Dead is going on, obviously his case has still not been solved.
00:02:39
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But there is a clue that Sheridan finds in this book where she finds a lead and she hands it to the cold case team.
00:02:48
Speaker
So they are now working on trying to solve Matthew's murder.
00:02:52
Speaker
But like I say, that is something that will carry on because I've just finished book three in the series.
00:02:57
Speaker
So Matthew's story will continue.
00:02:58
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I don't know how long because I don't want to sort of drag it out and there will be a conclusion to it.
00:03:04
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But that may be in book four or five.
00:03:06
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I'm not sure yet.
00:03:07
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So watch this space.
00:03:10
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Amazing.
00:03:10
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I mean, there's so much going on.
00:03:14
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Lots to kind of sink your

Influence of Criminal Justice Experience on Writing

00:03:15
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teeth into.
00:03:15
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It is in the style of like a police procedural.
00:03:19
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Yeah.
00:03:19
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Having worked with the police for many, many years, how much of the inspiration came from that experience?
00:03:29
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Well, to be fair, I've always...
00:03:32
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I've always been intrigued in crime.
00:03:34
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I've always been intrigued with it anyway, even before I joined the police.
00:03:37
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But I mean, my whole working life has been pretty much within the criminal justice system in some way.
00:03:44
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I mean, my first job when I left school was working in a shop and I ended up catching more shoplifters than I did serving people because I could just, I don't know what it was.
00:03:54
Speaker
I could just, I just knew someone was going to take, was going to steal something.
00:03:58
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So I was a store detective for many years.
00:04:01
Speaker
And then I moved and worked in the... What's a store detective?
00:04:04
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A store detective.
00:04:06
Speaker
You've obviously never been done for shoplifting, have you?
00:04:08
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No.
00:04:09
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Which is good.
00:04:11
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A store detective is somebody who dresses normally like every other shopper in the shop and they walk around pretending to be a shopper and they catch shoplifters.
00:04:20
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So you basically follow someone around the store, hope they don't spot you following them.
00:04:25
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And I have been known to hide in some very strange places within a shop.
00:04:29
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Once in a shop, there was a, like a clothing rail, a round clothing rail.
00:04:33
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And I managed to get in there and hide in there because the lady I was, I was watching was stealing clothes.
00:04:40
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And I, where I couldn't stand anywhere without her seeing me.
00:04:43
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So I waited for her to turn around and I hid inside.
00:04:46
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And she was shoveling all these clothes into her bag.
00:04:49
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And then as she sort of went to leave the shop, I had to very hurriedly sort of emerge.
00:04:52
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And I shocked a few people like, what is this crazy woman doing?
00:04:57
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And then basically you have to wait, pretty much wait till the person leaves the store.
00:05:02
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And then you follow them out and you show your ID and you identify yourself and say, you've got something on you that you haven't paid for.
00:05:10
Speaker
And you bring them back to the shop and have a chat with them.
00:05:13
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And then you call the police.

Anecdotes from a Store Detective

00:05:15
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Or sometimes you don't call the police.
00:05:16
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I have been known to let a couple of people off, I have to say.
00:05:21
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Okay.
00:05:21
Speaker
I don't know how old you are, and I'm not going to ask you, but Woolworths used to sell, and I worked in Woolworths actually as a store detective.
00:05:29
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They used to sell pick and mix sweets.
00:05:31
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Now, you probably don't remember them, but they were elderly ladies and gentlemen used to love pick and mix.
00:05:36
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And I've often allowed people to walk out of Woolworths with a bag of sweets.
00:05:43
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But what I would do is if I knew I'd let them off with it, I would roughly guess how much the sweets cost and I would actually go to the till and pay for them myself.
00:05:51
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So the store didn't lose out financially.
00:05:54
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And I'd sort of done my job, but I'm not going to arrest an elderly lady for nicking some chocolate.
00:06:00
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That's just not going to happen ever.
00:06:03
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So yeah, so that's, that's what a store detective is.
00:06:05
Speaker
So if you've never met one, then obviously you've always paid for your shopping.
00:06:08
Speaker
Yeah.
00:06:09
Speaker
Well, that's cool.
00:06:11
Speaker
I had no idea that that was a, that was a thing.
00:06:14
Speaker
It was a thing.
00:06:14
Speaker
Yeah.
00:06:15
Speaker
And I loved it.
00:06:15
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I did it.
00:06:16
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It was to be fair, looking back now, I mean, I was very young.
00:06:19
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I was in my twenties.
00:06:20
Speaker
it's a very dangerous job because you've got no like body armor or equipment or anything.
00:06:26
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And generally, back then I didn't even have a radio.
00:06:28
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I couldn't even radio someone and say, you know, I'm chasing this person down the road and can someone help me?
00:06:34
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We had none of that.
00:06:35
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It was just a matter of,
00:06:36
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hoping they came back to the store with you.
00:06:38
Speaker
Cause I would only run so far.
00:06:40
Speaker
If someone, if someone was, if they're, if they're going to run like a gazelle, I'm not going to, because by the time you catch up with them, you're so out of breath, you can't even tell them who you are.
00:06:48
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You know, you just got this, this panting woman going, just, just stop a minute.
00:06:51
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Stop a minute.
00:06:52
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Let me get my breath back.
00:06:53
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I need to tell you something.
00:06:55
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So yeah, so that was kind of like my intro to my working life, working, like I say, in the sort of criminal justice system.

Authenticity in Police Procedurals

00:07:02
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And then I was a prisoner custody officer in London.
00:07:06
Speaker
which my job was to transport prisoners from police stations or prisons to court and then deal with them in the cells of the court.
00:07:15
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And I ended up as a supervisor at Horse Ferry Road Magistrates Court, which isn't actually there anymore.
00:07:21
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I think it's called Westminster Magistrates Court now.
00:07:24
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So my job, there was 40 cells at Horse Ferry Road.
00:07:28
Speaker
And every day we'd have sort of probably about 70 or 80 prisoners brought in from police stations and prisons.
00:07:34
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So I've met some, I've met some characters.
00:07:37
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So I've always had this, this interest in, in criminals and how they work and how their minds work.
00:07:45
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And I've always liked to think I could write a book.
00:07:48
Speaker
And then obviously working in the police, I've dealt with a lot of domestic violence.
00:07:52
Speaker
So it's not,
00:07:55
Speaker
Working for the police wasn't an inspiration to write the book or books.
00:07:59
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It's always been there.
00:08:01
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And I haven't used any of the crimes that I've dealt with in the books.
00:08:05
Speaker
This is just kind of my imagination.
00:08:08
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But the beauty of working in the police for so long and working in the courts, and I've obviously worked with probation officers.
00:08:14
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you know, Crown Court Judges, all that sort of thing.
00:08:16
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It gives, it gave me, it's given me a good basis for the police procedural side of it to make the books, hopefully, very authentic.
00:08:25
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And if there's a scene where I'm not 100% sure if I've got it right, I've still got colleagues who work in the police or who have, you know, recently retired, who I can ring up and say, look, I've got this scene.
00:08:38
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Would this happen or could this happen or how would that happen?
00:08:41
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And they're more than happy to
00:08:43
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to sit for hours on the phone and explain it to me.
00:08:45
Speaker
So I'm quite, I'm quite lucky that way.
00:08:47
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So I've picked up a lot of good, good contacts and good friends from the police.
00:08:52
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So.
00:08:52
Speaker
Is it quite an important part for you that, that you do keep the sort of operating kind of standards of the police, like all of that stuff, do you want to keep it very grounded and kind of maintain the reality of that?
00:09:03
Speaker
Yes.
00:09:04
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Yeah, absolutely.
00:09:05
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And, and, and, and the reality of how police officers, how they are in, in their environment,
00:09:14
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I've dealt with, obviously, I've met a lot of police officers.
00:09:16
Speaker
And even the job that I did in domestic violence was, that was hard.
00:09:21
Speaker
It was tough.
00:09:22
Speaker
It was a serious job.
00:09:23
Speaker
You're dealing with people's lives.
00:09:25
Speaker
But there was always a time in the office where, not at the expense of a victim, obviously, but we would have, we'd have a laugh.
00:09:32
Speaker
We'd wind each other up.
00:09:33
Speaker
We'd do stupid things.
00:09:34
Speaker
Because
00:09:35
Speaker
it kind of got you through the day a little bit.
00:09:37
Speaker
If you were always very serious and always, you know, yeah, taking things too seriously, you'd probably struggle to stay in the job that long.
00:09:47
Speaker
So I think the authenticity of how police officers and police staff work together and how they talk to each other
00:09:56
Speaker
That's important to me.
00:09:57
Speaker
And there is humour in the book.
00:09:59
Speaker
And I will always put humour in the books.
00:10:00
Speaker
In fact, that's the easiest part for me is to write the funny scenes.
00:10:05
Speaker
But I don't think it takes away from the police procedural side of it because it is, you know, they're crime fiction novels at the end of the day.
00:10:11
Speaker
And, you know, there's horrible crimes being committed.
00:10:14
Speaker
So I hope I've got the balance right.
00:10:16
Speaker
I think I've got it right.
00:10:18
Speaker
We'll see.
00:10:18
Speaker
The readers will tell me, won't

True Crime vs. Fiction: Inspiration for Writing

00:10:20
Speaker
they?
00:10:20
Speaker
I'm sure.
00:10:20
Speaker
Yeah.
00:10:22
Speaker
Do you, do you read, um, or, or like watch a lot of crime and fiction sort of, uh, shows or novels or whatever?
00:10:29
Speaker
I, do you know what?
00:10:30
Speaker
I'm very late to the, to the game, Jamie, if I'm honest, I, um, in the last couple of years, I've read more books than I've read in however many years before that.
00:10:40
Speaker
Um, I, I obviously do now, um, read, read a lot and I've, I've met a lot of incredible authors and read their books.
00:10:48
Speaker
Um,
00:10:49
Speaker
because it intrigues me how other people do it.
00:10:52
Speaker
Do you know what I mean?
00:10:53
Speaker
And I think there's always this fear that people say, oh, you know, if you're reading so many crime fiction books and you're writing one yourself, do you end up not stealing their ideas, but their plots drift into your head and you end up using them yourself without even kind of knowing it?
00:11:08
Speaker
That hasn't happened yet.
00:11:10
Speaker
And that's another thing I think the more I read, the more I can sort of make sure my books don't copy them.
00:11:19
Speaker
But I'm different and I think everybody probably feels that way.
00:11:24
Speaker
I like watching films.
00:11:26
Speaker
I like watching true life crime because I think that's, you know, they say the truth is stranger than fiction.
00:11:32
Speaker
And when you sort of see a review on someone's book and they go, well, that's ridiculous.
00:11:38
Speaker
That would never happen.
00:11:39
Speaker
People don't act like that.
00:11:41
Speaker
I think we'll actually watch a true crime because...
00:11:43
Speaker
trust me, people do the strangest things and get away with, with crimes they shouldn't get away with.
00:11:50
Speaker
Um, so it's wild.
00:11:52
Speaker
Yeah.
00:11:52
Speaker
I was watching, um, my wife was watching dirty John.
00:11:55
Speaker
I don't know if you've seen either of the series for that, where it is like a dramatic recreations of things that happened, but I didn't realize that.
00:12:03
Speaker
So I was kind of watching it over her shoulder and I was just thinking like, wow, I literally said, imagine if someone did that in real life.
00:12:09
Speaker
And she just turned to me and said,
00:12:10
Speaker
This is a recreation.
00:12:12
Speaker
Someone did that.
00:12:13
Speaker
Exactly.
00:12:14
Speaker
It's crazy.
00:12:15
Speaker
Yeah, that's what I mean.
00:12:16
Speaker
So it doesn't matter.
00:12:17
Speaker
People that write crime fiction and put these incredible scenes in, you think, really?
00:12:23
Speaker
But there's more true crime out there that is unbelievable.
00:12:29
Speaker
So there's nothing that an author writes is going to be unbelievable because it's probably already been done in real life, like you say.
00:12:35
Speaker
Yeah, exactly.
00:12:36
Speaker
Was it like Ted Bundy escapes the police like two times?
00:12:40
Speaker
Oh, is that right?
00:12:41
Speaker
Something ridiculous like that.
00:12:43
Speaker
Getting back onto you though, as it's important to you that the book is like authentic and that the things that happen and the way that the police and the kind of courts work is true to life.
00:12:55
Speaker
Are there any things when you're sort of reading crime detective novels or watching shows, do you have any like pet peeves where they kind of repeatedly keep misrepresenting something?
00:13:07
Speaker
I try not to think like that.
00:13:09
Speaker
I mean, I have seen... Try and disassociate.
00:13:11
Speaker
Yeah, I just try and think, you know, for dramatization, I understand why people will do certain things.
00:13:17
Speaker
But, you know, if I'm watching a TV program where, say, someone's being interviewed by, say, two CID officers, two detective constables or whatever...
00:13:29
Speaker
and standing in the corner of the interview room as a big burly uniformed police officer.
00:13:35
Speaker
Um, I think that wouldn't happen.
00:13:37
Speaker
He wouldn't, he wouldn't be there to know what I mean.
00:13:40
Speaker
He, you just wouldn't have that.
00:13:42
Speaker
I've never, I've say I've, I've sat in thousands of interview rooms and with, with some very, very dangerous people.
00:13:48
Speaker
And, um, yeah, we don't have a burly uniformed officer, but there must be a reason that they've put that in there.
00:13:54
Speaker
So yeah,
00:13:55
Speaker
I try not to go, that wouldn't happen or that annoys me.
00:13:59
Speaker
I just think they've used that, shall we call it artistic license for a reason.
00:14:04
Speaker
And does it really make a difference if the person's enjoying the program, if the viewer's enjoying what they're seeing, then does it matter if they've probably got that a little bit wrong?
00:14:15
Speaker
So I try not to.
00:14:16
Speaker
Otherwise, I'd just be going, that wouldn't happen.
00:14:18
Speaker
That wouldn't happen.
00:14:19
Speaker
And that would just get, I just annoy myself, I think.
00:14:22
Speaker
Yeah, that's fair enough.
00:14:23
Speaker
Let's go back to a bit more about your writing and the origins

T.M. Payne’s Writing Journey

00:14:27
Speaker
of this.
00:14:27
Speaker
You did mention that you'd always wanted to write a book or that it's something you'd always thought about doing.
00:14:35
Speaker
Was Longtime Dad your first go at that or had you written other manuscripts and stories before this?
00:14:41
Speaker
I actually wrote a book many years ago.
00:14:43
Speaker
I always wanted to write a novel and I knew it would be crime before I was 40.
00:14:47
Speaker
I'm 57 now, so I told you I was late to the party, didn't I?
00:14:54
Speaker
So I wrote a book called To Catch a Butterfly and I couldn't get an agent and I couldn't get a publisher, so I self-published it.
00:15:04
Speaker
And it did really, really well.
00:15:06
Speaker
But then kind of life sort of took over and obviously work and your general, and it's not an excuse.
00:15:13
Speaker
Well, it sort of is an excuse.
00:15:15
Speaker
And I didn't really sort of touch anything else.
00:15:18
Speaker
And then in about 2015, I thought I really need to, if I'm going to write books, I need to kind of do it now.
00:15:27
Speaker
I just need to do it.
00:15:28
Speaker
So, and the idea for Long Time Dead came out of,
00:15:32
Speaker
one line, which I can't tell you what it is because it will give the whole, that one line will give the whole book away.
00:15:39
Speaker
And I just remember thinking, yeah, that this line is going to, is going to become a book.
00:15:44
Speaker
It's going to become, um, a whole novel.
00:15:48
Speaker
And then once I'd sort of started working on it and I'd created Sheridan Holler as a character, I realized very quickly that this wasn't going to be a standalone.
00:15:58
Speaker
This was going to be a series.
00:16:00
Speaker
And because,
00:16:01
Speaker
However this sounds, and it probably sounds really bad, I love her so much.
00:16:06
Speaker
I couldn't just have her in one book.
00:16:08
Speaker
I want her to be my best friend in real life because I think she's a great police officer.
00:16:15
Speaker
She's a great detective and she's funny and she's just everything that I would want in A Best Friend.
00:16:23
Speaker
So yeah, so Long Time Dead was born.
00:16:25
Speaker
That probably wasn't even the question, was it?
00:16:27
Speaker
Am I right?
00:16:28
Speaker
What was the question?
00:16:30
Speaker
No, you got there with some frills and bits on the edge.
00:16:33
Speaker
I was just asking you how much you'd written prior to this.
00:16:37
Speaker
And it sounds like you'd written one full novel and then you took a break and then you ended up writing this one.
00:16:43
Speaker
Yes.
00:16:44
Speaker
And like I say, I started it in about 2015.
00:16:47
Speaker
And then I sort of put it down, picked it up, put it down.
00:16:51
Speaker
And then I met my partner.
00:16:53
Speaker
Susie in 2016.
00:16:56
Speaker
And without actually knowing it at the time, she is a massive crime fiction reader.
00:17:02
Speaker
She's read everything.
00:17:03
Speaker
I mean, she's read thousands of books.
00:17:05
Speaker
And when I said to her, and I quite like writing crime, she's like, well, have you written anything?
00:17:09
Speaker
I said, yeah, I'm writing this book at the moment.
00:17:11
Speaker
And she said, well, finish it.
00:17:13
Speaker
And we actually worked quite closely together on the plot.
00:17:16
Speaker
And again, because she's been a reader for so long,
00:17:20
Speaker
When I throw a scene at her and say, how about this?
00:17:24
Speaker
Her mind works so well.
00:17:25
Speaker
She goes, no, that's been done loads of times before.
00:17:29
Speaker
So she's like my little kind of Google, really.
00:17:31
Speaker
She's my personal Google.
00:17:34
Speaker
And so, yeah, we started sort of working on it together.
00:17:38
Speaker
I was living in Norfolk at the time and she was on the Wirral.
00:17:41
Speaker
She's a scouser.
00:17:43
Speaker
eventually I moved in here I moved up to the Wirral in 2019 and still hadn't finished it and so one day she said to me just just get this book done you must get this book finished and then sadly COVID hit and I'm sure you've heard this many times before we were all locked away and it was like no excuse now and I finished it I finished it in lockdown and then sent it to my agent or sent it to
00:18:07
Speaker
many agents, shall I say, got a lot of rejections.
00:18:11
Speaker
Um, and then eventually got, got Brew Doherty from DHH Literary Agency, who was the agent I always, always wanted, um, and never submitted to her because I was so frightened that she would turn me down.
00:18:25
Speaker
So she was one of the last on the list and she should have been first cause she loved it.
00:18:30
Speaker
Um, and then since obviously finishing long time dead, I've written the second book, which is out in October.
00:18:37
Speaker
which is called This Ends Now.
00:18:39
Speaker
And I've just finished the third book.
00:18:40
Speaker
So that's now with my editor.
00:18:43
Speaker
And we haven't got a title for that yet.
00:18:44
Speaker
We have submitted one, but
00:18:46
Speaker
it might not stick.
00:18:47
Speaker
So I won't, I won't say what it is.
00:18:49
Speaker
So I'm three books in now.
00:18:51
Speaker
Yeah, three books in and I've got to start writing the fourth one.
00:18:56
Speaker
So do you, is it, is it a multi-book deal that you've signed with Thomas and Mercer?
00:19:01
Speaker
Yeah, it was a three book deal.
00:19:04
Speaker
We'll see where that goes.
00:19:05
Speaker
Like I say, at the moment, things are heading in the right directions, but certainly with the reviews, I'm absolutely blown away with the reviews that Long Time Dead's getting.
00:19:14
Speaker
We'll see.
00:19:15
Speaker
Like I say, it's a business where you don't know, do you?
00:19:17
Speaker
You might sign a three book deal and then the publisher says, thank you very much.
00:19:22
Speaker
We're done.
00:19:23
Speaker
Or they might say, yeah, we'll have some more.
00:19:26
Speaker
So I don't know at the moment.
00:19:27
Speaker
We'll see.
00:19:28
Speaker
Everything crossed.
00:19:29
Speaker
So everything crossed.
00:19:30
Speaker
Everybody.
00:19:32
Speaker
Yeah.
00:19:32
Speaker
Yeah.

Desert Island Book Choice: The Mercy Chair

00:19:33
Speaker
And that brings us to the, the, the desert island.
00:19:38
Speaker
So Tina, if you were stranded all alone on a desert island with a single book, which book do you hope that it would be?
00:19:47
Speaker
Do you know what?
00:19:47
Speaker
This is such a hard question.
00:19:49
Speaker
And like, again, I'm sure you get everyone saying, Oh, I really struggled with this.
00:19:53
Speaker
And I did a little bit, but I was extremely lucky to have
00:19:58
Speaker
been sent a copy of M.W.
00:20:00
Speaker
Craven's latest book, The Mercy Chair.
00:20:03
Speaker
And I don't know if you're into Mike Craven or read his Washington Poe and Tilly Bradshaw series, but I love them.
00:20:12
Speaker
And I've met Mike a couple of times and he's just a phenomenal human being.
00:20:17
Speaker
And there's a character in his books called Tilly Bradshaw.
00:20:22
Speaker
And anyone listening who knows the Washington Poe series will
00:20:26
Speaker
will smile when you say Tilly Bradshaw's name because she's a character who is so out there and different and wonderful.
00:20:35
Speaker
And whenever she appears in a scene, you just know that everything's going to be okay.
00:20:41
Speaker
So I haven't had the time to read Mike Craven's book yet.
00:20:46
Speaker
It's out in June, but I've started it.
00:20:48
Speaker
So if I was on a desert island, there's two reasons I would pick that, The Mercy Chair.
00:20:53
Speaker
One is because I haven't finished it.
00:20:55
Speaker
And I'd be really annoyed if I'm sat there on this island for however long and I haven't finished his book.
00:21:01
Speaker
And secondly, and I thought of this this morning, I just have this vision of Tilly Bradshaw.
00:21:06
Speaker
Sort of as I look out onto the horizon, she'll come paddling towards me in an inflatable dinghy and she'll pull up and she'll say something like,
00:21:16
Speaker
How did you get yourself stuck on this island, you muppet?
00:21:20
Speaker
Get in, I'll take you home.
00:21:22
Speaker
And like I say, anyone listening that knows Tilly Bradshaw will probably relate to that and go, yeah, so that's my desert.
00:21:28
Speaker
That's my desert island book.
00:21:30
Speaker
That's great.
00:21:31
Speaker
And it's cool that you know the author.
00:21:34
Speaker
I think it's rare that people pick a book where they have met the author because I think that if you've met the author and you like them, you get on with them, then obviously I think there's a much deeper kind of connection with the material because you kind of know the source in some ways.
00:21:50
Speaker
Yeah.
00:21:50
Speaker
And it's weird.
00:21:51
Speaker
It's like when you read a book and you haven't met the author, you read the book and you enjoy it or whatever.
00:21:57
Speaker
When you've met them, and I've done this a few times now, obviously, I mean, I've been lucky.
00:22:01
Speaker
I've been to a couple of sort of crime fiction festivals and I've managed to meet quite a few people, Steve Kavanagh, Mary Hannah.
00:22:09
Speaker
I've known Ellie Griffiths for quite a few years.
00:22:11
Speaker
When you've met that person and you kind of get to know them a little bit, when you read their book, you look at it differently differently.
00:22:19
Speaker
It's like you can see them writing it.
00:22:22
Speaker
Like Mike Craven, I've met him a few times now and...
00:22:26
Speaker
When you talk to him and then you read his books, you're like, yeah, I can see Mike Craven saying this or doing this.
00:22:33
Speaker
And it does make you look at the book very differently, I think.
00:22:36
Speaker
Yeah.
00:22:37
Speaker
And I find that when I read books from my friends who are authors, sometimes there's things that aren't necessarily jokes, but it'll make me laugh because I just picture them saying the thing.
00:22:47
Speaker
And I'm like, oh yeah, that's classic you.
00:22:50
Speaker
Exactly.
00:22:51
Speaker
Exactly.
00:22:51
Speaker
And I've had a few people who have read Long Time Dead.
00:22:56
Speaker
And I've said, I can hear you.
00:22:58
Speaker
That's Tina.
00:22:59
Speaker
That is I can hear you telling that joke or behaving that way at work.
00:23:05
Speaker
Because I've before I even send the books to my agent, I send them to what I call my gatekeepers.
00:23:11
Speaker
And they are six very trusted people.
00:23:14
Speaker
One is a retired police officer who I worked with for many years.
00:23:17
Speaker
And then five other people.

Feedback and Drafting Process

00:23:19
Speaker
And I send it to them before I even send it to my agent.
00:23:22
Speaker
And they, most of them come back and they, trust me, they're brutal.
00:23:26
Speaker
I mean, I don't send it to them for them to say, wow, this is the best book ever written.
00:23:30
Speaker
I send it to them for a reason because I know they are totally,
00:23:34
Speaker
honest and like I say a little bit brutal sometimes but if you don't listen to these people then you're going to get it wrong you know I send it to them for a reason but they do mostly come back and say oh that there's a scene in there Tina which made me cry with laughter and that makes me sound like I'm a really funny person I like to think I'm quite a funny person but yeah so it's it's yeah knowing the person and then reading the book I think it makes you look at it very differently
00:24:01
Speaker
Yeah, it makes a huge difference.
00:24:02
Speaker
And when you say like, you know, the person you see their voice coming through, that's the kind of, that's one of the things that agents are always saying that, you know, they're looking for that like distinctive voice.
00:24:13
Speaker
And most of the time, that's just you as a person coming through with all your individuality in the, in the story itself.
00:24:20
Speaker
So that's great.
00:24:20
Speaker
Absolutely.
00:24:21
Speaker
Yeah, absolutely.
00:24:21
Speaker
I agree

Conclusion and Social Media Handles

00:24:22
Speaker
with that.
00:24:22
Speaker
Yeah.
00:24:22
Speaker
We're about to get into some more craft-based chat about Tina's process and getting the novel ready for publication, but that will be in the extended cut, exclusive to Patreon subscribers.
00:24:32
Speaker
So anyone listening who hasn't yet joined the Patreon, please do think about it.
00:24:35
Speaker
It goes a long way towards covering the costs of running this podcast.
00:24:40
Speaker
You're going to cut that out of the podcast, aren't you?
00:24:43
Speaker
Never.
00:24:46
Speaker
Amazing.
00:24:47
Speaker
That's awesome.
00:24:47
Speaker
Well, thank you so much, Tina, for coming on the podcast and telling us all about your debut novel, as well as your kind of experiences with various different parts of crime and telling me, enlightening me about a shop detective, something that I think is fascinating.
00:25:02
Speaker
It's been awesome having you on the podcast.
00:25:05
Speaker
Thank you so much for inviting me.
00:25:07
Speaker
I've loved every second of it.
00:25:08
Speaker
Brilliant.
00:25:08
Speaker
Thank you.
00:25:09
Speaker
And for anyone listening, if you want to keep up with what Tina is doing, you can follow her on Twitter at Tina P 66 Payne, or she has recently joined Instagram and you can find her at T M Payne author to support the podcast, like follow, subscribe on your preferred podcast platform and follow along on socials.
00:25:28
Speaker
Join the Patreon for extended episodes ad free and a week early and check out my other podcast, the chosen ones and other tropes.
00:25:34
Speaker
Long Time Dead is out as of this airing, 1st of April.
00:25:39
Speaker
And thanks again to Tina.
00:25:40
Speaker
And thanks to everyone listening.
00:25:40
Speaker
We'll catch you on the next episode.