Author of Cold Blood
I am joined today by author Andrew King to talk about his debut thriller novel, Cold Blood. which released April 2nd, 2021. Welcome Andrew. Please tell us a little about your novel.
Andrew: My book is called Cold Blood. It’s about a detective in Victorian England covering for the fact that his wife is a serial killer.
Helen: What made you call your novel Cold Blood?
Andrew: Originally the title of the story was The Vampire Detective but I thought that was a bit too on the nose so I decided to change the title to Cold Blood as a reference to the phrase “to kill in cold blood” meaning to kill without remorse.
Helen: It sounds appropriately chilling! What gave you the inspiration to write this book?
Andrew: This particular story had two inspirations, the book The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde and the killings of jack the ripper. I first read the first in English literature taught by David Dalrymple and the second in History taught by Mrs Bugler both of whom have been thanked in the acknowledgements of the story.
Helen: Your book sounds really intriguing, part historical and part fantastical. Did you do a lot of research for your book?
Andrew: I don’t do a lot of research, honestly. I wrote the story and looked through it trying to find things that stand out as inaccurate and checked if it was. most of my stories have less of a focus on realism.
Helen: What inspired you to first start writing? Was there anyone in particular that lit that spark in you?
Andrew: I began writing when I was 14 after a, particularly long day meaning the main thing that made me start writing was boredom. I decided to continue writing after I showed a few people because I realised how much I enjoyed entertaining people. In the beginning, there wasn’t a particular person that inspired me to write mostly because I didn’t take it too seriously but the closer to cold blood I got and I talked to more writers I found more people that inspired me, If I had to say now it would be Myria Candies, author of Black Hollow, The Bitter Taste and White Embers.
Helen: Congratulations on finishing your first novel, and now you’ve written a thriller, what’s next?
Andrew: I plan on writing a mix of genres but this book is historical fiction because of its main inspiration, The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. Both stories are set in 1886.
Helen: How do you get ideas for books?
Andrew: Most of my ideas for stories, of which I have 21, come either from reading other works of fiction, like Cold Blood was, or general observations of the real world like my current WIP, Cup of Sleep, which was inspired by all the people saying they couldn’t survive without coffee.
Helen: Oh my, that’s great to hear. Tell us more about your latest work in progress, Cup of Sleep. That sounds like a really fascinating premise.
Andrew: My current work in progress, as mentioned in the last question is called Cup of Sleep. the basic plot is that a coffee company has taken over the world and has made sleep illegal so people need their coffee to stay awake. the main character finds a product called a sleep pod and must hide it from the government because the punishment for sleeping is death. the two main inspirations being all the people saying they couldn’t survive without coffee and how boring I thought 1984 was.
Helen: Every writer has a different way of writing, and favourites elements. Writing thrillers I suppose you have an interest in writing villains. Do you prefer writing Heroes or villains?
Andrew: I definitely prefer writing villains, I like seeing how people react to the evil things they do, both the reader and the characters in the story as we don’t know how we’ll react to something until it happens.
Helen: Tell us about your writing environment. Do you have time to write every day?
Andrew: I don’t find fitting writing into my everyday life difficult because I am a student in college. for the most part, I have one lesson a day and that lesson is two hours long meaning when I get home I have plenty of time to do both work and writing. I do listen to music, I write on my computer and have youtube open on a different tab. The main people I listen to are Dodie Clark, Anna Akana and The stupendium. there is no writing-related reason I just love their songs.
Helen: What is the most useful piece of writing advice you have received?
Andrew: I would have to say that the most useful is not to edit as I write that was given by the previously mentioned Myria Candies. This is because doing that will prevent progress as you constantly look at the same section without writing any more.
Helen: Thank you so much for joining me today, it has been a pleasure chatting with you. I wish you all the best with your next book. Just to close us out, can you tell us what advice you would give other authors?
Andrew: The main advice I would give is simply to start small, it was a problem I had when I started writing that I would try to make everything much bigger than it needed to be for example my first story being part of a five-book series, I didn’t have the skill to write a series yet I was trying anyway.
About the Author:
Andrew King is a self-published author whose main goal in life is to entertain others; we will see how successful that is. Born in Manchester, Droylsden to Edward and Sarah King I first began writing when I was in Secondary school at the end of a particularly long day. I wrote many stories in private until the year 2020 when, during lockdown, I decided to try and publish one. Cold Blood was born.
You can follow Andrew on Instagram
You can purchase Andrew’s novel from Amazon:
Cold Blood
UK: Paperback
USA: Paperback
Canada: Paperback
Helen Garraway 