South Tyneside’s Crime Fiction Festival – Authors
We will be joined by seven crime writers at the top of their game for a day of author talks, question and answer sessions and book signings.
Saturday 20 September 2025 10am-5pm at The Word.
Find out about the writers joining us below.
Emma Flint
Emma was born and grew up in Newcastle upon Tyne. She now lives and works in a cottage in the Cotswolds, where her study overlooks a Victorian cemetery.
Since childhood, she has been drawn to true-crime stories, developing an encyclopaedic knowledge of real-life murder cases from the early 20th century. Her first novel, Little Deaths, was inspired by a crime that took place in 1960s New York. Little Deaths was longlisted for the Women’s Prize for Fiction, for the Desmond Elliott Prize, for the Crime Writers’ Association Gold Dagger Award, and for The Guardian’s Not the Booker Prize.
Emma’s second novel, Other Women, was selected as a Zoe Ball BBC Radio 2 Book Club pick. Also inspired by a real case, it tells the story of a love triangle in 1920s London that ends in murder.
Vaseem Khan
Vaseem’s acclaimed Baby Ganesh Agency crime series won the Shamus Award in the US, with The Unexpected Inheritance of Inspector Chopra selected by the Sunday Times as one of the 40 best crime novels published 2015-2020, now translated into 16 languages. The first novel in the Malabar House series, Midnight at Malabar House, won the CWA Historical Dagger 2021 and was shortlisted for the Theakstons Crime Novel of the Year Award.
Fiona Cummins
Fiona’s 2022 novel, Into the Dark, introduced readers to Detective Saul Anguish, and was shortlisted for the Harrogate Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year Award in 2023. All Of Us Are Broken, the second book starring Saul Anguish, was a Richard and Judy Book Club pick in April 2024. Fiona has appeared on stage with everyone from David Baldacci to Adele Parks, Clare Mackintosh to Lucy Foley, Mark Billingham to Abir Mukherjee. She is currently teaching a Faber Academy course she devised, Writing Crime.
Fiona is a former journalist and now writes full-time.
John Sutherland
John is a married father of three, who lives with his wife and family in South London. He joined the Metropolitan Police Service in 1992 – serving as an officer for more than 25 years, until his early retirement on medical grounds in 2018.
Having started out as a uniformed PC, responding to emergencies on the streets of inner London, he rose through the ranks to become a highly respected senior officer. His last operational posting was as the Borough Commander for Southwark. He is an experienced Hostage and Crisis Negotiator, having been a member of both the national and international cadres.
Since leaving the Met, John has become an established author. His first book,‘Blue: A Memoir’, was an instant Sunday Times bestseller and his second, ‘Crossing the Line’ was a BBC Radio 4 Book of the Week. His first novel, ‘The Siege’ – which introduced readers to the worlds of police negotiators Alex Lewis and Pip Williams – was published by Orion Fiction in June 2022 and shortlisted for the Specsavers Debut Come Novel of the Year. It’s sequel, The Fallen, was published in 2023 to significant critical acclaim and the third book in the series, The Castle, will be released in April 2025.
John is a sought-after public speaker – addressing subjects including leadership, communication and mental health – and a media commentator on matters relating to policing and society. He has appeared regularly on national radio and television and has written for a variety of national newspapers.
MJ Arlidge
MJ Arlidge has worked in television for the last twenty years, specialising in high-end drama production, including prime-time crime serials Silent Witness, Torn, The Little Houseand, most recently, the hit ITV show Innocent. In 2015 his audiobook exclusive Six Degrees of Assassination was a number-one bestseller. His debut thriller, Eeny Meeny, was the UK’s bestselling crime debut of 2014 and has been followed by ten more DI Helen Grace thrillers – all Sunday Times bestsellers. He has sold over 1.5 million copies of his books in the UK alone and been translated into over 20 languages.
Steph McGovern
Steph is an award-winning broadcaster who currently presents The Rest Is Money podcast with Robert Peston. Steph has worked in journalism for over twenty years, eight of them as part of the BBC Breakfast family. She went on to present her own BAFTA-nominated live daily show, Steph’s Packed Lunch, on Channel 4 and is a regular Have I Got News for You panellist and host. Steph is an avid crime reader and has interviewed countless authors including Val McDermid, Ann Cleeves, Hillary Clinton, Harlan Coben, Lee Child and Don Winslow, as well as judging the Theakston Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year award at the Harrogate Crime Festival since 2019. Deadline is her first novel.
CM. Ewan
CM. Ewan is a pseudonym for Chris Ewan, the critically acclaimed and bestselling author of many mystery and thriller novels. Chris’s first standalone thriller, Safe House, was a bestseller in the UK and was shortlisted for the Theakston’s Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year Award. He is also the author of the thrillers The House Hunt, The Interview, Dead Line, Dark Tides, Long Time Lost and A Window Breaks, as well as the Good Thief’s Guide series of mystery novels. The Good Thief’s Guide to Amsterdam won the
Long Barn Books First Novel Award and has been published in thirteen countries.