It gives me chills to cast my mind back to a momentous Friday
afternoon in 2006…
4pm: Imagine, if you will, Transworld's headquarters in West
London (think Bridget Jones's Diary without the glass, or
the Hugh).
I glance at the time and decide to spend the last couple of
hours of my working week whizzing through the Teetering Submission
Pile on my desk.
4.25pm: Submission 1. A good but nothing new detective
novel.
5pm: Submission 2. An epic historical with a narrative that
sweeps across the centuries, and out of my head.
5.30pm: Submission 3: I pick up an enormous tome that is
blocking sunlight from my window. Let's see… It's called
Heart's Blood. It's by an author called 'Sharon Bolton'.
It is topped with a letter from an agency called the 'Ampersand
Agency', and a lady called 'Anne-Marie Doulton' who informs me it
is a debut.
Ok, I think, I'll read a few chapters before I head
home. Might just spin out an email to Anne-Marie explaining why,
sadly, HEART'S BLOOD isn't for us.
5.35pm: Suddenly feeling quite cold. Positively chilly. Has
someone opened a window?
5.37pm: What a cracking opening that was! Let's see if she can
keep it up…
5.45pm: Crikey, this is good. Really good. Turn the page, turn
the page….
7pm: Alone in office. Security guard just asked if he could turn
lights out (this is a publishing house on a Friday, not a city law
firm). Plead with security guard.
Maybe just one more chapter before I'm plunged into
darkness…
7.30pm: Evicted by security guard. Now sitting on Central Line.
Ignore pain as fellow passenger stands on toe with stiletto heel.
Turn the page, turn the page. Will the script stay this good,
or transform into space opera in second half?
8.30pm: Highbury station: nearly come a cropper reading and
juggling pages as I fail to notice top of escalator.
9pm: Back home on sofa. Boyfriend asks question. Boyfriend is
hungry. Boyfriend realises he needs to go to pub to find food and
conversation.
9.30pm: Begin to plan Monday morning phone call to Anne-Marie
Doulton.
***
So, that was just one afternoon over 3 years ago. Now let me
bring us back to the present.
Heart's Blood, for those of you wondering what on earth
I'm on about, was published as Sacrifice in 2008, and
Sharon (or rather S. J) Bolton is now the author of not one, but
three, outstanding thrillers… and one on the way. Oh, don't worry,
she got her 'Blood' in the title in the end: check out her brand
new novel Blood Harvest. It is sensational.
I'm certainly not alone in my praise for Sharon's writing… Since
2006, publishers around the globe have signed up S. J. Bolton. One
company has optioned Sacrifice for film. In America and
Europe Sharon has been nominated for major awards. The
Times believe she deserves to sell copies in their millions.
Bestselling author Tess Gerritsen claims her writing is
'mesmerising'.
And her editor?
Well, her editor is pretty lucky to be her editor, and each year
she receives a new tome from Sharon and Anne-Marie, and it blocks
out some light in her office . . . but somehow still makes it
significantly brighter.
She-Who-Must-Be-Obeyed