Worcestershire Literary Festival – Covert Operations with Cameron Addicott

My second visit to St Johns Library in this festival was for a very different event to my first, the illustrious crime panel, this time I was looking forward to being given an insight into the criminal underground where drugs are the main currency and people take unbelievable risks to traffic them into the country. The programme promised discussion to include criminal motivation, methods of intelligence gathering, cocaine production and smuggling and money laundering.

Cameron Addicott was an undercover officer in H.M Customs and the Serious Organised Crime Agency for nearly twenty years . He was a Criminal Investigator, Covert Surveillance Operative and Commander,  an Informant Handler and an Undercover Officer. Since leaving this work he is now a director of a Security Services company and is writing another book.

I really enjoyed listening to Cameron talk, as did my husband. He told a number of stories about his working life and reminisced about life undercover before turning the conversation to the dramatisation of his first book ‘The Interceptor’ which is currently being shown on BBC1. It has been a fantastic series and I hope that it is optioned for a second series.

Thank you to the festival organisers for supplying me with two tickets in return for a review.

Blog Tour - The Quality of Silence by Rosamund Lupton

On 24th November Yasmin and her deaf daughter Ruby arrive in Alaska. Within hours they are driving alone across a frozen wilderness Where nothing grows Where no one lives Where tears freeze And night will last for another fifty-four days. They are looking for Ruby's father. Travelling deeper into a silent land. They still cannot find him. And someone is watching them in the dark.

Publisher: Little, Brown Book Group

ISBN: 9780349408125

Rosamund Lupton has written some fantastic books: Sister and Afterwards, both of which have been international bestsellers and this, her third book, I believe is heading the same way.

Telling the story of Yasmin and Ruby, who is deaf, mother and daughter travel to Alaska in search of Ruby's father. They are starting on a long journey which leads them deeper into the Alaskan landscape, where they never feel they are alone. This landscape is a fantastic backdrop to the story, which keeps the reader on their toes throughout the book. 

Lupton's fantastic writing style continues as a brilliant storyteller. The storytelling is haunting but beautiful, often at a break neck speed as the hunt for Ruby's father continues to gather pace, leaving them both in peril. It is one of those books which are hard to put down, always wanting to know what will happen next. However, although this book is a thriller, there are also moments of humour, in Ruby's narrative, and also an insight into living with deafness where the environment is seen in a different way, with other senses heightened as one is lost. 

I would recommend this book to existing fans of Lupton, however it is also a fantastic introduction into Lupton's books which never fail to impress.