After the success of last year’s Crime Writers’ Clinics, the CWA is proud to announce the 2024 schedule of Clinics!

These online events will take place from 8 October to 7 November, and are programmed and hosted by William Shaw. Tickets are £15 for the general public, and free for CWA members. Not a member? You can apply here.

You will need to register for each event separately. Members will have received an email with the discount code. Use the same code for every purchase.

We hope to see you there!

Oct 8th 7.00pm Getting the Science Right: Brian Price

https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/getting-the-science-right-brian-price-tickets-1014500738017

Planning to poison? Hoping to blow something up? Fire a pistol at close range? Great storytelling is based in getting your facts right from the start. Crime writer, chemist and biologist Brian Price talks us through some of the most common errors and how to avoid them. 

Brian spent 26 years teaching science and technology courses for the Open University.  He worked for the Environment Agency for 12 years and has also been an environmental consultant and a pharmacy technician, analysing drugs.  In 2016 he set up a website (www.crimewriterscience.co.uk ),  designed to help crime writers avoid simple mistakes involving physics, chemistry and biology. In 2019 he expanded this greatly, producing the book Crime writing: How to Write the Science (Studymates).

Oct 15th 7.00pm The Future of Agenting: Simon Trewin

https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/the-future-of-agenting-simon-trewin-tickets-1014515893347

Literary agents work in an ultra-competitive environment and the world of rights is a fast-changing one. We talk to agent Simon Trewin, who has worked for over 30 years in senior roles at some of the biggest agencies in the world about the world of literary agents, what they can do for us – and what they can’t.  

Simon Trewin has been a literary agent since 1993 and has worked with authors who have been shortlisted for, or won, most of the major literary and commercial awards in the UK – including Paul Lynch – the current winner of The Booker Prize for Prophet Song. He is a former Secretary of The Association Of Authors Agents a two-time nominee for Literary Agent Of The Year and, through his founding of the letterpress studio The Garage Press, a passionate advocate for keeping heritage crafts alive. After a decade of working for a huge USA entertainment agency he launched his award-winning boutique agency Simon Trewin Creative in 2019 and is well placed to discuss the micro and macro issues influencing the publishing community today. His website is www.simontrewin.co.uk 

Oct 22 7.00pm Best Practice – Special Guest: Steve Cavanagh

https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/best-practice-steve-cavanagh-tickets-1014520166127

Winner of the CWA Gold Dagger and the Theakston’s Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year, Steve Cavanagh is a former lawyer from Belfast who took on the world of thriller writing and has become one of the best-known names in the genre globally and a mult-million seller. He discusses his career and the the reasoning behind the decisions he’s made over the course of it. 

Every one of Steve’s books has either won major international awards or been nominated for them. His latest Eddie Flynn thriller is Witness 8.

Oct 29th 7.00pm How to be Lucky as a Writer: Lucie Whitehouse

https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/how-to-be-lucky-as-a-writer-lucie-whitehouse-tickets-1014523345637

Success as an author requires a great deal of luck. But can your own positive behaviour affect how lucky you are? Lucie Whitehouse has been a Richard & Judy Summer Book Club Pick, an ITV Crime Thriller Book Club selection and a Channel 4/TV Book Club pick. How much does a writer’s attitude to the industry around them affect how they in turn are treated by the industry?

Lucie Whitehouse understands the industry well having worked on both sides of it. Before becoming an author, Lucie also worked as an agent, with agencies Darley Anderson and Janklow & Nesbit.

Nov 4th 7.00pm. Getting Events Right – Safeguarding and Inclusivity: Sharon Birch

https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/getting-events-right-safeguarding-and-inclusivity-sharon-birch-tickets-1014525201187

Putting on events – and taking part in them – can be the real icing on the cake for writers, but there is always a risk of things not going to plan. We all want our meetings to be safe and inclusive, but what does that really mean? What are our own responsibilities when we take part in something in the public arena – and what should we expect as participants?

Sharon Birch, who writes crime fiction as Effie Merryl is safeguarding officer for the CWA. An ex-police detective who has worked worked in criminal investigation and child

protection, she has over 40 years of experience in the field of safeguarding, doing work for the NSPCC and other charities. She is now a safeguarding specialist working across the UK for a national company. 

Nov 7th 7.00pm Selling Film and TV Rights: Yasmin McDonald 

https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/selling-film-and-tv-rights-yasmin-mcdonald-tickets-1014530326517

Now the writers’ strike is over, the wheels of TV and film production are moving again. How do you get film interest in your books? How do options work? How do you get a film and TV agent? Film and TV agent at CAA Yasmin McDonald talks us through how the industry works. 

Before moving to CAA Yasmin worked at United Agents for 11 years and her roster of  authors, illustrators, screenwriters and directors includes Paul Murray (The Bee Sting); John O’Farrell, co-writer of Chicken Run 2: Dawn Of The Nugget; JP Delaney (The New Wife); Tom Gauld, graphic novelist and cartoonist for The New Yorker, The Guardian, New Scientist; and Lisa Mulcahy (The Tourist, Lies We Tell), among others.