MAKING A KILLING
Crime writer from Kintyre credits being on the beat in Glasgow for authentic voice of his million-selling novels
ALMOsT three years on, Denzil Meyrick remembers the worst day of his life as if it were yesterday. The crime writer was in hospital, convinced something was seriously wrong after becoming breathless and exhausted while taking a new medication for his arthritis.
‘I couldn’t eat, I couldn’t walk, I could barely talk,’ he says.
after undergoing an echocardiogram, he went back to his ward and found a specialist awaiting him. ‘He told me I had heart failure. My heart was functioning at 11 per cent. It was absolutely terrifying. I fully expected to die.’
Fortunately for Meyrick, 54, and his legions of loyal fans, he did not. and although he is much better today, he has been shielding at his home near Loch Lomond throughout the pandemic, not taking so much as a foot over the threshold since March as he continues to take his recovery slowly.
at a time when he should be promoting his latest book, Jeremiah’s Bell, the ninth in his wildly popular DCI Daley series, Meyrick has been hunkered down, writing new projects and devouring TV box sets including The sopranos, which he happily admits he’s watching for the third time round.
‘Honestly, The sopranos is one of the influences for my books,’ he says.
‘People look at me like I’m from outer space when I say that but it’s true. You have these brilliant characters, and although it’s dark, there’s also humour that cuts through these dark goings-on.’
Certainly it sounds rather like Meyrick’s books, which have become famous in crime-writing circles for their easy humour and use of local dialect. He recently passed an extraordinary milestone, selling more than one million books in his series, and his novels are now in high demand across the globe.
The Daley series is set in Kinloch, a fictionalised version of Meyrick’s home town, Campbeltown, on the Kintyre peninsula, and revolves around the small and tight-knit community which, inevitably, struggles with a surprisingly high number of gruesome crimes for such a remote corner of the country.
THe reality, he says, was somewhat safer. ‘It was a fantastic place to grow up,’ he says. ‘You had the freedom, these beautiful beaches and countryside, it was marvellous. In the summer holidays we used to go out on our bikes, cycle ten miles to go snorkelling in the atlantic and our mothers wouldn’t turn a hair.
‘It gets a bad reputation for being a kind of bad town in ayrshire moved to Kintyre, but it’s not like that at all.’
One particularly moving incident during lockdown embodied, for Meyrick, Campbeltown’s community spirit, when local paramedic Robert Black, an old friend of his, died in May after testing positive for Covid-19.
‘when his funeral cortege drove through the town, everyone came and stood outside their houses, and all socially distanced. It was so moving. I don’t know of any other community in the country that would have done that. It encapsulated the spirit of Campbeltown.’
although Meyrick always enjoyed writing, he studied politics at the University of Glasgow and then – in a move which surprised even him, but turned out to be somewhat fortuitous for a crime writer – joined the police.
Part of the appeal was the instant money, at a time in the 1980s when unemployment was rife in Glasgow. ‘I passed the exam with flying colours and before I knew where I was I was plodding round the mean streets of Glasgow with a hat on,’ he says.
‘we didn’t have stab-proof vests, and we walked about everywhere. I did enjoy the camaraderie of it all but there was always something in me, this nagging voice saying, “Is this what you want to do for the rest of your life?”’
He left shortly afterwards and went into private business, working variously in marketing and engineering, even managing a distillery at one point. He will forever be grateful to his short police career, however, for inspiring his novels.
‘without the police I would probably never have written the books,’ he says.
‘I wouldn’t have written Daley. It gave me a proper idea of how policemen and women talk to each other when a case is run.
Let’s be honest. Crime writing is a conceit. If the public were to sit in on a real murder investigation they’d be bored to tears.
‘The idea that a single cop is solving crimes on the basis of his intellect and his intuition is simply untrue.
‘Crime novels can never really be authentic or they’d be really, really dull. so I try to bring that authenticity in when it comes to the camaraderie, the way policemen and women interact and the environment in which they’re working on these cases.
‘so from that point of view it was very handy to be a policeman.’
Meyrick only arrived at writing in 2011 when a spell of ill health meant he had to take a leave of absence from his job, and found himself in bed with nothing to do.
‘I had time off as I had really bad arthritis and so I had a lot of time on my hands for the first time in my life. I’d always wanted to write a book just to see if I can do it.
‘I planned to write a historical novel originally but to do a historical novel justice you have to research every part of the life they live and I could see me doing eight months of research instead of actually writing.
‘I’d been in the police and I knew Kintyre very well, as that’s where I’m from, so I decided to combine the two and up popped whisky in small Glasses.’
The novel was a runaway hit, readers instantly warming to Daley and his sidekick Brian scott, as well as the realistic Kintyre dialogue. He’s written a book a year ever since.
The endorsements for the series have come thick and fast.
as one advocate and former detective, Joe Cahill, said: ‘I was tired of the plastic and sanitised fictional detectives portrayed in crime novels set in scotland, where clearly the author had no idea of the workings of the scottish police or legal system.
‘I should have had no such fears with regards to the DCI Daley novels. I have now read all the books in the series and love the characters. I feel I have even worked with some of them.’
The audiobooks have done well too, several books in the series having become number one bestsellers not just in the crime genre but across the board on amazon’s audible platform.
as an audiobook fan himself, Meyrick approves.
‘It’s a growth market and they’re becoming more and more popular,’ he says.
‘I picked up the habit of listening to them in hospital and now I can’t go to sleep without them,’ he says.
‘although it’s a bit frustrating when you fall asleep and realise you’ve missed some of the story.’
Meyrick’s latest novel, Jeremiah’s Bell, the ninth in the DCI Daley series, sees a brand new mystery in Kinloch that explores the illegal whisky-running trade prevalent in Kintyre in the 1920s.
WITH Prohibition in full swing in the Us, shady booze runners, often with connections to the mob, would make the journey to Campbeltown, conveniently perched on the coast, where a whopping 34 distilleries churned out whisky which would then be transported back to illegal speakeasies across the United states.
so prized was the Campbeltown reputation that al Capone apparently plastered barrels of cheap moonshine with the name. Indeed, rumours persist in the area that the famous gangster himself even came to Kintyre, although most locals dismiss it as a myth.
There are also dark moments in the book, in particular involving one character who has faced down death, much like Meyrick himself. even now, it is an experience which has clearly changed him.
‘I don’t stress about the little things any more,’ he says.
‘I’ve got quite a temper and the publishing industry is notorious for making you lose your temper, too. But I just stopped sweating the small stuff.
‘and I re-evaluated my lifestyle. I like a dram but I drink very frugally now. I was 50, 51 years old when all this happened and it was such a shock.’
Lockdown then, has been part of that slowing down. although Meyrick misses the hurly-burly of book festivals and promotional tours, he’s enjoyed having time at home.
‘You learn to take life more in your stride,’ he says. ‘I’ve learned to appreciate what I have and not look to the horizon.’