Music To Mysteries
Former music executive Alan Parks’s love of 1970s Glasgow inspired a successful new career in crime writing
Former music producer Alan Parks traded records for writing with his new crime novels
IN the three years since Glasgow-based crime writer Alan Parks published his first novel Bloody January, he’s developed an incredible reputation.
Not only have his gritty Harry Mccoy novels been nominated for a number of high-profile awards, including a Grand Prix de Littérature Policière and an Edgar, the author has also received wide critical acclaim from the press and public alike.
His books have even been compared to the work of American master crime novelist, James Ellroy. As the former music executive releases his fourth novel, The
April Dead, he reflects on how his writing career began.
“It’s a terrible story which I hate telling!” Alan says, with a laugh. “Basically, I wrote the first Harry Mccoy book, put it in a drawer and then forgot about it. I have a friend called John Niven, who is also a Scottish novelist, and one day, I was helping him do some TV work and he said, ‘You should write a novel one day’. I replied, ‘It’s funny that you should say that because I already have!’
“I gave him the book, and l he came back to me and said, ‘You know what, it’s not that bad!’”
John, who wrote Kill Your Friends, began to spread the word about Alan’s thrilling novel.
“John passed it to his agent, who didn’t like it, but he then gave it to novelist Sarah Pinborough who passed it on to another agent – and that was it really!
“It was all very nepotistic and not very difficult, which is a terrible thing to admit, but that’s how it went. I always feel a bit ashamed when I tell that story, because I know so many people try so hard to get someone to look at their book.”
Alan first put pen to paper when he returned home to Glasgow, after 20 years in London.
“I started going to a night class about the industrial history of Glasgow and I was going to try and write a book about post-war housing in Glasgow but I didn’t think anyone apart from me would be interested in that.
“So, I decided to write a novel instead. I thought, if I write a crime book set in the 1970s it means that I can explore the bits of Glasgow that I want to write about.”
Despite being relatively new to writing, Alan had already built a stellar reputation as a creative, working
for 20 years in the music business. At the beginning of his career, the author managed up-and-coming bands before moving on to videos and photography for household names such as New Order, All Saints and Enya. Alan says this experience influences his writing process.
“When I worked for the record company my job was creating photoshoots, album covers and videos – the visual stuff. Some of the bands I worked with knew what they wanted, while some didn’t have a clue, so I’d create picture boards for them to help them decide on a style.
“Nowadays, I apply a lot of that to my writing. I find places and things that I’m interested in and work out how I can connect them in a book. Often, it’s the places that come first for me, for example, in this book I knew I wanted to write about the Holy Loch and about a secret army. And in earlier books I wanted to write about different parts of Glasgow, such as Paddy’s Market, the Milton and Springburn.”
Alan also creates a photobook filled with inspirational images, some taken by him, others taken from books.
“Once I have my photographs, I can try and figure out why my characters would be there and that helps me
“
I wanted to write about the Holy Loch and army” about a secret
start the plot. You have five or six different places or situations and you can then figure out how they all join together – that’s the way that I do it.
“Often all of that is sparked by a single photograph. For the first book, it was an image of a guy outside a barbers in Springburn in the 1970s. Springburn is on a hill and the picture was taken around dusk. The lights of Glasgow were down below and I thought, ‘that looks as glamorous as Hollywood.’”
Alan says the photo book for The April Dead includes two soldiers in Kenya, the Holy Loch and the singer Enya in a grand Irish house. From these completely unconnected images, Alan has woven a thrilling tale.
“The novel opens with a bomb going off in West
Princes Street,” he says. “The initial suspicion is that the IRA bombing campaign has come to Glasgow, but it soon becomes clear that a secret army are behind it. At the same time a sailor goes missing from the Holy Loch base and his father enlists Mccoy to find him.”
Full of twists and turns, The April Dead sees the 1970s detective trying to unravel a mystery and save the city.
“The books are mostly set in 1973 – when I was 10. My relations lived in Springburn, north of Glasgow, where most of the books take place. But I grew up in a village called Elderslie. It was nice but nothing ever happened. When I visited Glasgow it seemed like this exciting place.” Alan has already started work on novel number five. “I’m starting on the next book – whatever that will be called! I blame my editor for the fact that my books are all named after months. I hadn’t thought of it until he said, ‘I assume the book after Bloody January will be something February!’ I was like, ‘well, why not!’
“I’ve begun to gather photographs for the May book. One is of an old hotel I used to walk past, another is a David Bailey photograph of Jean Shrimpton standing in a street. It gives me a great excuse to wander about for a couple of months taking some photographs here and there!”
“The off” novel opens with a bomb going