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Friday giveaway winners revealed!
February 19, 201312:25 pm
An enormous thank you to everyone who entered our Friday Giveaway competition! We had a fantastic line up and your entries were brilliant, making it incredibly hard to pick the winners, but we eventually narrowed it down to…
A Foreign Country goes to Jake Eliot, who said:
I’d love to get my hands on a copy of Charles Cumming’s latest, A Foreign Country. I enjoyed watching Skyfall at the cinema, but it’s high time Bond’s flashy suits and big explosions cleared the way for proper suspense, taut dialogue and authentic spycraft. And by the sound of it, I reckon following Tom Kell tracing the disappearance of the first female head of MI6 across Europe and Africa will help me put the stresses of my working week into perspective.
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Win the books in our arms!
February 15, 20137:38 am
FRIDAY GIVE AWAY! You could win one of the books in our arms!
Just comment here or on our Facebook Page to tell us which one you want and why!
Best answers will win and we’ll pick our winners on Monday.
Just in case you can’t see clearly, the books we’re carrying are:
Close to the Bone by Stuart MacBride
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Autumn Travel Reads – brought to you by the KR team
October 25, 201211:00 am
Hello there,
So, it’s officially got to that time of year again when we wake up for work and it’s dark, and then we get home from work, and guess what…it’s dark.So, as there will be many of you out there jetting off for some Autumn sun, or maybe you’re going off for a nice traveling session (I’ve recently spoken to many a soon-to-be intrepid explorer – seems the travel bugs come around again), or even if, like me, you’re going to power through the winter months with layers of clothes and mugs of hot chocolate, then fear not I’ve got a plan that means we can all journey round the world together.
Follow this link to our world map of travel Killer Reads. Read the extracts and journey to cities you know and love, or get lost in towns you’ve never even heard of. If you are off on your travels this autumn to any of these locations (or any other destinations from your favorite thrillers) then please feel free to send us images from locations mentioned in those thriller books and films to killerreads@harpercollins.co.uk or tag Killer Reads in the photo on facebook so the team can journey all over the world this Autumn as well…
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Read an extract and win yourself a Kindle!
July 3, 201210:21 am
The terrifying new novel by Jilliane Hoffman is here, and the beginning is so good that we can’t keep it to ourselves any longer.*
To give you an even bigger incentive to read it, we’ve agreed to enter anyone who shares the extract on Facebook into a competition to win a brand new Kindle! Check it out here: http://on.fb.me/MGnMfF
But now, get reading! Once you enter the Cutting Room, you’ll never leave…
To read it on your iPhone or iPad, download the PDF…The Cutting Room extract
*As testified by Hannah and Emad
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Home alone? All the books you shouldn’t read
November 1, 20119:28 am
In the spirit of Halloween I asked the team to answer the following question:
What book would you never read alone in an empty house?
Don’t forget to look below for your chance to win two of our most terrifying reads…
Laura: I have started Misery by Stephen King many times. I have only ever finished it once, in broad daylight, in a park full of people. My reason for this was simple. Passers-by could come to my aid should Annie Wilkes decide to jump out from behind a tree and smash a typewriter over my legs before dragging me off into the wilderness. When reading Misery you cannot help but picture the film. But I urge you to read the book. It is the kind of read that has you on the edge of your seat from start to finish as obsessive fan Annie flits between the personas of, carer, tormentor and would-be murderer to author Paul Sheldon. The build-up of suspense between Annie and Paul is staggering and when you reach the end I guarantee that your heart will be in your mouth.
Helen: Anything by Neil White! I love Neil’s books, I really do, but he sure does know how to set up a gruesome murder scene. He’s a master of suspense, and as his killers stalk their victims, you know that someone’s about to meet a seriously sticky end.
I’m currently working on his new book, Beyond Evil, and it’s opening scene stayed with me long into the dark October nights. Imagine, if you will, the victim tied to a bed. Behind him, a wall daubed in his own blood. And his body, with blood, guts, bones and sinew on show to the world, after having had a full autopsy carried out on it. Whilst he was still alive…
Chilling? Gruesome? Oh yes. But I couldn’t wait to find out who was behind it all. Brilliant stuff.
Hannah: When I’m not checking every single cupboard and wardrobe in the house for skulking murderers, double-checking under my bed for the odd rapist, closing the curtains tight so that the lone eye of a madman can’t peep through, and convincing myself that I can hear breathing coming from underneath my bed, I am reading crime and thriller fiction. I can’t help it, I’m obsessed, and nothing will dissuade me from plunging into the latest in the genre. -
Lock the door and put the light on. The KR team’s most haunting books…
April 22, 20114:55 am
Which book has haunted you the most? Read on to find out what keeps The Killer Reads team up at night…The Terror of Living by Urban Waite
Oh yes, the title says it all. Of course I expected to be scared by this one, and – praise be! – I wasn’t disappointed.
The thing is, it starts off so quietly. It’s all very modern-day Western; Phil Hunt dons his Stetson, saddles his horse and heads off into the North American mountains to pick up a very special delivery. There’s beautiful scenery, a nice travelling companion, and time spent just enjoying the good old open road. But of course, this is a drug run and the package at the other end contains $100K worth of cocaine.
Perhaps he was too busy admiring the view, but Hunt is soon busted by an off-duty cop. As he makes his escape, the traffickers set out to reclaim what’s theirs, and believe you me, this – this – is the scary bit.
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An interview with Jilliane Hoffman
July 19, 20103:59 am
Killer Reads: What inspired you to write Pretty Little Things? Jilliane Hoffman: My daughter was just eleven years old when a classmate of hers started a texting relationship via cell phone with a boy she’d met on the internet. She had pretended she was sixteen and he had claimed he was a teen, as well. This classmate then passed the telephone numbers and email addresses of all her fourth grade friends along to her new cell phone pal. The friends, being eleven year old girls, thought the whole thing was pretty funny and so they continued the ruse and ‘told’ this stranger that they were all 16.
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Jilliane Hoffman’s Top Ten Favourite Novels
3:44 am
1. Silence of the Lambs, Thomas Harris, because he can scare me – not an easy task.
2. In Cold Blood, Truman Capote, because of his style. He took a real life crime and novelized it, but yet retained the grit of a true crime drama, complete with quotes.
3. The Firm, John Grisham, because it was the first legal thriller that I ever read that didn’t bore me during the legal parts.
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Win a signed copy of Pretty Little Things
July 9, 20106:00 am
Jilliane Hoffman’s…
Pretty Little Things
Pretty Little Things is the 4th novel from former Assistant District State Attorney Jilliane Hoffman. After her fantastic debut Retribution, Hoffman has gone from strength to strength and Pretty Little Things is no exception. A terrifying, spine-chilling tale that is set to get your pulse racing. Inspired by both her experience as a felony prosecutor in Miami and her worst fears as a mother to two young teenage daughters, Hoffman describes it as “the most personal, frightening thriller I’ve ever written”.
Read the first couple of chapters here
Buy now from Amazon
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October Newsletter Round Up
October 6, 20093:00 am
For those of you not signed up for the Killer Reads newsletter – all you need to do is go to Win and enter the your details to receive our montly catch-up and you might also be lucky enough to win the selection of top titles we’re currently giving away.
So if you missed October’s update here’s a quick round-up….
Jilliane Hoffman – we have an exclusive extract of her eagerly awaited 4th novel the truly chilling Pretty Little Things due for publication in Feb 2010. Read it here.
Jack Higgins – Legendary thriller writer Higgins is back with two brand new Sean Dillon titles. Read extracts of both books here.
Faye Kellerman – Returns with another title to add to the Peter Decker series. Read an extract here.
Ngaio Marsh – We celebrate one of the Queens of the Golden Age of Crime Writing and let you take a look inside her latest collection of stories.
Terry Goodkind - Read about his for foray into the world of thrillers
Also: Check out the books section for a new Q&A from Fragment author Warren Fahy.
