How does a writer keep an ongoing series of novels fresh when their publisher is eager for a new book each year? I’ve been pondering this lately, despite the fact it’s early in my crime writing career to fret about such challenges. After all, the latest Cesare Aldo novel A Divine Fury (out June 20th) is only the fourth in my series of Renaissance Florence thrillers.
Compare that to other authors and you’ll see I am just getting started. Ian Rankin publishes his twenty-fifth Rebus novel later this year, while Donna Leon’s Commissario Brunetti mysteries set in Venice now number more than thirty. And then there are the many, many Maigret tales by the masterful Georges Simenon...
Nonetheless, when A Divine Fury comes out, I’ll be finishing a draft of my fifth Aldo noel, and be thinking ahead to number six. Publish a new book every year and they soon mount up, regardless of whether that book emerges in spring [the season for debuts and those building a readership], sets forth in summer [holiday reads and mid-list favourites], or arrives in autumn [home to bestsellers and old favourites].
Like many crime writers, I have a morbid dread of repeating myself. [I also have an abiding fear that my latest book will not be the equal of my last, but I suspect this is true of almost every author, regardless of genre.] There are only so many ways to solve a murder in 1539 when facial recognition, DNA, CCTV and fingerprints are still centuries in the future.
Still, a fear of repetition didn’t stop me from wanting to write a crime series. Why? Because it’s what I’ve always wanted to do. You could blame a childhood devouring the Famous Five, the Hardy Boys and other mysteries for younger readers. But I suspect the real culprit is the US cop drama Hill Street Blues which I grew up watching it in New Zealand.
I loved the show’s ongoing, character-led storylines and its then-unconventional approach to the police procedural. UK shows such as Bergerac and The Gentle Touch were no match for that. Even muscular series like The Professionals focused on standalone tales, whereas Hill Street Blues was far more novelistic.
That struck a chord with me, and inspired much of my own writing ever since. For example, I write a Warhammer fantasy novel called A Murder in Marienburg that was a thinly disguised homage to Hill Street Blues. Yes, the occasional elf wandered past in the background, but it was still a police procedural, albeit with spells and swords.
Even when I was writing for the BBC medical drama series Doctors, I was still telling mystery stories, except they were solved by physicians rather than police. Finally, in 2017 I realised the stories I really wanted to tell were about crimes, the people who investigated them, and the consequences of transgressions against the law.
Keeping my Cesare Aldo historical thrillers fresh wasn’t a problem for the initial books; if anything, I worried about them being too varied. The first, City of Vengeance, is a conspiracy thriller in which all of Florence is under threat. By comparison, my second novel The Darkest Sin is a closed circle mystery set in a convent, making it a smaller scale story.
Happily, the story swerve didn’t alienate reader and The Darkest Sin went on to the CWA’s Historical Dagger. After that I decided each new Aldo novel should focus on a different kind of crime or employ a fresh sub-genre to keep myself and my readers on our toes. So, the third book, Ritual of Fire, features vendetta killings with each victim being burned alive.
Aldo book four, A Divine Fury, introduces a serial killer. Of course, nobody calls the killer that because such a description belongs to the 20th Century, not 1539. A Divine Fury also has exorcists, causing a dangerous collision of faith and fatalities. As Aldo tells his colleague Carlo Strocchi, investigating a murder that involves the church never ends well in Florence.
Looking ahead, next year’s book is an Ocean’s Eleven-esque caper in Renaissance Venice. After that Aldo is likely to face a Gothic mystery in book six. Sales shall determine whether he gets a seventh outing, but I’m open to suggestions for new sub-genres…
A Divine Fury by D V Bishop. (Pan Macmillian) Out Now
Florence. Autumn, 1539. A religious serial killer is haunting Florence and only Cesare Aldo can stop them. Cesare Aldo was once an officer for the city’s most feared criminal court. Following a period of exile, he is back – but demoted to night patrol, when only the drunk and the dangerous roam the streets. Chasing a suspect in the rain, Aldo discovers a horrifying scene beneath Michelangelo’s statue of David. Lifeless eyes gaze from the face of a man whose body has been posed as if crucified. It’s clear the killer had religious motives. When more bodies appear, Aldo believes an unholy murderer is stalking the citizens of Florence. Watching. Hunting. Waiting for the perfect moment to strike again . . .
Find out more about D. V. Bishop at his website: https://dvbishop.com/
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