Darren Laws

Male

London

United Kingdom

Profile Information:

Hometown:: London
About Me:: Crime writer and occasionally other dark matters. No matter how dark, serious or grungy never forget to make a reader smile every now and then.

If you have difficulty seeing my website (www.darrrenlaws.co.uk) go to www.cnpublishing.co.uk to read chapters from my first two novels
I Am A:: Reader, Writer, Publisher
Website:: http://www.darrenlaws.co.uk
Books And Authors I Like:: In no particular order:
Chuck Pallahniuk, Peter Hoeg, Harlan Coben, Lee Child, Stel Pavlou, Henning Mankell, Stephen King, Thomas Harris and many, many more
Movies And TV Shows I Like:: CSI, Criminal Minds, Touching Evil,

Too many films to mention but anything by David Fincher, The Coen Brothers, Ridley Scott and Spielberg on a good day. Love dark Sci-Fi

Comment Wall:

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Maryann Miller

Hope you enjoy Stephen's book when you get it. I always hesitate to recommend authors as tastes to vary. :-) But he is a good writer and used to belong to All About Murder, a list for mystery writers and readers. He has since published two more books, but can't recall the titles right now. I read the second and need to get the third.
Happy writing,
Maryann

Jan 4, 2008
Marta Stephens

Hi Darren! Thanks for inviting me into your group. I see we have much in common. :)

Jan 4, 2008
Donna Moore

Hi Darren - thanks for the invite - nice to virtually meet you :o)

Jan 4, 2008
Jack Getze

Hey, Darren. I see a lot of names in your favorite author section I'm not familiar with. I need to catch up...

Jan 4, 2008
Jacqui Horwood

hi darren - thanks for the invitation.

Jan 4, 2008
MC Halliday

Thanks for the add...I tried to visit your webpage, alas I do not (will not) have Active X so my next attempt will be to visit cn publishing. Cheers!

Jan 4, 2008
Joseph Pittman

Hi Darren. Welcome to CrimeSpace. I agree, MySpace just doesn't work for selling and marketing books. I'll give your site a visit, check out your work. Continued success.

Jan 5, 2008
Russ Heitz

Hi Darren,
Thanks for the add! It's great to have another UK writer in the group. My suspense novel, CROSSHAIRS

Jan 5, 2008
Russ Heitz

Whoops! I musta hit the wrong button. As I was saying, thanks for the add. It's great to have another UK writer in the group. My suspense novel, CROSSHAIRS, is available in the UK but, unfortunately, I haven't heard of anyone over there buying it yet. If you're interested, the first 50+ pages is available on my website, www.russheitz.com. Best wishes to you and yours for the New Year! And good luck with your many writing projects!
Russ

Jan 5, 2008
Charles Kelly

Darren, thanks so much for inviting me to be your friend on Crimespace. It's a wonderful site, and it looks like your talent will add to it immensely.

Jan 5, 2008
Charles Kelly

By the way, your website is totally cool.

Jan 5, 2008
carole gill

thank you. it's a pleasure.

Jan 5, 2008
Charles Kelly

Thanks, Darren. I haven't been spending much time on Crimespace lately, but I've got to get back to it. Lots of interesting folks here, with fascinating books like yours.

Jan 6, 2008
Hazel Edwards

Hi Darren and thanks for the invitation. I'm new to crime writing, but not to writing, is it's intriguing to see the sample chapters on the publishers' websites. How successful are you finding that as a form of PR? One of the copyright issues which has arisen for some of the Australian authors, is the wording on websites, so that CAL, the Copyright Agency will stay pay for downloads which are picked up in their sampling. Is that an issue for you? I've recently had to change the wording on mywebsite to '''for personal use only' to still be elegible for CAL payments on electronic downloads if they do sample my site,.Otherwise, it's a great way of giving a taste of the writing and I'm going to put up a Criem page with extracts on my site soon. Good luck with your new releases.

Jan 6, 2008
Hazel Edwards

Thanks for your comments about sample chapters and extracts. I was more interested in the CAL Copyright payment issue of whether works on an author's website would attract a copyright fee if sampled by CAL. who provide recompense for multiple usage.This affects whether authors can put up 'rights reverted' or 'remaindered' titles, for personal download only, and therefore attract a CAL recompense, or if it is free download, there's no financial return to the author-creator (other than PR) I think this is becoming a more important issue for authors with big backlists where international publishing companies amalgamate, remainder titles and creators get their rights back and decide to make those stories available electronically for readers on their own sites, either for free or a payment as e-books. I've been checking on the wording which allows your works to be copied but still be eligible for possible extra payments from CAL. Very complex administrivia, and steals time from writing original stuff which is more fun, and why we didn;t do law. Hope 2008 is productive writingwise for you and I'll follow up on your books.I'm getting my Crime page up this week on my website.

Jan 7, 2008
James Oswald

Hi Darren, thanks for the invitation. That's a very disturbing cover photo - makes me want to go out and buy the book;}#

Jan 8, 2008
Michael W. Sherer

Thanks for the invite, Darren.

Jan 8, 2008
Dee Owen

Thank you for inviting me Darren,

Jan 8, 2008
Karen from AustCrime

Hi Darren - thanks for the invite :)

Jan 8, 2008
LJ Roberts

Hi Darren, Thanks for the invite. I don't come onto Crimespace too often anymore. I don't blog but used the site as a place to upload my book reviews. I've since found GoodReads, which suits my particular needs much better.

Jan 9, 2008
JusticeSquad

Pleasure to meet you. Thanks for the invite. Interesting write-up of yourself. I liked the part about making the readers smile now and then. It's not easy but not impossible either.

Jan 9, 2008
Camilla Trinchieri

Ciao Darren-Happy to be your friend.

Jan 9, 2008
Clea Simon

hey - welcome to Crimespace and thanks for the add!

Jan 9, 2008
Timothy Hallinan

Hi, Darren --

Thanks for the B-friend. Could not agree with you more about Henning Mankell. He knocks me out. We'll have to agree to disagree about the later Thomas Harris, though.

Tim

Jan 9, 2008
George Wilder Jr.

Thanks so much for the add. Your page sounds interesting. Wishing you lots of success. God Bless

Jan 10, 2008
Grant McKenzie

Hey Darren: Now that is a very cool cover for Turtle Island. I just received my first look at my debut novel's unofficial official cover today. It's quite a thrill.

Jan 10, 2008
Loretta Ross

Hi Darren! Sorry it's taken me so long to reply to you! Life has been really hectic this week.

This is what happened when I visited your website. First, there was nothing but a little circle going around. I waited for several minutes (I have dialup and am used to waiting for things to load) and eventually got an orange line. Then your navigation bar came up but when I tried to click on something it just jiggled at me. Finally I gave up and went to your other website to read your first chapter of Turtle Island.

Very interesting. How did you do your research, if you don't mind my asking, living so far away?

Jan 10, 2008
ruth

Hi Darren, thanks for the invite. You are definitely in the right place here now. I found the site accidentally and have come across a number of new, interesting authors along with some old favourites. You should enjoy yourself here.

Jan 11, 2008
ruth

Quitting the rate race was indeed/is indeed an adventure. Um, by "developing quite nicely" - are you referring to the actual place here, or my attempts at learning to code in pure CSS? I am hoping the former as I am still struggling with the latter.

Jan 11, 2008
ruth

Trust me - I'd go for WYSIWYG (and did) - but I like to keep my hand in so am making an effort. It is amazing what you can do with a now ancient digital camera that over the last 7 years has taken some knocks and an ancient Photoshop package.

Jan 11, 2008
D K Gaston

Hi Darren, thanks for the add.

Jan 11, 2008
Declan Burke

Hi Darren - "No matter how dark, serious or grungy never forget to make a reader smile every now and then." Amen, brother ... If you fancy dropping over to Crime Always Pays and filling out a Q&A, I'd be delighted to have you on board. Cheers, Dec

http://crimealwayspays.blogspot.com/

Jan 12, 2008
Richard Madelin

Thanks for the invite Darren. I'll see you in the room.
Richard Madelin

Jan 12, 2008
Richard Madelin

There must a bar, a dive, somewhere, around here.

Jan 12, 2008
Declan Burke

Hi Darren - sorry, man, should have left my address ... dbrodb(at)gmail.com ... and if you have a publicity pic you prefer to use, just attach it and we're in business ... cheers,
Dec

Jan 12, 2008
Goldie Alexander

Hi Darren
thank you for contacting me. We share a love of similar writers. Like you I am relatively new to crime writing, as I mostly write for younger audiences. Nor am I too brilliant at managing this technology. Let's all stay in contact

Jan 14, 2008
robert walker

Hola Darren -- thanks for adding me on as a x-rated crimespree friend here. I havee to learn how to reciprocate. Just figuring out how everything works here and being an old guy, well hard to learn new tricks, but will keep at it. I did put up a blog at my space here on three steps to crafting great short stories and how the same considerations or elements must be in mind in the crafting of the novel. If anyone here is interested in doing shorts or have found their shorts "hanging out on the line" instead of selling -- you might care to see these hard won insights.
Again thanks for connecting with me --
Rob Walker
www.robertWWalkerbooks.com

Jan 15, 2008
robert walker

Hey Darren -- me I just get all excited when someone challenges me with a few sentences of an anthology set up -- as in J.A. Konrath's asking me to do a hit man story for his Bleak House anthology -- just a few challenging words and I am off to try my hand at it. I recently submitted a short story for the contest Daniel Hatadi set up here on Crimespace in which some mention of Australia must come into play. The trick is to come up with an interesting theme. Should you be looking for stories for an anthology, give me thought.

Rob

Jan 15, 2008
Charlotte Williamson

Darren,
Thanks for adding me as a crimespace friend. Sorry to be so late returning your correspondence. I've been out of town, then really busy at work. It's tax season, and since I do taxes and accounting for a living, things are picking up.From now until May, I hardly havetime to do anything except taxes. (I really hate this time of year)

Jan 16, 2008
Darren Laws

Hi Charlotte,
Sounds like fun. Well they do say there are two things you can't escape, death and taxes. I guesss given the choice I would always rather confront tax!

Jan 16, 2008
robert walker

To compete in today's tough market, an anthology, I feel, must touch a nerve across the board of readers. The theme must be both specific and broad-based at once. I would love to see an anthology that resonated on that score with any and all who share the human race--the human condition, of course as it relates to crime fiction. What's that old saw we always hear? Crime -- everyone is capable of murder under the right conditions? Maybe an anthology of people who've been backed into a corner and there really is only one way out -- murder. Murder Will Out. Problem is getting the message over with a publisher willing to take a chance on an anthology.
Rob

Jan 17, 2008
robert walker

Sorry, meant to add someting and managed to duplicate my last message. I've been toying with the idea of an old maxim in crime for an anthology title that is:
Crime Makes You Stupid = ie a mix of humor and "horrid" crime or at least stupidity and crime. This is a belief and an argument among crime fighters -- what came first the crime or the stupidity? Like the chicken and egg theory. If someone could sell this idea to a publisher, and if someone wished to do the labor of reviewing all the stories and editing same...well it represents a lot of ifs, ands, ors and buts.
I thought I might propose it to Bleak House editors I run into at Love is Murder in February, see if they bite. they recently did These Guns for Hire, a hitman anthology edited by my pal J.A. Konrath.

rob

Jan 17, 2008
Jon McGoran as D. H. Dublin

Hey Darren,
Thanks for the invitation. Yes, I love it here as well. If only I had more time to hang out....

Jan 20, 2008
Mitzi Szereto

Don't be lonely. I'm here. (when I'm not on Facebook that is!)

Feb 1, 2008
Camilla Trinchieri

Hi Darren-about not finding anyone on CrimeSpace when you log in. I get bogged down with trying to finish my novel, cook,shop for food, do the laundry, answer e-mails etc etc. Who's got the time to chat? I wish I did. Be and write well, Ciao Camilla

Feb 16, 2008
L.J. Sellers

Hi Darren
I keep seeing your face everywhere, so you must be a good "friend." I agree, CrimeSpace is much more useful than other networking sites.

Feb 17, 2008
Camilla Trinchieri

Ciao Darren--have fun editing your new novel. It's the phase of the writing process I enjoy the most. Alas I am still bogged down filling a blank monitor screen. May your editing be inspired. Ciao camilla

Feb 18, 2008
L.J. Sellers

Thanks.
And you do have that "Usual Suspect" look about you.
Kidding.

Feb 19, 2008
robert walker

Hola Daniel -- just coming on to say hello and hope all is going well with you and Tutrle Island. Seems Islands are all the rage right now, what with Dennis Lehane's new title. Am thinking of doing an Island titlle myself and why not? I have the perfect one in mind.
Any rate, jus dropped by to say howdy do.

Rob

Sep 1, 2008
Timothy C. Phillips

Hi Darren! How are things?

Dec 15, 2008