If you’re coming to San Francisco

I was in a dilemma about coming to Bouchercon San Francisco, as it is door-to-door over 20 hours from London, and apart from the cost; I really couldn’t spare the time between work, writing, reading and family commitments. Countering these issues were the memories of previous Bouchercon’s I’ve attended in Las Vegas in 2003 and the last two where I traveled with my friend Roger [R.J.] Ellory, Baltimore in 2008 and Indianapolis in 2009. I also haven’t seen Jeff Peirce the incredibly hard-working editor of The Rap Sheet since 2008 [though we’re in regular email and phone contact]. Even so, the idea of traveling to the West Coast of America, as wife said with puzzlement - “You want to travel 20 hours to the other side of the world, to sit in a hotel bar and talk about books for five nights and then travel 20 hours back…….that is not logical’. Of course she’s right, but so much of my life defies logic – like the eureka moment last week at The Theakston’s Old Peculiar Crime Festival in Harrogate. When Roger Ellory came off the podium after winning the Harrogate award for Best Crime Novel of the Year, he whispered to me “listen, we gotta go to San Francisco, we always have so much fun……”

Then I thought about how Roger and I first met, after I was one of the first people to review his debut novel ‘Candlemoth’ back in 2003. The surreal thing is the plot revolves around two friends - black guy and a white guy who traverse America…..

Top - Photo of Roger Ellory and Ali Karim having a laughing fit © 2010 Rachael Bloom