'˜Killer Women' head to South Shields

A weekend of crime fiction takes place on Saturday and Sunday at The Word, National Centre for the Written Word, when the ‘Killer Women’ descend on South Shields to divulge their deadly tips and killer instincts in a series of chilling workshops.

The group of London-based crime writers, which includes Erin Kelly, Katie Medina, Helen Smith and Kate Rhodes, will start by bringing the criminal to life with a thrilling Saturday afternoon of crime-based conversation and fun, from 1pm until 5pm.

To start, the Killer Women will pose the question ‘Deadlier than the male. Women and crime-writing’ in their joint panel discussion.

The audience will then be tested on how well they know their crime fiction with a killer quiz. To round off the afternoon of deadly fun the audience will turn into detectives as the four Killer Women perform an exclusive murder mystery, compete with alibis, forensics and a red herring to solve.

On Sunday, budding crime writers can take part in a series of workshops including ‘How to Write a Killer Opening’, with Erin Kelly, from 10am until 11am.

Erin is an acclaimed psychological thriller writer best known for The Poison Tree and for being chosen to write the novelisation of the Bafta-winning Broadchurch.

Deadly wordsmiths can also learn from prize winning poet and author Kate Rhodes with her ‘Secrets of Suspension’, from 11am until noon.

While, crime writer Helen Smith will hold the last workshop of the day entitled ‘Diagnostics, Tools and Hacks: How to plot your novel’ workshop, from noon until 1pm.