Kit sponsor Val McDermid joins recently-appointed manager Ray McKinnon to unveil Raith Rovers new strip
WHEN, as a little girl, Val McDermid first visited “the San Starko” – as she affectionately refers to Stark’s Park, Raith Rovers’ home ground – and experienced the unique terracing thrill of “a cold bum and pie dripping down my sleeve”, she could never have envisaged that by the age of 60, hers would be one of the most prominent names associated with her beloved football club.
The greatest impact is in China because the highlights have been shown on Chinese TV
Val McDermid
A career as an award-winning crime writer, in which she has sold more than 11 million books worldwide and had her work translated into 30 different languages, however, has elevated the Kirkcaldy wordsmith to “celebrity Rovers fan” status alongside her fellow author, Ian Rankin, Coldplay’s Guy Berryman and, of course, the former prime minister, Gordon Brown.
The name McDermid was already held in high esteem in the Fife town long before Val’s writing ability hoisted her into the public domain, with her late father, Jim, renowned as the man who unearthed the great Jim Baxter in his role as a Rovers scout. Now his daughter is carrying on the family name’s proud link with the club.
The crime writer on the “profound signifcance” of Banks’ writing, and why she’s looking forward to the BBC dramatisation of Stonemouth.
He was one of the finest novelists of his generation
I remember reading Iain’s first novel, The Wasp Factory, when it came out in paperback in the mid-80s and thinking, “Wow! This is extraordinary.” After that, I read everything of his — the science-fiction [published under the name Iain M Banks] as well as the straight novels.
Later we met at a book signing in Manchester. I went along as a friend of the shop and a fan of his work. We all went out for a drink afterwards and that was the start of our friendship. Read the full article…
West Highland Free Press – 14 May 2015 by Michael Russell
Photograph: Charlie Hopkinson
MICHAEL RUSSELL attended – and was part of – this year’s Ullapool Book Festival. Here are just a few of the highlights…
Crime writer Val McDermid, arguably the top draw at this year’s Ullapool Book Festival, likened last week’s General Election result to the Reformation. Bringing the festival to a close, she said the “schism” that now divides an SNP-dominated anti-austerity Scotland from a uniformly-blue south of England really is on that scale.
“You have to wonder where we are going and how we get there,” McDermid added. “But that is one of the exciting things about being in Scotland right now. In England, people there are amazed at what has happened here because they don’t have the same sense of control over their lives or the same sense of political engagement. And it’s not just the chattering classes in Scotland who have this level of engagement — everyone is interested in it.”
McDermid, along with Ian Rankin, was the first to follow in William Mcilvanney’s bloody footprints (the creator of Laidlaw himself being a beneficiary of the revitalisation of the genre pioneered by PD James and Ruth Rendell). McDermid’s 28th novel, ‘The Skeleton Road’, starts with human remains discovered at the top of a Gothic tower in Edinburgh and, as is her wont, links recent events — in this case, the Balkan wars — with the dreaming spires of Oxford. Documenting social history is as important to her as creating gripping crime fiction.
