Or in other words why I haven't written a Police Procedural and if I have any plans to.
For full disclosure I'm going to start by saying, I have actually written a police procedural, it was the first full length adult novel I completed. And I was pretty proud of it, although I'm sure there would be enough holes in my factual procedural knowledge to make it resemble a Swiss cheese.
When I sat in Birmingham airport, in 2015, and started to hash out what my first crime novel would be about it's fair to say that it bore no resemblance to what I actually wrote and that's okay.
When I finished that novel I was really proud of it and I still am for so many reasons, but I fear I'm digressing. Let me get back on track and talk about why I haven't written another one.
The next idea I had, that made me super excited to start writing was completely different and I ran with it and I will always be incredibly proud of that book. The other thing that happened was as I wrote it I realised the scope a character could have if they weren't tied up in the red tape of procedure.
I liked that element, I'm not great with rules myself, so the idea that I could have a main character that didn't have to play by them either really appealed. And that's when Rowan came to me with the idea of being a Private Detective.
This gives me two main advantages: one although there is a police presence in my books I don't have to get overly concerned with protocol etc; two (and this is the most important for me) it means that Rowan can go places and do things that she simply couldn't if she had a boss to answer to.
Will I ever write a police procedural? The jury is still out on that one. At the moment I'm really happy writing my Rowan books. I have three other ideas that I'd like to get into at some point and none of them are procedurals. What I would say though is, I created characters in my first book that I still think about and there was something very nice about writing a team dynamic. Perhaps one day I'll revisit them and see if I can find them a new case to solve.
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