Crime Story
Crime Story is a unique concept that brings together crime experts with crime writers and readers.
As lovers of crime writing, we’re fascinated by the facts behind the fiction. Crime Story commissions a brilliant crime writer to create a fictional crime, which the audience then investigates with the help of experts from law, policing, criminology, forensic science and technology.
Crime Story was launched by New Writing North and Northumbria University in 2012. In previous years we have held festivals, events and seminars, including with leading writers Paula Hawkins, Denise Mina, AA Dhand and Ann Cleeves. Our events have turned a magnifying glass on some of crime’s biggest contemporary issues, from the dark web to money laundering to fiction’s obsession with ‘dead girl’ tropes.
New work by crime authors
We commissioned the crime, now you solve it. Each festival has seen a top crime novelist write a brand new Crime Story especially for us.
Learn all the details
From how to launder £100k to how to identify a cadaver, our expert speakers draw out the specifics of criminal activity and the detailed work that goes on behind the scenes to tackle it.
Writing and reading workshops
Challenge your plot, cross-examine your characters and finesse all the details of your story with leading crime writers.
