Jennifer Thomson's Blog

  

Published by Diamond Crime, 
28 September 2022. 
ISBN: 978-1-91564915-7 (PB)

DI Duncan Waddell is facing the most bizarre case of his career.  It seems that a killer is stalking victims on Glasgow’s streets.  Men unfortunate enough to be caught are being abducted, tied up, force-fed, then strangled and their livers removed. 

The first indication is a reported kidnap – the victim is Kevin Drummond, a well-known career criminal, who has been found unconscious near a hospital.  When he comes to, he claims that he had been abducted, but had managed to escape - his story is supported by physical evidence, but he is very confused and does not know who he is.  However, he does insist that his abductor apologised for making a mistake.  Then another victim is found - Daniel Adams.  The investigation into this murder reveals some unexpected information, but does it support the idea of a serial killer, or is there something else behind the killings? 

During the investigation, Waddell, as is his habit, visits his friend and colleague at the Intensive Care unit, where he has been since receiving injuries which had left him comatose.  Waddell updates Stevie on his current case and they talk things over.  Waddell seems at ease with this unusual and unlikely state of affairs, but no-one else, staff or family, knows about it.  For them the question is how long Stevie will be kept on life support if there no evidence of any improvement in his condition. 

The story moves forward with a number of unexpected events before the individual ribbons of evidence are neatly tied up and provide a disturbing solution.  The characters are well-developed, all adding their own flavour and knowledge to the investigation.  Waddell holds his team together and deals with the twists and turns confidently.  This is the second in the Detective in a Coma series and it will be interesting to see how the storyline involving the actual detective in a coma is handled.  
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Jennifer Lee Thomson is anaward-winning crime writer who has been scribbling away all her life. She alsowrites as Jenny Thomson and is an animal and human rights advocate.

Jo Hesslewood.  Crime fiction hasbeen my favourite reading material since as a teenager I first spotted AgathaChristie on the library bookshelves.  For twenty-five years thecommute to and from London provided plenty of reading time.  I amfortunate to live in Cambridge, where my local crime fiction book club,Crimecrackers, meets at Heffers Bookshop .  I enjoy attending crimefiction events and currently organise events for the Margery Allingham Society.

Butcher City is available on Amazon and all good book shops. Click here for details 

By Family members of Lamplugh or friends, distributed nationwide in the media by the Metropolitan Police*

The disappearance of estate agent Suzy Lamplugh in July 1986, is a case that continues to be talked about. How could a bright young woman in the prime of her life go to meet a client in broad daylight and never be seen again? No trace of the 25-year-old has ever been found.

At the start it seemed as if the police had a good, solid starting point. Written down in the estate agent's diary was the name Mr Kipper. Next to his name was the address of a property she was going to be showing him.
It seemed a simple task for the police to trace this Mr Kipper and find out what he knew about her disappearance. Despite their efforts they couldn't find the man named.
I remember the 80s well. Women were more liberated then than they had been in the 70's. Jobs for women didn't mean just traditional job roles seen as women's like secretarial and nursing. Not to say that there is anything wrong with those jobs. 
Despite the progressiveness, I remember one of my teachers - a technical education teacher - who used to smack all the girl pupils on the bottom. These days you would be charged with sexual assault but in days gone by behavior like that was ignored. 
In the 1980s there was one other thing other thing from 70s that remained. Men often wore kipper ties.
What is a kipper tie?


Kipper ties are broad ties known for having horrendously garish patterns and colours. When I think of used car salesmen I think of kipper ties. 
The police at the time did consider the possibility that Mr Kipper wasn't the man's name at all - or even an alias - but did her killer definitely use that name? Or was it that he told Suzy he would be wearing a kipper tie so she would recognise him when they met? Hence, she wrote down Mr Kipper not bacuse it was his name but because he told her that's how she could recognise him? 

Shirley Banks - murdered by a psychopath
Convicted killer John Cannan, the coward who abducted and murdered newlywed Shirley Banks has been constantly linked to the Suzy Lamplugh case. In prison, he'd gained the name Mr Kipper because of the big ties he wore but what if he wasn't the Mr Kipper Suzy wrote about at all, which is possible? 
Cannan's MO doesn't match the Lamplugh crime 
Arrogant Cannan is hardly a criminal mastermind. He doesn't come across as a planner. Instead, his attacks were more opportunistic. He seems to have crossed paths with his victims rather than have planned his vile crimes and arranging to meet the estate agent at a house would have taken some planning. 
Consider his previous known crimes. 1. He used a knife on a shop assistant at a dress shop. Thankfully, passers-by intervened. 
2. He tried to abduct a woman at gunpoint in a car park the night before he targeted tragic Shirley. 
3. When he abducted Shirley Banks, she was out shopping. He took her back to his own flat and held her hostage before he killed her. Then, he stupidly put the tax disc from her car in his glove compartment where it was later found. 
Dumb criminal 
It seems inconceivable that he could have abducted and killed Suzy without leaving any trace. He just doesn't come across as smart enough. 

In short, he's too stupid to have killed Suzy and gotten away with it without leaving a trace. 
I pray that I'm wrong because if he didn't kill Suzy that means someone else did and unlike Cannan they're still out there. Have they killed again? Once killer's escalate they don't tend to de-escalate to lesser crimes. 
Hopefully, one day Suzy's body will be found, and she can finally be laid to rest. 

Attributions 
- Lamplugh with her hair tinted blonde, as it was on the day she disappearedOriginal publication: Distributed nationwide in the media, July 1986 onwardsImmediate source: https://www.bristolpost.co.uk/news/br..., Fair use, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?...

 

#VileCity #detectiveinaComa

#crimethriller #tartannoir 

DI Duncan Waddell is on the brink of a nervous breakdown – he thinks his best pal DC Stevie Campbell, who’s been in a coma since he was attacked by a suspect, is talking to him.

When office worker Shelley rushes to her boyfriend’s aid after he is attacked, she is abducted. She wakes up in a strange room with no memory of how she got there.

On the case, Waddell finds himself in a desperate race against time to uncover the truth behind the abduction or Shelley dies.

To do this, he and his team must delve into the seedy underbelly of Scotland’s swingers’ scene and a world where women are tricked into the sex business and traded like cattle.

Vile City is out now, published by Diamond Books in paperback and eBook. 
You can buy it by clicking here
 ~ Read an extract ~
Chapter 1Stuart was hiding something. Shelley could tell. She was always the one who’d had to wake him because he could block out the shrill of the alarm clock. Nowadays, he was up before her, grabbing the mail whilst she slept. And he’d started making breakfast – nothing much, just tea and toast, more than he’d ever made her in their near three years together.

When she’d ask him if anything was wrong, he’d shrug his shoulders, give her a wee smile and say everything was fine. She knew he was lying because his face went even paler, making his freckles stand out as if they’d been drawn in by a kid with a coloured pencil. She never pushed it, maybe because deep down she was worried that he’d tell her he’d met someone else.

The No.76 bus was empty when they clambered on board – one of the benefits of working until eleven at night in a call centre, was that there was no need to scoot past a sea of legs and become a contortionist to get on and off a bus.

Their cold breath filled the air with ghosts as they walked towards Waterstones, Shelley pausing to peek at the new crime fiction releases showcased in the illuminated windows, whilst Stuart fidgeted with his watch. He was always footering about with something since he’d given up cigarettes and it drove her mad, but at least it didn’t fill his lungs with tar and make the house smell like an overflowing ashtray.

“I need to have a pee,” he announced, as they came to the dimly lit lane off Mitchell Street that reeked of eau de Glasgow: decomposing takeaway, urine and other bodily fluids.

She groaned. “Can’t you wait until we get home, Stuart?” She knew she’d pronounced his name “Stew-art” as she always did when she was annoyed with him. She couldn’t help it.

What made men think it was okay to urinate in public?

Stuart looked pained. “Sorry, I can’t. Too much coffee tonight.”

She let him walk on ahead of her and whilst he scooted down the alley, she stood outside the amusement arcade, pretending to look in so she wouldn’t be mistaken for a prostitute. It’d happened to her once when she’d got off the bus alone. Stuart hadn’t been working that night.

Five minutes later, she was so cold she couldn’t feel her nose and Stuart still wasn’t back.

She turned the corner to look for him, fully expecting to see him ambling back towards her with that jaunty walk that always made her smile. He wasn’t there.

Where was he?

Anger welled up in her chest. Had he started smoking again? He swore he wouldn’t.

There was one way to find out.

She headed down the alley. The sole light was provided from some nearby buildings, so visibility was poor.

She’d walked a few steps when she spotted a bundle of rags on the ground. Was someone sleeping there?

She moved closer, squinting into the dim light. Stuart was lying motionless on the ground. He must have tripped and knocked himself out as he hit the concrete.

She ran to him, calling out his name, the squeezing in her chest waning slightly when she knelt and heard him groan.

She pulled her mobile phone from her bag to call for an ambulance.

She didn’t make it to the third digit. A gloved hand clamped across her mouth and nose, cutting off her airways. The phone fell from her grasp, clattering onto the cobbles. Terror gripped her and she couldn’t breathe.

As she struggled, her assailant pressed his mouth to her ear. He was so close that it occurred to her that if anyone saw them, they would think he was her boyfriend whispering sweet nothings in her ear.

“Your man’s been given a strong sedative. He’ll wake up with a sore head and nothing more. If you scream, I’ll kick him several times in the head and he’ll never get up again. Do you understand?”

The voice was cold and emotionless She didn’t recognise it and there was an accent. Not from around here.

She nodded under his hand. Then did something he didn’t expect. Backheeled him in the groin.

There was a satisfying yelp as he released her.

She ran, arms pumping away like Usain Bolt, down towards the café at the end of the alley and safety.

She’d almost made it when he grabbed her arm and hauled her back. An electric shock shot from her elbow to her shoulder as she tried to pull herself free. He was too strong.

He dragged her towards him.

Before she could scream, he punched her in the face and she went down with a thud, jarring every bone in her body, momentarily stunning her.

As she fought to get up, he punched her in the back, and she fell again.

The last thing she saw was the pavement rushing towards her before she blacked out...

 Vigilante City - Book 3 in the Detetcive in a coma is out now

Everybody expects Douglas John MacDonald to be convicted for the rape and murder of schoolgirl Kylie Donovan. When he walks free there’s a public outcry. But someone is not content simply to leave it that way. 

MacDonald is found murdered – his pinkie removed just like his 15-year-old victim’s. The police believe it’s an isolated incident, until more murders follow.

DI Duncan Waddell and his team have to work fast. They know that, guilty or innocent, no one is safe until they catch the vigilante killer.

You can buy Vigilante City here
Amazon UK Kindle 
Amazon UK Paperback 
Amazon.com Kindle
Amazon.com Paperback 
I know what you're thinking - yet another crime/mystery/detective novel. 
Here's why you should read Vigilante City- 

You should read Vigilante City because who hasn't asked the question has justice really been served? 

In Vigilante City that's the question being asked as those seen as getting away with murder are picked off by a hooded assailant, killed in a similar way to their suspected crimes. 

When the unthinkable happens and one of the dead turns out to be innocent, DI Duncan Waddell and his team are under even more pressure to catch the culprits. 

Vigilante City makes you ask the question - if justice hasn't been achieved, is it okay to take it into your own hands? 

Other books in the series -

VILE CITY

BUTCHER CITY 

Coming soon...

ROMEO CITY 

 

Caroline was a vibrant young girl with her whole life ahead of her

When 14 year old Caroline Glachan set out one night to meet her friends in West Dunbartonshire, she wasn't to know that would be her last night alive.

She was found later face down in a burn with horrific injuries. She had at least ten head injuries and her skull was fractured in several places. It was described as a 'horrific and violent attack' by the prosecutor. Mercifully, experts think she was unconscious when she was put in the water. She drowned. 
Police investigation found that Caroline had been besotted with a boy named Robert O'Brien. He was a few years older than her and she'd gone to meet him on a bridge that fateful night. She left her home just before midnight.
She was never seen alive again. At least not by anyone who loved her. The last person to see her were her killers. 
It took 27 long, heartbreaking years but when Caroline's mum Margaret McKeich stood outside the High Court in Glasgow and announced that her daughter could finally rest in peace, it was a day she worried she would never see. 
For 27 years, her wee girl's savage killers had been free to enjoy their lives. To enjoy family events and special occasions like birthdays, weddings and Christmases. Caroline's mum couldn't even enjoy her birthday. Not when her daughter had been brutally murdered and the date on her death certificate was her 40th birthday. 
Unknown to the 3 monsters who'd killed her - all teenagers when they murdered Caroline - the clock was already ticking. It took nearly 3 decades but the countdown to them being punished for their evil crime had begun.
It was police re-interviewing witnesses in 2009 that snared Caroline's killers. 
The testimony of a 4 year old boy helped convict the evil trio. He didn't testify at the trial but there was a police recording of the captivating little boy being interviewed 27 years ago where he spoke of seeing a 'lassie get battered' and fall in the water helped convict the vile trio.
The killers had been babysitting both him and his brother when they'd taken them to the spot where they'd met Caroline. 
Robert O'Brien was 17 when he murdered 14 year old Caroline
It was a brutal, unprovoked attack.

It would end with Robert O'Brien* who was 4 years older than the dead girl, Andrew Kelly and Donna Marie Brand being found guilty by a jury of their peers. Their motives for attacking the 14 year old were never fully established.
Now that countdown is over and Caroline finally has her justice that was denied for so long.
*Thug and heroin addict O'Brien had been sentenced to 10 years in prison in 2006 for the attempted murder of a stranger near his home. He had a lengthy criminal record. 

 

charismaticWillie McRae
I have always been fascinated by conspiracy theories even if I don't believe most of them. There is a fair few going around after former First Minister Nicola Sturgeon's arrest and subsquent release in connection with alleged missing funds from the SNP an accusation which she vehemently denies. 
I can't comment on that when it's an ongoing police inquiry but many people I have spoken to don't trust the police and that's hardly new.
One of the many mysteries/conroversies that has always interested me was the death - or was it murder or execution of - Scottish independence hero Willie McRae. 
Who was Willie McRae?
Born in Falkrik, he was a razor sharp prominent lawyer and politician who had won cases against the then English based UK government (remember, this is many years before devolution). He didn't want Scotland used as a nuclear dustbin and was an advocate for Scottish independence. 
He also wasn't as cosetted as so many of today's politicians having served in WWII as a naval officer and then in the Royal Indian Navy. He was also an advocate for Indian independence.
Against nuclear power and pro- independence for both his beloved Scotland and India, these were considered dangerous views by some back then. 

The car crash?
In 1985, Mr McRae's apparently crashed car was found by two tourists who flagged down a passing car driven by Dr Dorothy Messer.  Immediately, the doctor attended to the man inside the car,  noticing that Willie McRae was still breathing but suspecting he might have brain damage, probably from the crash.
It was only in hospital when a nurse was washing Mr McRae's head that a bullet wound was found. He'd been shot. An x-ray proved this to be the case. 
What had first appeared to be a car crash now became something more sinister. Who shot Willie McRae? Or, did he really shoot himself? 
Suicide was suspected but the gun was nowhere to be seen. It wasn't until later it was found 60 feet away from the car's supposed resting place in a burn. How had it got there?
There were two theories - 1. The car had been moved by the police and that's why the gun wasn't next to the car. Well, dead men can't throw guns away after they shoot themselves in the head can they? Note - later it was claimed that the police assumed the car has been in an accident and had it moved but they moved it back once they discovered McRae had been shot. If that was the case, it sounds like a sloppy investigation right from the start. Can we trust the findings of such sloppy police work? 
2. Someone else had shot Mr McRae. Friends believed the secret services had been following him. To give that theory credence, a former serving British police officer (at that time there was no Police Scotland) who had become a private investigator insisted he had been hired to keep tabs on Mr McRae. 
There was good reason to believe that Mr McRae had been got at.
A man of strong principles and an even stronger constitution, he was a boil on the backside of the pro-nuclear British establishment and a fervent believer in Scottish independence. Firmly anti-nuclear, he was credited with almost single-handedly having plans to dump nuclear waste in the Galloway Hills of Scotland turned down by the local authority. 
Could he have brought down the Thatcher government? 
There were rumours McRae had evidence of a paedophile ring at the heart of the Thatcher government which would be bad enough to bring down the whole English government. 
He was also currently working on stopping even more nuclear waste being dumped in Scotland. He was so paranoid about what he was working on that he carried a copy of his files around with him at all times. No such paperwork was found in the car. 
Had it been removed by someone else? Or had he suspected he'd been followed and hidden it somewhere?
Stolen files before his death
To make it even more suspicious, it was claimed the only other copy of his files had been stolen in a break-in at his home before his death. Nothing else had been stolen. Coincidence or something more sinister? Will we ever know? 
Yet more questions that still haven't been answered. 
Questions still abound and it doesn't kill off the conspiracy theories when those seen as part of the establishment have refused to - 1. hold a FAI (Fatal Account Inquiry)2. give them investigator Winnie Ewing who was a qualified lawyer and SNP President a copy of the police files.3. meet with Fergus Ewing the son of Winnie. He requested a meeting with the Solicitor General for Scotland and was rebuffed. The Official Secrets Act may have been quoted. 
What do they have to fear from the truth? 
Then there was the investigation into his death conducted by 'A Justice for Willie' group. In the report in 2016 they said there was nothing to suggest that his death had been anything other than a suicide. 
Did that investigation put the tin lid on it? Well, sadly not.
The nurse who says someone shot McRae
In 2018, one of the nurses who treated the dying man, insisted that the bullet wound had been to the back of his head and not his temple. It's not completely impossible that someone could shoot themselves in the back of the head or neck but less likely than putting a gun to the temple of their head or the gun in their mouth and then pulling the trigger. 
Also, why would a man who respected the rights of other people to live their lives shoot himself whilst driving his own car, something that risked injuring or killing someone? 
With time marching on, maybe we will never find out the full truth of what happened to Willie McRae on that lonely road.  The one thing that is certain is that he was a great loss to the Scottish independence movement of which he was a strong advocate. 

Writing a novel can seem like an arduous task.But there are ways to make it easier, especially with a bitof pre-planning and organisation.

This is what I learnt writing Vile City,the first book in my Detective in a Coma series.
Plan or you'll fail.

1. You need to beable to tell at a glance what's in every chapter. That includes plot andcharacter development.

Unless you're blessed with a photographic memory (if youare, I envy you) there are a few ways to do this. You can have a timeline onpaper or a spreadsheet on your computer. I prefer to have a summary to go with each chapter on a Worddocument. I constantly update this and when I’m editing I print it out andconstantly refer to it.
Get those character details right, or they'll be trouble.

2. If your charactersare going to be in a series do a character profile for each character.

This should cover character, background and appearance. Ireserve several pages in a notebook I keep for DI Waddell, his coma strickenpal DC Stevie Campbell (who talks to Waddell even although nobody else canhear) & Co for each character in my Detective in a Coma books. I adddetails as I write each book. I've just finished book three.
You need to have pertinent details of your charactersquickly to hand so you can access them without slowing down your writing byhaving to search through text for that one detail that you need.
How many times have they been married? Do they have kids andif so what are their names? If they were in an accident who'd be their next ofkin? What colour is their hair?You need to know these things so you won't suddenly changeyour balding, thrice divorced, childless bachelor into someone with enviablehair, two kids and a first wife.

3. Keep a firm gripon the continuity.

You need to be consistent. No changing characters nameshalfway through your book. Keep an eye on the details - is your charactersitting down when they've recently complained of a back injury and said theycouldn't sit down?
In one of my earlier versions of Vile City,I had Shelley Craig who gets kidnapped in the book, deliberately leaving behinda necklace with a charm based on a Monopoly playing piece in one of the placesshe'd been kept. When my main character DI Waddell finds it the charm on thenecklace had changed.


4. Save your firstdraft and subsequent drafts to at least three places (or four or five...).

We've all done it haven't we - toiled over our writing onlyto forget to save the new changes we've made or lost it all when our computerwent nuts/was hit with a virus/decided that it hated us.
There is nothing worse than losing hours, days and evenweeks of hard graft and somebody saying: "Hey didn’t you back it up?"when you sit there looking sheepish because you haven't.
That's why it's important to save your work at least once aday to at least three places - I send my work to two different emails, save itto Dropbox and save it on my laptop and tablet. That way if something goeswrong I won't lose work. I also save my WIP to all these places every time I doany revamping or substantial writing. 

5. Always edit onpaper.

Trust me on this, when you read on a laptop or tablet screenyou miss mistakes and because it's your writing your brain can trick you intothinking you've written something different to what you have.
For example - I once wrote that a character was wearing aviolent jumpsuit rather than a violet one. Major difference. Don’t let yourjumpsuit get violent:)

Kirsty Gets Her Kicks gets the review treatment over at the fantastic Mystery People. 
Here's what Dot Marshall-Gent had to say - 
‘How Kirsty Gets Her Kicks’ by Jennifer Lee Thomson

Published by Shotgun Honey,
13 June 2019.
ISBN: 978-1-6439-6005-0 (PB)

'Wow.  You took out one of McPhee’s boys with one bloody leg.  Awesome.'

Kirsty explodes onto the opening page of this outrageous thriller as a thug makes the mistake of getting too fresh with her. She’s not the sort of woman who takes kindly to such behaviour.  She is the sort of woman who deals out her own justice.  Kirsty may be a below-knee amputee, but whatever anger she feels about her disability, she channels into her overwhelming desire to succeed in a life that has dealt her some cruel blows.  Having stopped the would-be attacker in his tracks, she allows herself a moment of self-congratulation.  Then, as she considers her next move, Kirsty makes the unwelcome discovery that Jamie, another member of the bar staff, saw everything.  The annoying voyeur reveals that the guy she just flattened is an “enforcer” employed by their boss, Jimmy McPhee. 

McPhee is a career criminal who controls much of the illegal activity in this area of Glasgow.  He has friends in high places, including the local constabulary, and enough dirt on the city’s bigwigs to ensure that his nefarious endeavours are kept well below the law’s radar.  As if Jamie’s presence at the scene of her crime was not enough, it then turns out that the hapless-looking witness seems to want to join forces.  This is the first of many conundrums that our anti-heroine faces in the novel but, rest assured, she’s rarely out of ideas to deal with the most impossible of situations.

The pace of the narrative is fast and gets faster as Kirsty uses her quick mind and laudable resilience to face and overcome countless challenges that confront her as the story progresses.  Her true north may be slightly off when compared with that of the average citizen, but Kirsty’s backstory is harrowing, and she can be forgiven the odd offence.  Her proclivity to inflict grievous bodily harm is restricted to those who have done far, far worse.  Kirsty does have a softer side which, when it shows, elicits empathy.  The writing has humour too, but it’s never cosy.

How Kirsty Gets Her Kicks is a tongue-in-cheek thriller with an unbreakable and unstoppable hard-boiled protagonist taking a rip-roaring ride in a wild and wind-blown tide.  If you like tough and gritty this is for you.  Expect the unexpected in this adults-only novel and you’ll still be shocked.  Enjoy it, I did!
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Reviewer: Dot Marshall-Gent

Note - review is copyright (c) of Mystery People.

click on cover to find out more:)
What's it about then?
A tale of skullduggery that plays out on the mean streets of Glasgow…

One-legged barmaid Kirsty is in a shit-load of trouble after she kills one of gangster Jimmy McPhee’s enforcers with a stiletto heel to the head after he gets a bit too handsie.

Now she’s on the run from the gang boss who loves to torture his victims before he kills them, with a safe-load of cash she stole from him and a hot gun. And she has company—a choirboy barman Jamie who just happens to be the only witness.

She needs to survive long enough to spend the cash.

How difficult can it be to catch a “daft wee lassie with one leg?” Glasgow hardman Jimmy McPhee is about to find out. Kirsty’s made a laughing stock out of him and he doesn’t like that one wee bit.

Bring together a one-legged barmaid who’s legged it with a safe load of dirty cash, a spurned gangster’s wife who wants a walking womb for her mail order sperm, a giant birthday cake and a mad chase to the end, and you’ve got How Kirsty Gets Her Kicks: one freaking minute at a time.

Praise for HOW KIRSTY GETS HER KICKS:

“A high-kicking, double-barrelled, blast of grindhouse pulp.” —Paul D. Brazill, author of Last Year’s Man

“How Kirsty Gets Her Kicks hits the ground running and does not let up for a single breathless second. I tore through this in one sitting, and it’s a hell of a ride filled with colourful characters and casual violence—everything I look for in crime fiction—not to mention a lead character that takes everything thrown at her and just keeps on coming. This is a great story, and Jennifer Lee Thomson is a great story-teller.” —Paul Heatley, author of Fatboy, Guillotine, and the Eye for an Eye series

******************************************************************************************

You can find out more about Mystery People here - 

www.mysterypeople.co.uk

www.promotingcrime.blogspot.co.uk

mysterypeople@outlook.com

It was in the wee small hours of Sunday when the email came through from PayPal. It said that there was a payment that I needed to authorise. A money request in other words. 
Because I was exhausted and I had searched all over the PayPal site and couldn't find a phone number anywhere (seriously PayPal where the hell do you hide the contact details - if I had seen your number I would have phoned that instead and I wouldn't have almost been scammed), I stupidly phoned the number on the message (see photo) that was sent to my PayPal account. And so the scam was on..
It started with a Paypal money request 

Under the guise of being customer service at PayPal, I was put through a process of confirming my account which was very similar to checks I'd had before when I was the victim of fraud and contacted by the police. On that occasion, I had made a purchase from an online store and their receipts had been stolen during a break in - someone who worked in the shop had written down full card numbers with expiry dates and security codes. 
This time, I was asked for things like the last transaction date and amount paid. I was told this was to verify my Identity and so the customer service person I spoke to could find any other fraudulent activity on my account. According to him, there were half a dozen other payments on my account that looked suspect. Throughout this all, the person I was speaking to came across as professional and caring. He even gave me advice on how to avoid my phone being hacked in the future. 
Surprisingly, at no point was I asked for any password. Maybe they didn't ask for any log in details because they quite rightly thought I would be suspicious. 
It's a con
When I realised it, I wanted to hide away
I only realised I was being scammed when the man on the phone told me he had sent a request to my bank to cancel all of the past payments to a certain person in Germany.  To do this I had to log into my banking app. When I did that it was very clear to me that instead of helping me to cancel transactions he was trying to get me confused enough to authorise a transaction of over £700.
Feeling like a prized eejit (idiot) I hung up the phone and immediately signed into my banking app to cancel my card and have a new one sent out. I had been one step away from being conned by a fraudster. I was equally angry with myself and with the scam artist for trying to do that to me. 
Another example of a scam email

If this happens to you...😱😱😱😱
STOP THEM GETTING YOUR MONEY
There's no point beating yourself up about it as it's happened. You need to take urgent action. PDQ. 
In my case, I stupidly gave them my debit card number which is linked to my main current account after they said they would need it to track all of the transactions I hadn't authorised. 
Thanks to the wonders of internet banking and apps I was able to cancel my card and have another one sent out to me in a matter of seconds. In the not so good old days, I would have had to wait until the bank opened on Monday to do that and run the risk of my card being used to run up a huge bill. But then, back in those days there was no PayPal and no one paid for things online so there was less chance of fraud.
Getting a new card meant my old card number would be useless to the fraudsters as they wouldn't have the expiry date and a security code needed to make any payment. 
I also have strong reason to believe that my Amazon account was hacked. In this case the one I opened in Australia so that I could track all my books on sale there. The financial details that the fraudster had all seemed to be in that account including two credit cards that were out of date a long time ago. 
To be on the safe side, I changed my Amazon password and PayPal password.
What I have learnt 1. I have no doubt that the person I spoke to on the phone had at some point worked for a bank. He was articulate and knew the process banks put you through when you phone up to say your card has been lost, stolen, or misused. 
2. Most people have a PayPal account so you're just as likely for scammers to target that as you are your bank account.
3. Scammers make it sound as if they're doing you a favour. In my case, he claimed he was going to stop any unauthorised future transactions and past ones. He even advised me to use a VPN as he claimed my phone had been hacked. 
4. If something doesn't feel right, trust your intuition. Hang up that phone. 
5. Tell other people what happened so they can avoid it happening to them. It's us vs the scammers. 

In Butcher City the killer's victims are force-fed in a similar way
Suffragettes were before they're killed
Years ago I lived on an island. Not one of those remote Islands but one of the most accessible ones you are likely to get. One day I was walking past a local restaurant and I was shocked to see something on the menu that's so cruel the production of it is banned in my country but not the sale. 

You can read about what happened next on my companion blog for my book Living Cruelty Free: Live a more Compassionate Life here 

That product was Foie gras which is made by ramming a metal or plastic pipe down a duck or goose's throat so their livers swell abnormally to around ten times their normal size. 

Foie gras is French and translates as fatty liver.​ 

There's never been an appetite for reversing the ban on producing it in the UK where I live because even farmers who could make money out of producing this vile 'foodstuff' find the cruelty involved too much. 




In Butcher City, DI Waddell investigates a sinister killer who's killing
people and removing their livers
When I was writing book 2 in the Detective in a Coma series (the follow up to Vile City) I wanted to do something a bit different. Come up with a different method of murder whilst also letting people who don't know into the sick little secret of how cruel a 'food' Foie gras is. 

In Butcher City, my killer craves Foie gras but is so sickened by how it's obtained he decides that he'll make a human version instead. Pretty gross but as well as coming up with a more novel way to kill people, it also gives folk an insight into one of the cruellest things humans eat. 

A food so cruel that when Scottish tennis star Andy Murray discovered what it was he banned it from being served in the hotel he owns. 

If you want to see how it's used in Butcher City you can check out the book now.




A killer is stalking his victims on Glasgow's streets.
Men are being abducted, kept tied up for weeks and force-fed, then strangled and their livers are being removed.
~from Jennifer Lee Thomson @jenthom72 and Diamond Crime~ #ButcherCity Detective in a Coma Book 2, the follow up to VILE CITY is outnow-
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