The top selling Kindle and iBook crime fiction author Kerry Wilkinson has just signed a three book deal with the international publishing house Pan Macmillan. This follows on from the tremendous success of his novels Locked In, Vigilante and The Woman in Black which have rarely been outside the top 10 in Amazon UK’s Crime, Thriller & Mystery chart for Kindle since he began publishing his own books in July 2011.
Wilkinson’s career as an author started with a challenge to himself – simply to write a mystery and release it himself using digital formats. Since then, in each story he’s developed main character DS Jessica Daniel as she investigates murders in Manchester. Going forward, Pan Macmillan will be publishing his first three books digitally and in print, whilest also taking the series forward with three further novels.
Book four is to be called Think of the Children and will remain true to what he’s done so far. “I already have complete drafts of books four and five,” says Wilkinson. “There are a lot of pay-offs to come in terms of things that have been building over the first three books. For the people who really enjoy them, I think they realise the crime part is only ever really the hook. It’s about Jessica and her life and things really begin to move on for her. That said, there’s some tricky cases for her to get her teeth into as well.”
When we interviewed Wilkinson as part of our themed month New Talent November last year, he was content as a self-published author and had just brought out The Woman in Black. Now he’s found a deal that’s right for him, he hopes to benefit from the publishing company’s know-how, and reach. Wilkinson adds: “I could have kept banging stuff out on my own but there never would have been the professional editing procedure I’ll now be able to have. People say self-publishing is vanity. Whatever they may think, it never was for me – it was just something to do. Taking the deal almost feels like the vanity side of it because I’ll end up with something polished and professional with my name on it.”
You can read our review of The Woman in Black here, and our previous interview with Kerry Wilkinson here. Think of the Children is slated for February 2013, so fans of his writing will have to hold tight for a while… In the meantime, if you’re new to the author his books are available on Kindle.
