Sometimes, you’ve just got to write. Maybe other authors reading can relate. This is certainly how AM Belsey felt, and she’s the writer we’re going to meet today here on the site. On 19 March 2026, her debut crime novella – Six Mile Store – hits the shelves. But it didn’t start out as a crime story and AM Belsey didn’t set out to be a crime author. That’s just where the characters and story led.
A natural progression like this bodes well for readers. It means there could be a strong sense of authenticity in the pages of Six Mile Store. The book falls into the rural noir fold and is set in a lonesome community in Arkansas. The main character is works in the local shop, and when one of the regular customers turns up dead, well that’s when the noir aspect comes into play.
Now based in London, AM Belsey grew up in central Arkansas, therefore she knows of what she writes. We decided to invite her to join us so we could find out more about Six Mile Store and the inspiration behind it.
What are crime fiction lovers going to love about Six Mile Store?
I think they’ll enjoy the atmosphere. Six Mile Store is variously described as Southern gothic or rural noir: the locals may appear to be friendly, but the landscape doesn’t even try. And my early readers have enjoyed the twist ending.
Who is Honey? What inspired her and how have you developed your main character?
Honey is a young woman who works weekend shifts at the Six Mile Store while attending university during the week. She is watchful and intelligent, but her culture does not encourage her – or any other woman – to be independent or brave. She is not a conventional crime heroine: she does not investigate or take charge. She observes, and she survives. The question is: at what cost? Honey was inspired by the women I worked alongside at the real version of the Six Mile Store, and by my own experience of being a young woman in that place at that time.
And what is she up against?
Honey’s most obvious threat is The Cop, a police officer who has taken an unhealthy interest in her. He is the kind of guy who uses his authority to control the people around him. But really the major antagonist, of which The Cop is simply a symptom, is the general rural southern culture of extreme conservatism, and the resulting controlled flow of information.
Who are some of the other interesting characters we will meet as the story unfolds?
Lisa is Honey’s colleague at the Six Mile Store who seems quiet at first but turns out to be a very important character. Karim, Honey’s boyfriend, is a Turkish immigrant who lives in an apartment with several Bulgarian musicians. Billy Wayne is a regular customer who visits the store several times a day, in a rotation of unusual outfits. And Lynn is Honey’s best friend… sometimes with benefits.
Can you tell us more about the setting and the role it plays?
Arkansas in 1998 is one of the few places this story could have been told. The store sits in an unincorporated community in a dry county where you can drive for half an hour in any direction without finding a place to buy a beer, despite the fact that there are three universities nearby. The characters are surrounded from childhood by fundamentalist religion, insular politics and educational inadequacy, though the raw natural beauty of the empty land around them appears to have unlimited potential. Highlighting the gap between what a place appears to offer and what it actually provides is an important element of this book. Rural noir, to me, means taking that gap seriously. Having grown up in that landscape myself, I refuse to romanticise it or condescend to it, which I feel are pitfalls some non-native authors fall into when portraying the US south.
What kind of tone or atmosphere did you want to evoke for readers?
Uneasy. I wanted readers to feel a low-level discomfort that indicates something has gone wrong before anything technically has.
Were there any important themes you wanted to explore in your first novella?
One theme that I have explored is what happens to women who have an instinct to survive but have been denied the imagination to plan. The women in Six Mile Store are not helpless, but they have been raised to defer to others and to trust that things will work out. When things don’t work out, they have act on instinct rather than strategy. Unfortunately for these women, instinct alone is not always enough.
What other crime books and authors have inspired or influenced you?
Daniel Woodrell’s Winter’s Bone comes from the same territory as Six Mile Store, with similar themes, and characters with similar backgrounds. My characters and settings owe a lot to William Faulkner and Flannery O’Connor, too. If I can evoke even a fraction of the bleakness and unease that I feel when reading Flannery O’Connor’s short stories, I’ll feel that I have been successful.
What’s next for AM Belsey?
I am working on a thriller also set in Conway, Arkansas, tentatively titled Razor’s Edge. It is a little different, perhaps more plot-driven, but it returns to the same landscape and the same cultural influences.
Six Mile Store is available to order in paperback, audiobook and for Kindle. Use the buttons below to secure your copy.
