Chris Nickson is the author of the highly-acclaimed Richard Nottingham series and is also a well-known music journalist. Born and raised in Leeds, he lived in the USA for thirty years and now makes his home in England.Nickson's new novel is The Hanging Psalm.
Recently I asked the author about what he was reading. Nickson's reply:
I tend to have two books on the go at any one time, a downstairs book and an upstairs one for bedtime. Downstairs I’m currently enjoying Vita Nuova by Magdalen Nabb. She was an English writer, dead for a few years now, who moved to Florence in the mid ‘70s with her young son, knowing nobody and no Italian – about as daring as you can be. Yet she made a life for herself there, and created a reputation both as a children’s writer and aVisit Chris Nickson's website.crime writer. I came across one of her novels featuring the marshal, a carabinieri NCO, in the library. I liked it, and since then I’ve read three more. Her Florence isn’t as exquisitely portrayed as Donna Leon’s Venice, but her main character is quite enchanting, and she can take an unusual tack in a book. That was very true in Property of Blood, about a kidnapping, where the act of finding and releasing the victim is far from being the focus. For me, at least, she’s a real find.
And upstairs? Re-reading Roddy Doyle’s The Guts, because you can never go wrong with the Rabbitte family and Doyle’s Dublin.
The Page 69 Test: The Hanging Psalm.
--Marshal Zeringue
Posts
