I’m going to be launching my book at The Riverside Bookshop in Tooley Street near London Bridge and will be on-site on the 2nd November (exactly a week after the book comes out) to sign pre-ordered copies. If you’d like to order from a fabulous indie bookshop and get a more personalised signed copy then drop them a line here. Tell them who you’d like me to dedicate it to – I’ll also write any short message you’d like to include. Within Reason. Keep it clean, people. Pre-orders really help authors make an impact, and ordering from an independent bookshop rather than the big river site helps keep local businesses going so please do give it a go.
My very first job in magazines was in a poky, grubby office just round the corner from London Bridge. It was very stressful – we had no budget, virtually no staff, punishing deadlines and I was very much out of my depth. When the pressure got too much I’d escape to Hay’s Galleria and the Riverside Bookshop. Browsing a bookshop or library has always helped me de-stress and the beautiful location made me feel all Londony and grown-up. Now I’m launching my book there!
When I first moved to Dorset, I volunteered at the Dorchester Literary Festival as a way of feeling part of the bookish world. I spent many happy hours ushering people to their seats, fetching tea in the Green Room and, later down the line, helping out with the festival’s social media. At the time I dreamed of appearing at the festival as an author in my own right and now, at last, my chance has come! I’ll be talking to students at Thomas Hardye School and Purbeck School about Dead Lucky, social media, and what it does to our brains on 17 October 2023. Can’t wait!
Check out the full programme for the Festival here, and the school programme here. It’s running between 14-21 October 2023.
You can find more details on my school visits here.
I’m utterly thrilled to announce that my Christmas whodunnit The Twelve Days of Murder is going to be published in the USA by Pegasus Books. I’ve never had a book come out on the other side of the pond before so I’m understandably very excited. They’ve gone a different direction with the cover but I really like it. The UK cover says festive, fun and entertaining, the US cover says it’s a dark, brooding read to curl up with on winter nights – and it’s ALL those things! If you’re Stateside and you love a twisty locked-room murder mystery in remote Scottish houses with a cast of eccentric characters then this is the one for you. It’s basically Knives Out but with tinsel.
I’m so excited to reveal the top secret project that’s been taking over my life for the last year. My next novel is a whodunnit aimed at adults, called THE TWELVE DAYS OF MURDER and it will be published by Zaffre on 26th October this year!. It involves a twelve-year-old locked-room mystery, a remote location, a selection of quite awful people and a killer on the loose who murders people in grisly but oddly festive ways. It also reveals what your favourite type of Quality Street says about you. It was loads of fun to write and if you’re a fan of whodunnits and murder mysteries I do hope you’ll add it to your Christmas TBR.
One of the most fun things about being a debut author is that I finally got a chance to swap writing tips with other authors and share some of my own. I feel a lot less alone now than I did when I was working away on The Girl Who… in my basement, wondering if it would ever amount to anything… or if I’d ever even finish it. There’s some really strong advice in these chats from smart, talented kid-lit and young adult writers. So if you’re looking for writing tips or general writing advice, it’s worth taking a look…
This is me on super-spooky Amy McCaw’s BookTube channel we talk about how to create characters with depth and tricky second books (how you take 10 years to write your first then have to crank the second one out in a year flat, while still learning how to be a better writer. There’s also some good book recommendations in there.
Here’s my Book Chain chat with Sarah Ann Juckes we talk about writing from unusual perspectives – her main character is bed-bound with a chronic debilitating illness. And how to create a satisfying ending without making it super-neat and sugar-sweet.
Here’s my Book Chain chat with Dave Cousins we talk about the idea for The Girl Who… why I wrote the book with three different perspectives and I go off on one about opening a dialogue between Gen Z and Gen X.
People can’t bring themselves to say what happened to her. They just describe her as ‘the girl who… you know…’. But nobody really knows, no one sees the real Leah.
Leah is the perfect survivor. She was seven years old when she saw her mother and sister killed by a troubled gang member. Her case hit the headlines and her bravery made her a national sweetheart: strong, courageous and forgiving.
But Leah is hiding a secret about their deaths. And now, ten years later, all she can think of is revenge.
When Leah’s dad meets a new partner, stepsister Ellie moves in. Sensing Leah isn’t quite the sweet girl she pretends to be, Ellie discovers that Leah has a plan, one she has been putting together ever since that fateful day. Now that the killer – and the only one who knows the truth – is being released from prison, time is running out for Ellie to discover how far Leah will go to silence her anger . . .
“One of those books I spent all day thinking about”
AMY MCCAW, AUTHOR OF MINA AND THE UNDEAD
“Whether you’re a teen or not, it’s brilliant”
CATHERINE COOPER, AUTHOR OF THE CHALET
“A twisted, suspenseful thriller”
somewhereinabook
Want to know more about Ellie and Leah, my characters in The Girl Who…?
About Andreina Cordani
I wanted to be a writer from the age of seven, but got a little bit distracted by the world of magazines. Over the years I’ve written for titles including Cosmopolitan, Grazia, Good Housekeeping, Prima, that’s life! and Marie Claire. I specialise in real life interviews, talking to seemingly ordinary people about their extraordinary lives, and these chats inspired me to put myself in other people’s shoes and imagine how different life can be. I write young adult thrillers about people in impossible emotional situations, with a little bit of murder thrown in. My dream is to sit and write books all day then sit and read books all night, but I also love procrastinating on social media, being sarcastic and swimming in the sea.
Here it is – the cover for my next book, Dead Lucky and I love it so much! The idea first came to me almost two years ago, when there were lots of debates about dangerous copycat stunts on video streaming sites and I thought… what if a famous YouTuber was murdered on their channel? I mentioned it offhandedly to my agent and she got chills – so I immediately started working. And this is the result – my twisted lockdown-born baby. Dead Lucky has a few elements of horror, with a masked figure threatening my poor hapless content creators. It’s mainly a thriller with my “professional airhead” Maxine racing to uncover the truth while retaining her tenuous grip on reality. And it’s funny in places too – honest!
It’s always a bit nerve-wracking waiting for your cover design – visual arts isn’t my strong point as you can see by this picture on the right, which was my own terrible attempt at sketching out a concept! But like a lot of art-ignoramuses I do know what I like, and I absolutely love what the designer Mark Swan has done. Making the cover bright AND creepy must have been a challenge, but he’s pulled it off. I love the colours, the fractured image and the placement of the title. Now all we have to do is launch the thing!
And here’s the official Dead Lucky blurb, if you want to know more….
They are the influencers, the lucky ones. Gifted, gilded people who have everything – fame, respect, adulation, more freebies than they can ever unbox. Their lives, loves and feuds are shared with millions of fans on the streaming platform PlayMii, and they are living the dream.
But it’s broken Ed’s heart.
It’s crushing Maxine.
It’s destroying Leni’s friendships.
And it’s gone to Xav’s head.
Then, a masked figure walks into Xav’s apartment and murders him on camera.
As the world reels with shock, Maxine discovers Xav was sitting on a file of secrets about his fellow creators – career-destroying secrets that they’d do anything to keep hidden. And if she doesn’t find the file, she could be next . . .
One of the weirdest thing about being an author is taking that secret beloved project you nurtured for years and then… having to talk about it in front of the whole world. Thankfully I had The Book Chain Project to ease me into this. It’s a really simple idea: One week one author interviews another, who then interviews the next in turn. It’s a great way to find out about different authors’ work – and amazing to find out how much we all have in common.
First I was interviewed…
When it was my turn, my interviewer was Dave Cousins, author of YA books like 15 Days Without A Head, and middle grade books including My Robot’s Gone Wild. I was unbelievably nervous and cack-handed, Dave was incredibly confident and professional! We talked the media spotlight, ‘missing White Woman syndrome’ mental health issues… But we also talked about Calvin And Hobbes, how we both write by the seat of our pants and why I love piglet squid. (Answer: what’s not to love?) It really was a pleasure to chat and swap writing tips.
Then I was the interviewer…
I’ve spent years interviewing people so I was much more comfortable being the one asking the questions. I was really excited to get the opportunity to talk to Sarah Ann Juckes, author of Outside and The World Between Us. Like me, she writes stories about young people in impossible situations so we have a bit of common ground.
Sarah’s books are full of insight, wisdom, suspense and big feels and it was brilliant to get the inside story on how she writes. The book is told from two different perspectives, which switch from paragraph to paragraph. That sort of thing is hard to pull off, but it works so smoothly and sends a strong message about how two people can look at the same view and see something completely different.
A piglet squid, just because. Image credit: Caters, Samuel Greenberg, SunGazing
Huge thanks to KL Kettle for organising the Book Chain, and making it so wide and varied. There are debuts, well-known names, picture book, middle grade and YA fiction writers. If it’s writing tips you’re after there’s so much wisdom in there. Check out the YouTube channel for more Book Chain Project videos, and it’s also available as a podcast. And the chain is still rumbling on – for latest interviews, follow @thebookchain on Twitter!
You can read more about my writing on my blog, about my book deal here or get some more info on my book, The Girl Who… here.
People can’t bring themselves to say what happened to her. They just call her ‘the girl who… you know…’
This is Leah. Ten years ago she witnessed a troubled gang member kill her mother and sister. The media focus on her as a survivor made her a public figure, a famous survivor and a poster child for forgiveness. People feel sorry for her. People admire her. But at seventeen she’s hiding a darker side, an angrier side. And she can’t stop thinking about revenge…
And then there’s Ellie. She likes to think she’s pretty easy going. All she wants to do is hang out with her mates, make YouTube videos and, eventually, get famous. But then her mum fell in love with Leah’s dad. And she has to move out of her nice comfy home in to Leah’s gloomy flat above a decrepit bookshop. And she’s the only one who can see that Leah’s really not OK. That she might be planning to do something terrible…
The Girl Who… is about surviving trauma, about coming to terms with the past, but it’s also about figuring out who you are, despite other people’s perceptions of you. It’s also about the cringes and quibbles of living with a stepfamily. I really hope that you like it.
