Granite Noir 2024: Hidden Darkness with Denise Mina, Charles Cumming and Louise Welsh

Granite Noir 2024: Hidden Darkness with Denise Mina, Charles Cumming and Louise Welsh

Chaired by Bryan Burnett

Three of our most-celebrated authors join us to chat about their latest books.

Charles Cumming has written another blinding espionage thriller with Kennedy 35. When tragedy strikes, Kite must use all his resources to bring down a criminal network with links to international terror.

Denise Mina has brought the past to life and to the future in Three Fires which centres on the world around the misogynist, anti-corruption campaigner Savonarola in Florence.

To The Dogs is a darkly comic, gritty novel from the award-winning Louise Welsh, exploring organised crime, institutional corruption and moral compromise in Glasgow.

Charles Cumming

Charles Cumming was born in Scotland. After graduating from the University of Edinburgh, he was approached by the UK’s Secret Intelligence Service (MI6) and used his experiences as the basis for his debut novel, A Spy By Nature which has been adapted for film by BAFTA winner and Academy Award nominee John Hodge (Trainspotting), with Paul Mescal (Normal People) attached to the lead role.

Cumming’s espionage fiction has since won the CWA Ian Fleming Steel Dagger and Bloody Scotland Crime Book of the Year, and his novels have been translated into fourteen languages. The Observer has described Charles as ‘the best of the new generation of British spy writers who are taking over where John le Carré and Len Deighton left off’.

Denise Mina

Denise Mina was born in East Kilbride in 1966. Her first book, Garnethill, won the CWA Dagger for Best First Crime Novel. She has won the Theakstons Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year twice, and the MacIlvanney Prize twice. She is a presenter of TV and radio programmes, and appears regularly in the media. She is the author of Rizzio, the first book of the Darkland Tales series.

Louise Welsh

Louise Welsh is an award-winning author of ten novels. The Cutting Room, her debut novel, won the Crime Writers’ Association John Creasey (New Blood) Dagger Award and the Saltire First Book of The Year Award. In 2018, she was named the Most Inspiring Saltire First Book Award winner by public vote. She is Professor of Creative Writing at the University of Glasgow. In 2022 she published The Second Cut, which was shortlisted for the Bloody Scotland McIlvanney Prize for Crime Book of the Year and named by The Times as their Crime Book of the Year.

Bryan Burnett

Bryan Burnett is the host of BBC Radio Scotland’s popular evening music programme, Get It On

Aberdeen born Bryan began his career as a teenage magazine journalist before moving into radio and TV presenting.

Bryan has presented a wide range of shows over the years from arts and entertainment to quiz shows. He was also the frontman of the long running travel show, Scottish Passport.