Harrogate Crime Writing Festival - new Chair

This doesn't seem to be up on the website yet but an email from the organisers today reveals that Natasha Cooper is taking over from Mark Billingham to helm this year's Harrogate Crime Writing Festival.

To programme what has now become the finest Crime Writing Festival in the world is a great responsibility, but also a great pleasure, and with a tenure of only one year, the decision as to who will take over the role once your time is up is a very important one. Yes, of course a “safe pair of hands” is crucial – just ask Andrew Flintoff – but it is vital that each successive chair will take the Festival further; will oversee growth, bring a fresh perspective and raise the bar even higher, so that writers, publishers and readers will continue to flock to a festival that is unrivalled anywhere.

This is what the programming chair must take on, and there could be nobody more ideally suited to the task than Natasha Cooper.

Daphne – as those fortunate enough to be her friends call her – is not only one of the most accomplished crime writers in the country, but she is one of the most popular figures in the literary community as a whole. She is as adored as she is respected, and, under her chairmanship, the programme for the 2007 festival is shaping up to be the best yet.

So what makes the ideal Programming Chair?

Daphne’s writings about crime fiction make it clear that she sees this genre as one that must continue to develop. She is a fresh thinker; bubbling with ideas and initiatives and her programme for this year’s festival will most certainly reflect this.

Daphne is hugely “clubbable”, and not in the baby seal or Pete Doherty sense of the word. This quality will go a long way towards creating the Festival’s uniquely warm and welcoming atmosphere and I can think of no writer who better unites readers and writers which is what makes the Theakston’s Old Peculier Harrogate Crime Writing Festival so special.

And, of course, there also needs to be a degree of steel. Anyone who has read any of Daphne’s wonderful Trish Maguire novels will not need to be told that there is a darkness and a determination lurking beneath that charming exterior, and when you’re dealing with the pressures of putting a large festival together, not to mention the miscellaneous demands of stroppy crime writers (suites, drugs, limousines etc), this is a quality that cannot be underestimated!

A tradition has evolved whereby the outgoing chair nominates his or her successor.

There was only ever one name on my list.

I was delighted when Natasha Cooper accepted the invitation and I know, that under her chairmanship, the 2007 Harrogate Crime Writing Festival will be the best yet.

Mark Billingham