Why a Booktrail?
2000s: An old man has fallen down the stairs in his house in Bristol. Or has he?
Broken Fall (DI Harland novella)
What you need to know before your trail
It looks like a straightforward accident from first glance. A 79 year old man appears to have tripped and fallen down his stairs. He lived alone, liked to be active despite having a long term carer, so it’s all very plausible. However his son and daughter, along with the carer are all stunned and shocked at what has happened.
DI Harland also thinks there’s something not quite right. Just who is trying to get away with murder . .
Travel Guide
Fergus McNeil himself is your guide to Bristol:
Broken Fall is a short novella, with a tightly constrained word count, so I didn’t have the scope I usually have to include lots of settings with plenty of description. Instead, I focused on a tighter group of locations, mainly around the Hotwells area.
Here, the bend of the river means that Bristol ends abruptly – on one side of the water you’re right in the city, while on the other you’re out in the countryside. This natural compression by the geography – combined with ongoing urban regeneration – means that there are several very different areas, very close together. Some are affluent, some less so, but they’re all within a few minutes walk of each other, and I think that makes them more interesting… it also means that several different suspects could have committed the crime!
There are a few scenes elsewhere in the city, as well as some in Portishead and Long Ashton (all genuine places that you should recognise if you look for them) but my favourite setting is Brunel’s Locks – a less-obvious way across the water that I found during a research trip, and one which is very significant when the solution to the case is finally revealed.
Booktrail Boarding Pass Information:
Twitter: @fergusmcneill
Web: fergusmcneill.blogspot.co.uk
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