After my pilgrimage to Calke Abbey, I headed for Oxford. We own a house in the city, near Folly Bridge, where one can still see (and punt beneath) the Saxon underpinnings on which everyone from the Norman Lord of Oxford, Robert D’Oilley, to the ever-busy 19th century Victorians built and re-built this bridge over the…

One of my favorite places in the UK is Calke Abbey. I stopped there on my way from Edinburgh to Oxford, having first seen the place in 1989, three or four years after the National Trust took it over. Every time I go, I wander the house and grounds in wonder (and have a great…

I came back to Edinburgh, picked up the rental car I’d left in the airport car park, and shortly thereafter was having a lovely cup of tea at the Elephant (haunted by J. K. Rowling’s ghost, scribbling away at a table in the back) with Chris, long-time Friend of LRK and member of the Virtual…

Last notes on Orkney:  In the restroom, the sign says that they endeavour to satisfy, but that if they have disappointed the user of the facilities in any fashion, please to notify the desk. The word “disappoint” has such a poignant touch, one simply knows that the cleaner would be personally crushed to find…

I am sitting in the lounge bar of the Stenness hotel on Orkney with a glass of the local brewery’s Red MacGregor (“An intensely hoppy, ruby red beer with a delicious delicate aroma and a rich, rewarding palate,” in case you wondered.) while the giant screen television is blaring on one side and three young…

If you want to get an idea of the effects of living on a small island, consider the techniques of car hire. The booking is done online, yes, but the owner of the business then meets one at the airport, and casually asks that when the car is returned, the customer just park it over…

Edinburgh is a city that requires the description “vital.” It is old but not dominated by age, beautiful but not limited by appearance. I imagine that it, like Seattle and San Francisco, are exciting places to live and work.  One of the interesting things about the downtown is that it has two levels. …

Posting has been spotty along with connections, first with a working class hotel conveniently near the library in Gateshead where I had an event, and then out in the moors, and finally in a nice well-connected Radisson hotel in Edinburgh where I had next to no time to write or post. And then to Orkney,…

A final note on Crime Fest: If you have the opportunity to see Simon Brett perform his one-man multiple-character play “Lines of Enquiry”, don’t pass it by. Forty minutes of silliness and high drama, performed in a variety of accents—oh, and it’s all in verse. His characters are played by Osbert Mint, Betti Morns, and…

The dinners at crime festivals are a tricky affair. To rubber chicken, or not to rubber chicken, that is the question. I generally toss a coin in the air and let it decide, but in this case I’d promised the organizer Adrian Muller (married to my UK publisher, not coincidentally) that I would be around…