Sheila Quigley ( ) was a British
author
An author is the writer of a book, article, play, mostly written work. A broader definition of the word "author" states:
"''An author is "the person who originated or gave existence to anything" and whose authorship determines responsibility f ...
of
thrillers.
Career
In 2003, Sheila Quigley became a national news story when
Random House
Random House is an American book publisher and the largest general-interest paperback publisher in the world. The company has several independently managed subsidiaries around the world. It is part of Penguin Random House, which is owned by Germ ...
acquired her first novel, ''Run For Home'', with major coverage throughout the press and television. A documentary about Sheila and the making of ''Run for Home'' was broadcast on
BBC1
BBC One is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network owned and operated by the BBC. It is the corporation's flagship network and is known for broadcasting mainstream programming, which includes BBC News television bulletins, ...
.
Sheila lived on the Homelands Estate in
Houghton-le-Spring near
Durham Durham most commonly refers to:
*Durham, England, a cathedral city and the county town of County Durham
*County Durham, an English county
* Durham County, North Carolina, a county in North Carolina, United States
*Durham, North Carolina, a city in N ...
, opposite a field which became the fictional location of the council housing estate in her Seahills books.
Homicide in Houghton
As part of the
Houghton Feast celebrations each October, Sheila and local historian Paul Lanagan led an investigation which visited the fictional murder scenes from Sheila's novels. The tours typically departed from Houghton library, trailed across the town and returned to the library where attendees were treated to a sneak preview of Sheila's next novel.
Personal life
Quigley began work at the age of 15 in Hepworths, a tailoring factory where she was employed as a presser.
She married when she was 18 but was later divorced. She has three daughters and a son from the relationship.
Bibliography
These novels are set in the fictional estate o
Seahillsin
Houghton-le-Spring in the
City of Sunderland
The City of Sunderland () is a metropolitan borough with city status in the metropolitan county of Tyne and Wear, North East England. It is named after its largest settlement, Sunderland, spanning a far larger area, including nearby towns incl ...
.
* ''Run for Home'' (2004)
* ''Bad Moon Rising'' (2005)
* ''Living on a Prayer'' (2006)
* ''Every Breath You Take'' (2007)
* ''Hungry Eyes'' (short story) (2008)
* ''Black Betty'' (short story) (2009)
* ''The Road to Hell'' (2009)
* ''Stand By Me'' (2011)
Run for Home, Bad Moon Rising, Living on a Prayer and Every Breath You Take were published by Random. Hungry Eyes was published as part of Creme de la Crime Ltd's Criminal Tendencies book, which was released in April 2009 to help raise funds for a breast cancer charity, and was a short story set in the Seahills. In 2011 it was published as a bonus story inside ''Nowhere Man'', showing how the two series of books are linked. Black Betty was another Seahills short story, published by Byker Books in the anthology, 'Radgepacket Vol 2'. The Road to Hell was published by Tonto Books.
In September 2010, Sheila published the first of a trilogy of novels, featuring the new lead character of DI Mike Yorke and his sidekick Smiler, a psychic street kid.
* ''Thorn in My Side'' (2010)
* ''Nowhere Man'' (2011)
* ''The Final Countdown'' (2012)
References
External links
Fictional Seahills estate setting for the novels.
Homicide in Houghton-le-SpringExclusive murder tour with Sheila Quigley
{{DEFAULTSORT:Quigley, Sheila
British thriller writers
Living people
People from Houghton-le-Spring
Writers from Tyne and Wear
1947 births
Women thriller writers
21st-century British novelists
21st-century British women writers