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Thriller author

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Helen Oddfellow

Coming soon: Folly Ditch, the next Helen Oddfellow mystery thriller

June 17, 2022 by Anna Sayburn Lane

A Dickensian murder mystery. A brutal modern-day gang. Can Helen Oddfellow outwit an old enemy – or will she be his next victim?

When literary researcher Helen Oddfellow finds an old newspaper clipping in an antiquarian bookshop in Rochester, she uncovers a Dickensian murder mystery. But her quest to solve the puzzle takes a dangerous turn when the bookshop owner disappears.

The 200-year-old report of a woman’s murder on the steps of London Bridge provides clues to the real-life inspiration for Nancy, one of Charles Dickens best-loved characters. As Helen investigates, she discovers the woman died because she knew a secret that the British establishment was intent on covering up. Now Helen knows… and the secret is still alive today.

Helen teams up with the booksellers’ distraught teenage daughter, and enlists help from a charming businessman who seems to have more than a passing interest in Helen herself.

As they follows the dead man’s trail, Helen discovers that the eerie marshes of north Kent are home to a modern-day criminal gang more brutal than anything Dickens dreamed up.  On the bleak shore of the Thames estuary, she comes face to face with an old enemy . Can she keep Nancy’s secret from him, without sharing her fate?

Expected publication: August 2022

Long-listed for the Stockholm Writers Festival’s First 5 Pages prize.

Filed Under: Folly Ditch, New novel Tagged With: Charles Dickens, Folly Ditch, Helen Oddfellow

A trip to Doughty Street

July 14, 2021 by Anna Sayburn Lane

48 Doughty Street, the Charles Dickens Museum.

The inspiration for the next Helen Oddfellow mystery is Charles Dickens, the great London novelist. I took a trip to the Charles Dickens Museum in Doughty Street, Bloomsbury, where Dickens lived with his with Catherine and young family from 1837 to 1839.

The three-storey house was, as Dickens wrote of it, ‘a frightfully first-class Family Mansion, involving awful responsibilities’.

For a recently-married young journalist aged just 24, with a baby son and a second child on the way, taking a lease on Doughty Street was an ambitious statement of intent, especially as he had only recently begun to establish himself as a successful writer.

Certain rooms of the house are set up as they might have been when Dickens and his family lived there in the first years of Queen Victoria’s reign. These include the dining room, its table set for a merry dinner – Dickens famously loved to entertain – and the study, with a desk used by Dickens towards the end of his life. Here you can see pages of hand-written manuscripts from some of the novels, and pity the compositor and printer who had to make sense of the close-written handwriting.

Upstairs, the Dickens’ bedroom is made cosy with the slipper bath in front of the fire and a four poster bed. Next to it, a poignant reminder of the tragedy that struck the young family. Mary Hogarth, Catherine’s young sister, stayed with them often, and was a great friend of both. She died suddenly, aged just 17, having been taken ill after a trip to the theatre. The room in which she died is laid out as if for her return, with a white night dress across the bed. Dickens was grief-stricken, missing deadlines for the first and last time in his life. Mary soon made an appearance in his fiction, an inspiration for the saintly Rose Maylie in Oliver Twist.

The museum has an exhibition about Oliver Twist at present, and a map of the area of London around Doughty Street shows how Dickens drew on his surroundings when writing his serial novel. Fagin’s gang of child thieves were located in Saffron Hill, a short walk east and richly detailed in the novel. The kindly Mr Brownlow lived a little north of Bloomsbury in a villa in Pentonville. Oliver realises the nature of Fagin’s business when he witnesses the Artful Dodger pick a pocket at a book stall in bustling Clerkenwell Green.

I finished my visit by downloading an audio guide from the museum, which took me on a tour of the streets around the museum. From spotting ornate coal holes on the pavement, to considering the significance of Victorian boot scrapers outside houses on James Street, a peek into Doughty Mews and the parish markers denoting the boundary between parishes next to the Lamb pub in Lamb’s Conduit Street, it’s a fascinating glimpse into what remains of London’s past. I thought I knew these streets pretty well – but it showed me plenty that I had overlooked.

The dining room, set for dinner
The dining room, set for dinner
Dickens' bedroom
Dickens’ bedroom
Dickens' study, looking into the morning room.
Dickens’ study, looking into the morning room.
Fragment of Oliver Twist
Fragment of Oliver Twist
Doughty Mews
Doughty Mews

Filed Under: Folly Ditch, New novel Tagged With: Charles Dickens Museum, Dickens, Doughty Street, Helen Oddfellow, Oliver Twist

The Crimson Thread: out now

May 7, 2021 by Anna Sayburn Lane

The third Helen Oddfellow mystery takes Helen out of London, to the cathedral city of Canterbury in Kent. Helen is expecting an exciting night out at the theatre – but things quickly become a bit too exciting for comfort.

A bloody curse, a (fresh) body in the cathedral crypt and a choirboy in peril make for a night at the theatre that Helen won’t forget. Helen will need all her intelligence and bravery to navigate the secrets of Canterbury cathedral and its tombs. But can she catch a killer – before he strikes again?

You can buy an e-book for 99p over here, or get an e-book free when you sign up to my newsletter here. Paperbacks cost £6.99 and can be purchased here.

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With: Becket, Canterbury, Helen Oddfellow, mystery, The Crimson Thread

Coming soon: The Crimson Thread

April 1, 2021 by Anna Sayburn Lane


A theatrical curse. A shocking discovery in the cathedral. Only one woman can unravel the mystery and prevent more bloodshed.

When Helen Oddfellow goes to Canterbury for the opening of a Christopher Marlowe play unseen for 400 years, she is expecting an exciting night. But the performance is disrupted by protests, then a gruesome discovery in the cathedral crypt draws her into a desperate hunt for a murderer.

Is the play cursed? The actors think so, but Helen doesn’t believe in curses. As friends go missing and Helen herself is threatened, she pursues the clues through the ornate tombs of the cathedral and the alleyways of the ancient city. Mysteries from the distant and not-so-distant past are exposed. Can Helen find the killer – before he kills again?

The third Helen Oddfellow mystery is coming soon.

To receive a free e-book of THE CRIMSON THREAD on publication, sign up to Anna Sayburn Lane’s newsletter here.

Publishing Spring 2021.

Filed Under: New novel Tagged With: Canterbury, Christopher Marlowe, Helen Oddfellow

Christmas offer – two-book signed bundles

November 16, 2020 by Anna Sayburn Lane

Are you looking for a perfect present to introduce someone to the Helen Oddfellow mysteries this Christmas?
I’m offering two-book bundles, each including a signed copy of Unlawful Things and The Peacock Room, gift-wrapped and sent to the address of your choice, for £15 (including posting and packing). UK postage only.
I only have a few of these available, so if you’d like to order one, email me today at hello@annasayburnlane.com.

Filed Under: The Peacock Room, Unlawful Things Tagged With: Christopher Marlowe, Helen Oddfellow, The Peacock Room, Unlawful Things, William Blake

Cover reveal: The Peacock Room

August 7, 2020 by Anna Sayburn Lane

And here it is! I’m delighted to share the cover for the new Helen Oddfellow mystery, THE PEACOCK ROOM, which will be published in October.

A literary obsession.

An angry young man with a gun.

And one woman trying to foil his deadly plan.

When Helen Oddfellow starts work as a lecturer in English literature, she’s hoping for a quiet life after the trauma and loss of her recent past. But trouble knows where to find her.

There’s something wrong with her new students. Their unhappiness seems to be linked to their flamboyant former tutor, Professor Petrarch Greenwood, who holds decadent parties in his beautiful Bloomsbury apartment.

When Helen is asked to take over his course on the Romantic poet William Blake, life and art start to show uncomfortable parallels. Disturbing poison pen letters lead down dark paths, until Helen is the only person standing between a lone gunman and a massacre.

As Helen knows only too well, even dead poets can be dangerous.

THE PEACOCK ROOM is the intriguing follow-up to the acclaimed 2018 mystery thriller UNLAWFUL THINGS, which introduced the London literary sleuth Helen Oddfellow.

Thanks to designer Jessica Bell for another great cover.

Filed Under: New novel, The Peacock Room Tagged With: book cover, Helen Oddfellow, The Peacock Room

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