SFOW: Well hello David, we last spoke to you way back on the 27th July 2018
DW: Duw, you've got a good memory, how's the shark fishing going?
SFOW: Mostly tiddlers Dai bach. So what has been happening with your alter ego, your anti-hero Ken Frane since we last interviewed you?
DW:Well I have to say that doing the interview enthused me. It showed that somebody cared, that somebody was showing an interest and that's all that you can ask for in this cold, indifferent world.
SFOW: Please continue, wax lyrical why don't you?
DW:Well I've surprised myself really. I brought out a volume of 5 short stories which included the first ever short story adventure namely 'The Dubrovnik Postcard Affair' which your fishy readers can read here for free right now. And since publishing that I have written another seven short stories which includes my most recent one featured above namely 'Murder at the Market'.
SFOW:Famous 5 & Secret 7? You weren't an Enid Blyton fan by any chance?
DW:I read the Secret 7 books as a nipper but not the famous five.
SFOW: So why short stories Dai? OK to call you Dai is it?
DW: Yes why not. I think we know each other intimately now. Well short stories are like poems to me. I can 'knock them out' relatively quickly in comparison to a novella or a novel.
SFOW: 'Knock them out'? what a quaint turn of phrase Dai. I'm sure your readership will be delighted that you knock your work out.
DW: Well, it's a Ken Franeism. It's the type of thing that the hard boiled, 'has been' gumshoe would say.
SFOW: Well tell us about the Famous Five & The Secret Seven Short Stories then Dai!
DW: Apart from 'Postcard' we have Ken Frane visiting Bermo(Abermaw)or Barmouth to the hard of hearing. A town that I as the author have always marveled at really, nestling in the Snowdonia National Park and a mini Las Vegas or Rhyl to all intents and purposes. An ideal location for a murder.
SFOW: I thought Ken Frane was the Last of the Cardiff Docks' Detectives so why are you taking him to other locales?
DW: Well I like to think that I know Wales quite well having traveled to most corners.I think that Frane would get a bit stale and stagnant staying in his 'filltir scwar' so similar to the National Eisteddfod I like to alternate him between north and south for his different cases. I do bring him back to Cardiff in the next two stories of the famous five 'Bluebird Voodoo Doll' & 'Rigorous Mortis'.
SFOW: Would we at the Aquarium be right in thinking that you like a good title?
DW: Well thank you for alluding to the fact. Location & Title do come to me first and then I work out the story and plot from there along with the ancilliary characters. I knew I wanted to write a story incorporating voodoo and football and I also wanted to write one that included the #Senedd as a character.
SFOW: Would it be fair to say that you took a few risks with the last story?
DW: I am back in the Docks with this one and the short walk up Bute Street to Cardiff Central Library and back again. The shortest of all the stories I wanted to write something about Jews and the Jewish faith linked to south Wales with anti-semitism swirling in the political ferment. The old sea shanty Farewell and Adieu sprang to mind and I changed that to 'Farewell and a Jew'
SFOW:The Secret Seven? Have you turned these into an anthology?
DW: Not yet! That's definitely in the pipeline. I would like them to be stand alone's perhaps for at least a year and then I will anthologise them.
SFOW: And the locations for these?
DW: Again places that I am familiar with. Tregaron with its eponymous bog, I thought would be an atmospheric location for 'Trouble in Tregaron'
Newport then, another atmospheric town, with similar psycho-geographical sensory points as Cardiff Docks.
SFOW: Exqueese me? Psycho-geography?
DW: Without wishing to sound too pretentious, my work is as much to do with location, genius loci as it is with crime, mystery and detective fiction. Somebody reading 'Nightmare in Newport' and Murder at the Market will see similarities in subject matter.
SFOW:The Catholic Church?
DW: Dammo! Is it that obvious?
SFOW: Religion plays a role in your work?
DW: The oppression of organised religion can be very atmospheric and add to location.
SFOW: The other stories?
DW: Hay on Wye, Rhuthun, Merthyr, Eryri & Cardiff Market.
SFOW: All places that you are familiar with?
DW: I hope so yes, although people from these places I'm sure will wonder if I have ever been there. My writing is as much about Wales as it is about solving crime.
SFOW:So what are you hoping for? What do you want to come out of these interviews?
DW: You make it sound as if I'm trying to flog my tat! I would hope for a wider readership. People with low expectations of the genre. People who are looking for a little entertainment and escapism in their dinner hour. If you are stuck to the screen with a sandwich and a coffee, why not spend your lunch time with Ken Frane & Terry Heston?
SFOW: So where to next for Ken Frane?
DW: without spoilers, Ken Frane is off abroad again. Not the Netherlands this time and he's hoping for a more successful resolution to the case on this one.
SFOW:Well thank you for your time Dai and we'll interview you again in another year or so?
DW:God Willing. Diolch yn fawr
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