Author Genre: Mystery & Thrillers, Literature & Fiction, Crime
Website: Adam Croft
Twitter: @adamcroft
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Amazon Author Profile
Author Description:
With more than one million books sold to date, Adam Croft is one of the best-selling crime and thriller authors in the world.
His 2015 worldwide bestselling psychological thriller HER LAST TOMORROW became one of the biggest selling books of the year with over 150,000 copies sold in the first five months, and has since been in development for television.
In 2016 he was featured by The Guardian as one of the biggest selling authors of the year, and regularly takes part in discussions and panels on publishing and the future of books.
In February 2017, ONLY THE TRUTH became a worldwide bestseller, reaching storewide number 1 at both Amazon US and Amazon UK, making it the bestselling book in the world at that moment in time. The same day, Amazon's overall Author Rankings placed Adam as the mostly widely read author in the world, with J.K. Rowling in second place.
Adam has been featured on BBC television, BBC Radio 4, BBC Radio 5 Live, the BBC World Service, The Guardian, The Huffington Post, The Bookseller and a number of other news and media outlets.
SPOTLIGHT Questions and Answers with the Author
Congratulations on your book: Only the Truth. What do you have on the drawing board next? Can you tell us the timeline for its release and give us a little tease?
My next book is entitled IN HER IMAGE, out on 1 May 2017. The blurb is as follows:
He's watching. He knows everything about you. And you don't even know he's there.
No-one believes Alice Jefferson’s stalker exists. But he’s been in her house. And he's made sure she knows it.
With the police unable to find any trace of him, Alice starts to doubt her own sanity. But then she uncovers his true identity — a shocking revelation that will turn her entire world upside down and leave her unable to trust anybody — even herself.
When she discovers his chilling plans, Alice is left terrified and frightened for her life. Can she escape before it’s too late?
You have a good following on twitter. Since you started before the social media buzz, what impact has social media relationships had on your current success? How did you build your following in your niche? How much has it changed your book launch process?
Not a whole lot, I don't think. Simply having a few thousand Twitter followers doesn't necessarily convert into book sales. It's helped to build working relationships a few times, which have been very productive, but I don't think it's really a platform for generating sales. It's not really affected my book launch process, either. That's very much driven by my mailing list and, to a certain extent, Facebook, Bookbub and AMS ads.
Do you do any book signings, interviews, speaking and personal appearances? If so, when and where is the next place where your readers can see you? Where can they keep up with your personal contacts online?
I don't tend to do many, no. I spoke at the London Book Fair a couple of weeks ago, but there's nothing else lined up until Beaconlit in July. I maybe do one or two festivals a year at the most. The issue with book signings is that they take a lot of time and effort to organise, and that time is better spent writing new books.
You have great covers. They carry a theme and your brand with them. How does your book cover creation process work? Do you hand over the basic theme or do you have more of a hands-on approach? Do you get your readers involved in its development?
I have a fantastic designer who can work wonders with just a basic plot outline provided by me. He then comes back with a couple of design ideas, and we refine one until there's a cover design everyone is happy with.
Several of your novels have been converted into audio books. What has been the impact on your regular sales? Has the audio books gained a new audience for you?
Yes, the audio audience is fairly distinct from the ebook and paperback audiences, but there is some crossover. I get a decent number of WhisperSync sales, whereby people who own the ebook can also add on the audio at a reduced cost and flit between the two seamlessly. It's a great piece of tech. Most importantly, the audiobooks are another product to be able to offer.
You have written a Kindle Single novella called Gone. Can you tell us if it has had an impact on the sales of your novels? Are shorty’s one of your styles of writing or are they created to give readers a sample of your work? Do you feel short reads are a product of our email and smart phone age?
I don't think it had any impact on novel sales — not that I can measure, anyway. In terms of style, my writing tends to veer towards the shorter, leaner end anyway. My novels are 50-70k at the most, so only just in novel territory. I can't stand books that are padded out with needless, mindless waffle. Get to the point, get the story told, keep the reader wanting more. It works. And yes, readers are leaning more towards shorter books. The evidence is all clear to see in terms of what sells and what doesn't, and it makes sense from my side too. I can write a short story in much less time and keep my readers in a steady supply of books to read.
I like the idea of bundling a series of novels. You have put together a couple sets of your novels. (Knight & Culverhouse Series and the Kempston Hardwick Mysteries) What was the impact on your other sales? What was your main objective in bundling your novels?
Box sets are an absolutely must for indie authors. They are regularly my biggest sellers, and without taking any noticeable sales away from the constituent books. Box sets are big business.
What has been your experience in giving your books away free? Have you been involved in any other type of giveaways and how did that work out? What was your main goal in doing this? Did you run into any obstacles?
It gives readers a chance to sample my books without any financial outlay. They have the option to buy the next book and carry on reading the series if they like it, but of course that's entirely up to them. It gives them a no-obligation way of seeing whether or not they like my books.
Living in England creates a unique selling and marketing situation. Where is your biggest audience? Does marketing online help in this situation? You have published one of your books in German. What was the response to that novel?
My biggest audience is in the UK, and always has been. It's a market that lots of authors tend to ignore and neglect, instead going after the bigger piece of the pie in the US. That's a very crowded market, however. There's a lot of pie to be had in other, less congested markets such as Canada and Australia. They seem to be better suited to my books, too. American readers, more than others, tend to be a little wary of books set in England or with English spellings — and my books are *definitely* in the English vernacular, to say the least.
The German book isn't out yet, so hasn't had any response. I've not been involved with it at all, to be honest.
You have written several books on writing and publishing for indies. How rewarding is it to give back your knowledge to your fellow writers?
It's something I enjoy, but it absolutely has to come second to my fiction. My fiction readers are the ones who gave me the success I've had so far, and they have to be my priority. But it's fair to say that I've learnt a lot in seven years, and that sort of help and assistance wasn't really around when I started out. Seven years of trying means you make mistakes and go down blind alleys occasionally. If I can impart some of that learned wisdom to people starting out now, great.
Author's Book List
Only the Truth
He's not the perfect husband. But he is the perfect suspect.
Dan Cooper has never been the perfect husband to Lisa. He travels for work and plays the carefree bachelor when he can. But now, on a solo business trip, in a remote coastal hotel, he’s surprised to find Lisa in his bathroom. She’s dead.
He has no idea how she got there but one chilling fact is clear: everything points to Dan having murdered her. Someone is trying to frame him. Someone who might still be watching. In a panic, he goes on the run. But even as he flees across Europe, his unknown enemy stacks up the evidence against him.
Dan is determined to clear his name and take revenge on Lisa’s killer, but the culprit is closing in. And then there’s the agony of his own guilty conscience. No, he didn’t kill her—but is it all his fault?
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In the Name of the Father
- Knight & Culverhouse Book 6An anonymous phone call reveals a horrifying secret. But can it be murder if there isn't a body?
Father Joseph Kümmel is not just a deeply religious and spiritual man. He's the leader of a closed religious community at Hilltop Farm — one which kills members who want to leave.
When someone manages to get messages to DCI Jack Culverhouse and DS Wendy Knight about the goings-on at Hilltop Farm, they begin to uncover a web of dark deception and murderous intent. With a distinct lack of evidence and a community distrustful of the police, they’re left fighting against the odds.
The stakes are raised when their attempts to charge Father Joseph are blocked by higher powers. Will they be able to uncover the truth in time to stop his plans for a far more sinister fate for the residents of Hilltop Farm?
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Her Last Tomorrow
Could you murder your wife to save your daughter?
Nick and Tasha are a couple held together by their five-year-old daughter. Until one ordinary morning, when Ellie vanishes amid the chaos of the school run.
Nick knows she can’t have gone far on her own, which can mean only one thing: she’s not on her own. Who would take his daughter, and why? With no motive and no leads, Nick is thrown into a tailspin of suspicion and guilt. Like Tasha, he doesn’t know what to think, or whom to trust…
But then someone starts doing the thinking for him. Confronted with an impossible choice, Nick will have to make a decision, and both options will leave him with blood on his hands. But perhaps that’s to be expected.
After all, Nick’s not quite as blameless as he seems.
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Gone
- Kindle SingleStephen Lightfoot is a man of small means. He works at a supermarket, doesn't drive and has no close friends. The one thing that keeps him going is his girlfriend, Anya. So when Anya disappears in mysterious circumstances, Stephen's life is turned upside down.
He knows she hasn't just walked out on him. Something doesn't quite add up. But there's no way Stephen could ever prepare himself for the truth…
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In Too Deep
- Knight & Culverhouse Book 5No clues. No time. One chance to expose a terrifying secret. Dive into a series of crime thrillers with over 250,000 copies sold.
DS Wendy Knight has endured both tragedy and pain in her short time with Mildenheath CID's murder squad. Her grizzled partner DCI Jack Culverhouse has seen it all. But neither of them is prepared for a case without a single lead.
A journalist with her finger on the pulse of Mildenheath’s corrupt underbelly is beaten within an inch of her life. With a comatose victim and a defenseless child as the only witness, Knight & Culverhouse must reveal the horrifying truth before the ruthless killer comes back to finish the job.
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Rough Justice
- Knight & Culverhouse Book 4Who hunts the hunters?
When a man is found dead, mutilated in his house, DS Wendy Knight and DCI Jack Culverhouse soon realise that Jeff Brelsford was killed for one reason: he was a paedophile.
As Wendy does her job and tries to find the killer, Culverhouse is less keen. As far as he's concerned, this is justice.
With Culverhouse's attitude and stubbornness leaving him on the sidelines, Wendy delves deeper into the dark and murky world of Jeff Brelsford, and what she discovers is enough to shock her to her core.
Could it be that the killer was someone very close to home... a police officer?
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The Thirteenth Room
- Kempston Hardwick Mysteries Book 4How Do You Stop a Killer When Nobody Believes There’s Been a Murder?
Another Thrilling Kempston Hardwick Mystery from International #1 Bestseller Adam Croft
A tragic suicide at the Manor Hotel rattles the community, evokes sympathy for the new widow, and makes Kempston Hardwick suspicious. The more he learns about the suspicious death, the more sure he is that whatever happened in room 13 wasn’t suicide.
When the local police are reluctant to investigate, it’s up to Hardwick and his friend Ellis to unravel the mystery. But, before the two men can even finish processing all the clues, another dead body, another supposed suicide, is discovered in room 13.
Rumors of a supernatural culprit begin to get harder to ignore as the danger and the body count mount at the Manor Hotel.
Will Hardwick discover the true killer, or will he and Ellis become the next guests who go to room 13 to check out permanently?
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Death Under the Sun
- Kempston Hardwick Mysteries Book 3Holidays can be murder…
Sun, sea, sand and murder. How do you find a killer amongst a group of holidaymakers with their own hidden agendas and sordid backgrounds?
After solving two particularly tricky murder cases, Kempston Hardwick needs a holiday. At least that's what his friend, Ellis Flint, in his infinite wisdom, believes.
When the pair arrive on the twenty-four-hour Greek party island of Friktos, Hardwick is in his idea of hell. Eventually, he decides to make the most of his holiday and to try to relax.
That is until one of their fellow holidaymakers is found dead in their apartment…
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The Westerlea House Mystery
- Kempston Hardwick Mysteries Book 2Oscar Whitehouse foretold his own death on live TV. Hours later, he's found dead in a locked room. But who killed him?
When TV psychic Oscar Whitehouse is found murdered inside a locked room, private detective Kempston Hardwick and his friend Ellis Flint are called in to investigate.
Within a matter of days, a second murder takes place in the small village of Tollinghill and a local resident claims she saw the already-dead Oscar Whitehouse at the scene, apparently alive and well. Hardwick and Flint realise they have more than just a conventional mystery in the village. Can they uncover the secret of the Tollinghill murders, before it’s too late?
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Exit Stage Left
- Kempston Hardwick Mysteries Book 1Charlie Sparks brought a whole new meaning to dying on stage...
Charlie Sparks had it all. A former primetime television personality, his outdated style has seen him relegated to the scrapheap.
When he collapses and dies during a stand-up routine at a local pub, mysterious bystander Kempston Hardwick is compelled to investigate his suspicious death.
As Hardwick begins to unravel the mystery, he quickly comes to realise that Charlie Sparks's death throws up more peculiar questions than answers.
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Guilty as Sin
- Knight & Culverhouse Book 2A missing teenager. A murdered businessman. A huge, earth-shattering secret.
When seventeen-year-old Danielle Levy goes missing one lunchtime, DS Wendy Knight and DCI Jack Culverhouse believe they have a routine case on their hands.
When a prominent local businessman is found dead in his warehouse, however, the case takes a whole new disturbing turn as Knight and Culverhouse begin to unravel the connections between the two cases which lead to a dark and disturbing secret that will make them question everything they thought they knew.
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Too Close For Comfort
- Knight & Culverhouse Book 1What if the serial killer you were investigating was someone you knew?
DS Wendy Knight's first murder case was always going to test her limits, but even she couldn't anticipate that a sadistic serial killer might be someone she knew - very well.
As her investigation unfolds, so too does a sinister plot that will turn her world upside down and make it increasingly difficult to distinguish friend from foe in her tightknit world.
By the time Wendy realises she is the killer's final intended victim, she's left fighting against her personal instincts - and for her life.
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