VERA STANHOPE

Vera in The Glass Room

The many admirers of Ann Cleeves's brilliant but unglamorous DI Vera Stanhope will be pleased to know that the fifth Vera Stanhope mystery, The Glass Room, is now available. In it, we meet Vera Stanhope at home: she is not one to make friends easily, but her hippy neighbours keep her well-supplied in homebrew and conversation, so she has more tolerance for them than most. When one of them goes missing she feels duty-bound to find out what happened. And her path leads her onto strange territory, to a writers' retreat where everyone is cooking up murder - but someone is taking death off the page and is making it real.

Read more about The Glass Room

Despite Vera's continuing - and growing - success, Ann Cleeves told Shots Magazine that The Crow Trap (the first Vera Stanhope novel) was originally intended as a standalone novel. But "I liked Vera Stanhope so much that I brought her back, first in Telling Tales and now in Hidden Depths. She developed because I was so cross with even feminist writers writing female central characters who were young, fit and beautiful. Vera isn't any of those things. She's overweight and middle-aged." - "more Nero Wolfe than V I Warshawski", as Jake Kerridge put it in The Telegraph!

Read an interview with Ann Cleeves in the Edinburgh Evening News about Vera Stanhope.

"... one of the most appealing fictional detectives to emerge since Andy Dalziel got into his stride..."

Martin Edwards, Spinetingler Magazine

"... although she is lonely, obsessed with her job and over fond of a beer, Vera is one of the few fictional detectives who seems not only like a real person, but one capable of conducting a murder enquiry. Ann Cleeves brings the same skill to all her characterisations in this highly impressive story."

Jake Kerridge, Daily Telegraph

Vera on television

2012 brings a second series of VERA, starring Brenda Blethyn as DI Vera Stanhope. Four new stand-alone episodes of the hit crime thriller are set once again in contemporary Northumberland and Newcastle, where - as Ann notes in her Diary - people living locally had already spotted the cast and crew out on location. Like the first series, the second series is produced by Elaine Collins who discovered Ann Cleeves' Vera Stanhope books in an Oxfam bookshop. Paul Rutman rejoins the production team and has written the first film entitled The Ghost Position. Paul has also written the fourth as yet untitled film. Colin Teevan has written the second film Sanddancers and Gaby Chiappe has adapted the third film, Silent Voices, from Ann Cleeves's novel.

The first series was shortlisted for not one but two Dagger awards in 2011. Author Ann Cleeves is delighted to have Brenda Blethyn playing the part of Detective Inspector Vera Stanhope: "She absolutely captures the spirit of the character," she says. &Now, I hear her voice when I'm writing dialogue for the books. She has that wit, humour and a touch of cruelty. I don't see Brenda so much because my vision of Vera is uglier than Brenda, even dressed-down Brenda, but I do hear Brenda's voice in my head."

Enthusiasm for the unglamorous but brilliant DI Vera Stanhope is worldwide: the first series of the television drama has been sold in 21 territories across the world. And the DVD of Series 1, previously only available in Region 2 format, has now been released for Region 1, which means it can be enjoyed in the USA and Canada as well as in Europe: order the DVD from Amazon UK (region 2 format) or from Amazon.com (Region 1). For a taster, you can still watch Telling Tales via the ITV mini-site dedicated to Vera, which also offers links to some promotional interviews.

You can also keep up with the show through its page on Facebook!

Vera in brief

Ann Cleeves has revealed something of Vera's past in two short stories. The Habit of Silence, one of Ann's contributions to Best Eaten Cold, a new anthology of stories from Ann and her colleagues in the Murder Squad writers' group, reveals something more about Vera Stanhope, the woman she is now and the past that made her. Another short story, Hector's Other Woman, is published in Guilty Consciences, the new anthology from the prestigious Crime Writers' Association.

Best Eaten Cold is now available from the publisher, The History Press and there is a nifty preview of the book on their website too.

Read more about these and all Ann Cleeves's short stories.

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