Nick Oldham was born in April 1956 in a house in the tiny village of Belthorn on the moors high above Blackburn, Lancashire.After leaving college and spending a depressing year in a bank, he joined Lancashire Constabulary at the age of nineteen in 1975 and served in many operational postings around the county. Most of his service was spent in uniform, but the final ten years were spent as a trainer and a manager in police training. He retired in 2005 at the rank of inspector.
He lives with his partner, Belinda, on the outskirts of Preston.
Oldham applied the Page 69 Test to his new novel, Bad Cops, and reported the following:
I scoffed at this concept! Until I read page 69 and began to think that maybe it was representative of the rest of the book, and I suppose that one should be able to take any random page and apply that question ... But my page 69, much to my delight, said so much about the book. First of all, I think it's quite a funny page – Henry Christie is being tailed by two corrupt but inept detectives who do not like each other very much, one of whom has been eating too much fast food which plays havoc with his digestive system, and also discloses Henry's love of carrot cake – but it is also something more than this, and I think the book is summed up in a short sentence said by one of the bad guys to the other as they drive past Henry, who is sitting outside a café eating said cake, as this bad guy suddenly realizes something profound about Henry: 'This fucker is gonna haunt us.' And in that succinct phrase we readers learn something (which we may already know about Henry if we've read other books in the series): Once Henry Christie is on your tail, he is not gonna let go, whatever the cost.Follow Nick Oldham on Facebook and Twitter.
Writers Read: Nick Oldham.
--Marshal Zeringue
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