"What do you think is worth killing for?"
Consequential is the third installment in T.C. Parker's Hummingbird Murder Mystery series. For those familiar with Hummingbird and To Coventry, you already know that Parker's writing style is witty, thoughtful, and pulls you right in. According to ARC reviews for Consequential, readers can expect more of the same. Consequential is a unique venture into the worlds of both true crime and mythology, bringing readers a story that they might find hard to compare to anything else, and that's truly exciting!
Here's the book's synopsis:
Fresh from her recent foray into crime-solving, demonic fallen god (and would-be detective) Sunny is back from Coventry - with a debt still owed to the murderous ghost, Lady Godiva, and now a giant mythical pig in need of babysitting on her to-do- list.
What she needs, more than anything, is a nice hot bath and an episode of Poirot.
Fate, unfortunately, has other plans. As does her newest human ally, Jonas.
Plans that will lead Sunny down a conspiracy-riddled rabbit-hole of murder, mutilation and moral philosophy - and give her a brand new reason to dust off her fedora and go chasing after the perp.
T.C. answered a few questions for me regarding Consequential and her writing.
Q: You blend a lot of elements into Consequential that we don't see together often, namely true crime and mythology. How did the idea for Consequential come about? Was there ever a concern that it wouldn't all come together the way it did? I imagine a mash-up like that takes some considerably creativity to do well, which you've managed.
A: I absolutely love crime fiction - the twister and more intricate, the better! Long before I wrote Hummingbird (not long after I finished Saltblood, my first book), I wrote a crime trilogy about a group of female con artists in '90s London, and one of the things I most enjoyed was plotting their elaborate heists, concocting the final reveals... and having them all change identities every few scenes as they moved between cons. So I had a sense after that that I'd come back to crime at some point.
It didn't occur to me when I was writing Hummingbird that there'd be spin-offs or sequels. Without going into spoilers, some aspects of the ending felt very much like the book was closed! But I really enjoyed writing Sunny, the stranded demigod who's simultaneously fascinated by everything she sees and doesn't give a fuck about any of it, and whose ethical compass is... quite different than you'd expect of most protagonists. Once I started thinking through the story that became To Coventry and I realized I wanted to write something about the Lady Godiva myth and this medieval folk legend coming back to seek revenge... Sunny felt like the right character to explore it with. Not least because she's thousands of years old, so would have a better handle than most on communicating with the ghost of an 11th century noblewoman!
I can't say I was every massively worried it wouldn't come together... but mostly because I'm a plotter, and pretty much every chapter I write (sometimes scene by scene, and beat by beat) is mapped out in great detail before I ever start writing! The thought of sitting down to write without a roadmap terrifies me.
Q: Consequential is the third book in the Hummingbird Murder Mystery series. For readers new to the series, can the books be read as standalones? If so, what elements do you maintain in each book to ensure they remain obviously in the same universe while also being their own unique stories?
A:To Coventry and Consequential can definitely be read apart f rom Hummingbird, I think. They're very different tonally. Hummingbird is absolutely a horror novel, whereas To Coventry and Consequential are kind of horror/murder mystery/comic fantasy hybrids with as much emphasis on the comedy as the horror.
The consistent thread is the characters, specifically Sunny and Jonas, who also survived the events of Hummingbird and, though mostly off-page in To Coventry, comes back with a bang in Consequential. I love those characters to death; as a writer, I'd follow them anywhere, through any genre (or genre mash-up). Hopefully at least a few readers will feel the same!
Q: Can we expect more from the Hummingbird universe? What other projects, if any, have you been working on?
A: You definitely can! I've already tacitly mapped out a fourth Hummingbird book, which - without giving too much away - is likely to explore a lot more of Sunny's past and some of her misadventures across the last six millennia from Mesopotamia to the court of Henry VIII (anyone who knows me knows I love Anne of Cleves, so I daresay she'll find her way in there somewhere too).
Before that, though, I have a standalone crime novel out next year with Nefarious Bat, the small press I set up this year with my partner, Shauna McEleney (Awake the Night). It's called Tradwife, is a fictionalized true crime story in the Ghosts That Ate Us/Penance mold... and explores the aftermath of a mass murder in the UK's first (and completely fictional!) purpose-built Tradwife community. It's a little bit Stepford Wives, a little bit Handmaid's Tale, and while there are no supernatural elements in it per se, there's enough gore, hopefully, to satisfy horror lovers.
I'm also working on what I think will end up being a body horror/eco horror novelette, but I'm barely 3,000 words into it, so who knows where it'll end up? Most of my stories seem to take a detour along the way, no matter how many plans I make for them...
As a lover of both horror and mythology, this installment of the Hummingbird Murder Mystery series sounds perfect! With sky-high ratings on Goodreads, the entire series is worth the read. You can pick up Consequential here, and while you're at it, grab the other books too!
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