Mr Paul Toolan

Paul Toolan is a bearded, left-handed, non-swimming Piscean who was born in Leeds, Yorkshire, quite a long time ago. He's now a Southern softie enjoying the green landscape of England's West Country. After a successful career in Colleges and Universities, he wrote book/lyrics for stage musicals before ‘turning to murder’.

His mystery novels feature Inspector ‘Zig’ Batten, an urban Northerner displaced to Somerset where, to his horror, he discovers they still have crime. Worse, despite a fear of flying, Zig must sometimes forsake cider-land to confront villains in foreign countries such as Greece and Spain.

Like Zig, Paul enjoys walking, fishing, gardens and the occasional whisky. Unlike him, he appreciates sport and mushrooms, and loves travelling to sunnier climes. His idea of bliss is a slow lunch at a beachside taverna after productively tapping a keyboard to the ebb and flow of the Mediterranean sea.

His rural noir crime mysteries are character-based, with intricate plots and a slice of humour. Though largely set amid the apple-orchards of Somerset, escapades overseas bring added variety. The series so far:

A Killing Tree

A January Killing

An Easter Killing

The Killing of Queen Mab

A Secret Killing

A Ring O'Bells Killing

All can be read in series or standalone. And keep a lookout for familiar characters and new landscapes in book 7...

'A View from Memory Hill' is Paul's first collection of "beautifully poignant and funny" stories, giving voice to the dilemmas of mostly older minds, whose common ground is the half-shaded landscape of memory.