Denise Mina

Denise Mina (born 21 August 1966) is a Scottish crime writer and playwright. She has written the Garnethill trilogy and another three novels featuring the character Patricia "Paddy" Meehan, a Glasgow journalist. Described as an author of Tartan Noir, she has also written for comic books, including 13 issues of Hellblazer.

Mina's first Paddy Meehan novel, The Field of Blood (2005), was filmed for broadcast in 2011 by the BBC, starring Jayd Johnson, Peter Capaldi and David Morrissey. The second, The Dead Hour, was filmed and broadcast in 2013.

Biography

Denise Mina was born in East Kilbride in 1966. Her father worked as an engineer. Because of his work, the family moved 21 times in 18 years: from Paris to The Hague, London, Scotland and Bergen; she has also professed an affection for Rutherglen, her mother's home town. Mina left school at 16 and worked in a variety of jobs, including as a kitchen porter, a cook and behind a bar. She also worked for a time in a meat-processing factory. In her twenties she worked in auxiliary nursing for geriatric and terminal care patients, before returning to education and earning a law degree from Glasgow University.

It was while researching a PhD thesis on the ascription of mental illness to female offenders, and teaching criminology and criminal law at Strathclyde University in the 1990s, that she decided to write her first novel Garnethill, published in 1998 by Transworld.

Mina lives in Glasgow.

Awards and honours

• 1998 John Creasey Dagger for Best First Crime Novel, Garnethill
• 2011 The Martin Beck Award (Bästa till svenska översatta kriminalroman), The End of the Wasp Season
• 2012 Theakston's Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year Award, The End of the Wasp Season
• 2013 Theakston's Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year Award, Gods and Beasts
• 2017 Gordon Burn Prize, The Long Drop
• 2017 McIlvanney Prize for Scottish Crime Novel of the Year, The Long Drop
• 2020 Deutscher Krimi Preis (Category: International crime writers) for Gods and Beasts

Bibliography

Novels

Garnethill trilogy

• Garnethill (1998)
• Exile (2000)
• Resolution (2001)

Patricia "Paddy" Meehan novels

• The Field of Blood (2005)
• The Dead Hour (2006)
• The Last Breath (2007) – published as Slip of the Knife in America

Alex Morrow novels

• Still Midnight (2009)
• The End of the Wasp Season (2010)
• Gods and Beasts (2012)
• The Red Road (2013)
• Blood, Salt, Water (2014)

Anna & Fin novels

• Conviction (2019)
• Confidence (2022)

Other novels

• Sanctum (2003) (published as Deception in the US in 2004)
• The Long Drop (2017) based on the 1958 trial and execution of the serial killer Peter Manuel.
• The Less Dead (2020)
• Rizzio (2021)
• The Second Murderer (2023), a Philip Marlowe novel

Comics

To date, the entirety of Mina's work in comics has been published under DC Comics' Vertigo imprint:

• Hellblazer #216–228 (with Leonardo Manco and Cristiano Cucina (#223), 2006–2007) collected as John Constantine, Hellblazer Volume 19 (tpb, 328 pages, 2018, ISBN 1-401-28080-3)
• Vertigo Crime: A Sickness in the Family (with Antonio Fuso, graphic novel, 192 pages, 2010, ISBN 1-4012-1081-3)
• The Millennium Trilogy graphic novel adaptations:
  • The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (tpb, 312 pages, 2014, ISBN 1-4012-4286-3) collects:
    • The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo Book One (with Leonardo Manco and Andrea Mutti, hc, 152 pages, 2012, ISBN 1-40123-557-3)
    • The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo Book Two (with Leonardo Manco and Andrea Mutti, hc, 160 pages, 2013, ISBN 1-4012-3558-1)
  • The Girl Who Played with Fire (with Andrea Mutti, Leonardo Manco and Antonio Fuso, hc, 288 pages, 2014, ISBN 1-401-23757-6; sc, 2015, ISBN 1-4012-5550-7)
  • The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest (with Andrea Mutti and Antonio Fuso, hc, 272 pages, 2015, ISBN 1-4012-3759-2; sc, 2016, ISBN 1-401-26477-8)

Plays

• Ida Tamson (2006)
• A Drunk Woman Looks at the Thistle (2007), inspired by Hugh MacDiarmid's modernist poem, A Drunk Man Looks at the Thistle, and first performed by Karen Dunbar.
• The Meek, radio play for BBC Radio 3, broadcast on 7 March 2009

Notes

External links

• Official website
• Denise Mina at British Council: Literature
• Still Midnight review and interview in The Scotsman
• Denise Mina talking with Ian Rankin at the Edinburgh International Book Festival (transcript and audio), 17 August 2006
• Amy Myers, End of the Wasp Season review in ShotsMag Ezine