Our first featured author of the year is V.J. Randle. Victoria reached out to me with an offer to send a PR box of her Scottish murder mystery, aptly titled Cold Secrets, which she has been serializing weekly on her Substack. Naturally, I began reading it immediately, and was hooked before my copy came in the mail!
In the interview below, Victoria and I chat about the novel’s characters, its unconventional publishing path, and more.
Connect with Victoria on Substack, Instagram, TikTok, and more. Grab a copy of Cold Secrets here—or start reading it now on her Substack!
Welcome, Victoria! Thanks so much for joining. Set in the wintry Scottish Highlands, Cold Secrets follows Robert Begg and a crew of friends as they work to solve a decades-old murder case. What do you love about Robert as an investigator, as well as his friends that comprise this group of sleuths?
Such a pleasure to be here—thank you for having me.
Robert is such an unlikely sleuth, which is why I love him! He’s the sort of guy who’s happy to be running his bar (The Pine Needle) and quietly reading his hiking books. He’s certainly not looking for any drama when Londoner Mirabella Rowley disrupts his New Year’s Eve party, claiming his recently deceased father has something to do with a decades’ old murder . . .
He eventually investigates the case out of a sense of duty towards his community and friends, as opposed to any sort of ego. I enjoyed creating a younger-millennial sleuth with the money worries and anxieties that can go with being in your late twenties.
His friends Eilidh, Justine, and Hammy remind me of the warm and brilliant people you find living in the North-East of Scotland (Findrussie is a fictional village set in the Highlands, but I’ve drawn a lot from Moray, Speyside, which is my home). It’s lovely to explore friendships between people of different generations. Each of their unique traits certainly helps solve the crime!
A large part of the investigation relies on local knowledge, which is why the “Pine Needle” team is uniquely placed to move from clue to clue. I love mysteries which expose the secrets kept by small, unassuming communities. It’s been compared to Only Murders in the Building and The Marlowe Murder Club—both of which I’m very pleased with!
After penning (and shelving it) a few years ago, Cold Secrets gained readership on Substack, after you began serializing it in September 2024—and now, it’s published! What prompted you to serialize the book, and what have you learned during this process?
Well, this a bit of a sad story (and, strangely, pertinent to Robert’s situation at the opening of the book).
Having shelved Cold Secrets because my publisher, Bloodhound Books, wanted to focus on my other series (The Hellenic Mysteries), I’d accepted the fact this book was destined for the Google Drive-aether. However, in August, my father very suddenly passed away. I found myself unable to work on my work-in-progress in the aftermath, but I still wanted to do something useful.
Cold Secrets had already been edited years ago, and I’d also commissioned some lovely artwork for it; both these endeavours were going to waste. So, I tentatively (and, if I’m honest, somewhat impulsively) posted the first two chapters on Substack.
I’d never considered it fully before, but, of course, the mystery genre lends itself very well to serialisation. Within the first week, I had around 250 subscribers. This kept growing to the 650 readers I have today.
The wonderful thing about a platform like Substack is you can see how invested your readers are in your story. It’s powerful encouragement to know people are opening your email and reading a chapter each week! The feedback was also lovely: Unlike when I’d released my previous novels, there was more scope for meaningful conversations with readers.
I would never have considered publishing Cold Secrets without the backing of a publisher if it weren’t for the serialisation process. However—with a dedicated readership, some wonderful pre-publication reviews, and a certainty that Findrussie’s mystery already had people hooked—it seemed silly not to turn it into a “proper” book!
The chapters on Substack actually function per se as a marketing tool. When approaching book bloggers, booktokers, bookstagrammers etc., I can direct them to the released chapters and they can decide whether they like them or not (thankfully, they have!).
I know some authors serialise their fiction as they write it, however, this seems like an extremely stressful thing to do. I’ve noted how important it is to publish consistently (even to the minute!), so the pressure of releasing an unfinished work every week would be overwhelming for me. My advice to anyone considering the serialisation route is to have your manuscript ready-for-publication before doing anything else.
Your other series, the Hellenic Mysteries, are set in present-day Greece and draw on your experience as an educator of Latin and Greek. Can you share a bit about those books? How would you compare writing the Hellenic Mysteries with a murder mystery like Cold Secrets?
The first in the series, The Athenian Murders, follows police officer Michail Mikras, his partner Katerina, and detective Sofia as they investigate a string of murders seemingly inspired by the Greek myths. This is more of a whydunit, rather than a whodunit, and readers enjoy how knowledge of mythology ultimately helps Michail and his colleagues solve the case. If you like mythology and mystery, then there’s a good chance this will be up your street.
The Saturn House Killings, the second book in the series, takes place on the island of Aegina. The same team investigates a body found on the beach of an exclusive luxury resort. There’s very much an eat-the-rich theme present, which lots of readers have enjoyed. Michail Mikras has actually been compared to the detective Monk from the television series!
Unlike the Hellenic Mysteries, Cold Secrets isn’t told from the point of view of law enforcers. This actually gave me a lot more freedom as a storyteller. When you’re writing from the perspective of the police, you must ensure certain procedural elements are correct, otherwise, readers will rightly begin to pick holes in the plot’s credibility. With Cold Secrets, it was easier to build a traditional whodunit without the constraints of procedure, placing the reader right at the heart of the mystery with Robert and his team.
Cold Secrets is just a segment of your other content on Substack—what else do you like to discuss on the platform? Why do you, as an author, love using Substack to communicate with your audience?
As I’m sure is the case for all authors, random (and, I like to think, interesting) thoughts are always popping into my head and it’s good to noodle them out! My Substack, Myriatid, publishes articles about my borderline fetish for notebooks, the Renaissance, the symbology of owls, cultural commentary . . . you name it!
It’s a great place to connect with people over shared interests. Book promotion is essential, but it does seem a bit tiresome to be constantly talking about my books and reviews, et cetera. Substack allows me to write about unrelated topics and connect with readers over these.
Lastly, what’s on your horizon? What are you currently working on and looking forward to?
I have a few projects on the go. I’m currently finishing a standalone murder mystery set in a luxury hotel in the Highlands (no surprises there!). I’m also excited to get started on the sequel to Cold Secrets—readers seem to love these characters and I’d like to spend more time with them.
Thanks so much to Victoria for the interview. Sleuths, I hope you enjoyed it! If you aren’t already subscribed, please be sure to sign up for the Cluesletter and get author features like this alongside other mystery goodies, delivered to your inbox every other Tuesday.