Online return to Sheffield's Off the Shelf Festival for superstar crime writer Lee Child

Lee and his biographer Heather Martin will be in conversation, speaking live online, as the opening event of the city’s Off the Shelf book festival on October 9.

The duo were last in the city for Off the Shelf in 2017, when Lee was speaking and Heather was in the audience making notes for her biography, which she had only just started researching at the time.

The book is called The Reacher Guy: The Authorised Biography of Lee Child.

The writer’s 25 books featuring his ex-military policeman hero have sold more than 100 million copies and Tom Cruise has starred in two Jack Reacher films so far.

Lee said: “It is so sad this year that everything has to be held virtually. We’ll do our best to make it just as good.”

Judging by our lively interview held on Zoom, the audience are in for a treat.

Lee said he was amazed at the changes to the city during his last visit. His brother and fellow crime writer Andrew Grant (Lee’s real name is James Grant) has been a more frequent visitor as his ex-partner lived in Sheffield with their children, who are now grown up.

That event was Heather’s first visit to Sheffield but she has been back several times since to find out more about Lee’s time at the University of Sheffield in the mid-1970s when he was studying for a law degree.

He said: “I mainly lived at Crookesmoor Road. I wasn’t on campus all that much, apart from the student union and concerts in the evening.

“I didn’t take being a student very seriously. For a long time I introduced myself as a bad student. I was a 1970s student when we were paid to go.”

Lee said he managed to pass his degree despite spending most of his time at the University Drama Studio, pursuing a career in theatre. He wasn’t a performer, preferring backstage roles.

"The drama studio was the one thing that made me pick Sheffield over everywhere else.”

Lee’s interest in theatre led him to a career in TV production with Granada. He famously starts each new book on the anniversary of the day when he was made redundant.

Lee said he was thrilled when his 1975 production of Ibsen’s A Doll’s House, including his set design, got a good review in the Sheffield Morning Telegraph.

Off the Shelf defies pandemic

He was also keen on the newspaper because of the chance to win £10,000 in the spot the ball competition. “You could have bought a detached house in Crookes and a car and had enough for fish and chips and a pint of beer!”

Talk of fish and chips reminded Lee of his favourite chippie, off Ecclesall Road: “I think it was run by Chinese people and I remember a woman who worked there. She was a fantastic reader and would always be reading a book.

"In the early 2000s I was visiting my brother who has a flat here and we went back to the same chip shop just for nostalgia’s sake. She was still there 30 years later in very thick glasses and she was holding my book, The Killing Floor.”

Asked by Heather whether he said anything, Lee replied: “I’d never say anything in those situations. A lot of readers are quite shy and want to be lost in the book.

"They don’t necessarily want to associate a book with an author. Also, I didn’t want to chat for half an hour!”

Lee has an ambivalent attitude to personal fame and was surprised that his publisher’s market research revealed that lots of readers are interested in the author.

His hero is hugely important to readers, though, said Heather, who has seen boxes of Lee’s fan mail in his archives begging him not to stop writing the books or kill Jack off.

He has come up with a unique solution: passing the torch to brother Andrew. They will work together initially before Lee step s away to retirement.

Then he says he’s going to sit on a sofa at home near New York and read someone else's books.

Watch Lee and Heather on October 9 via www.offtheshelf.org.uk