Everyone has their dirty little secrets. Mine – well, one of mine – is a love of sensationalist murder magazines. They seem to be breeding on the top shelves of newsagents these days. Every time I go in, there is another title: Murder Casebook, Master Detective, True Crime. They are full of florid headlines, blocky neon fonts, agonising prose and close-up images of mutilated bodies – and their horribleness is part of their appeal.
Like a tabloid newspaper, they sometimes pretend that they are taking a moral line, but nobody is fooled. They know that dangling violent crime in the public’s face has always been a recipe for profit, and I continue to prove it by buying them.
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