Mark Billingham was born in Solihull, West Midlands and grew up in Moseley, Birmingham. He attended the King Edward VI Camp Hill School for Boys grammar school in nearby King's Heath, and lived in that general area "right the way through university".[2][3] After graduating with a degree in drama, he stayed in Birmingham and helped form a socialist theatre company (Bread & Circuses). Bread & Circuses toured with a number of shows in schools, colleges, arts centres and the street.[3] In the mid-1980s he moved from Birmingham to London as a "jobbing actor", taking minor roles in episodes of TV shows Dempsey and Makepeace, Juliet Bravo, Boon, and The Bill.[2][4] After finding himself playing a variety of "bad guy roles such as a soccer hooligan, drug addict, a nasty copper, a racist copper or a bent copper", he became somewhat disenchanted with acting, perceiving that the emphasis was not on talent, but on looks.[3]
Around 1987 he decided to pursue a career in comedy, in part because:
"[The] one great advantage of stand-up comedy [is that] nobody gives a stuff about what you look like – as long as you're funny, and if you can do it, and people laugh, then you'll get bookings."[3]
At the time, breaking into stand-up was not as difficult as it would later become, nor was there the modern infrastructure and chain businesses. Billingham cites his own route as a simple progression from 5-minute, unpaid "try-out" spots to (if one was deemed worthy) 10-, 20- and 30-minute paid slots.[3] As he stated, "within a year, you could be playing the Comedy Store".[3] Indeed, Billingham has headlined at the Comedy Store on many occasions, where he also appears regularly as a Master of Ceremonies.[3]
Despite feeling rather ambivalent towards "serious" roles, Billingham still found considerable success by merging his careers as actor and comic to work in comedy shows. He was the human face on the puppet-representation-of-celebrities series Spitting Image, and "the taller half" of top double act the "Tracy Brothers" with Mike Mole from Bread & Circuses days (now guitarist with British comedy punk band Punks Not Dad), appearing regularly on the radio version of The Mary Whitehouse Experience. In 1988, he was seen in the children's comedy series News at Twelve, in which the central character "broadcasts his own (imaginary) TV news bulletin every evening".[5] In 1989, a new role in a children's series written by Blackadder's Tony Robinson, would have a lasting effect, both on the nation's children and on Billingham himself.
My Opinion: Just reading my first by this writer, Die of Shame.
Bibliography:
Knight School (with Peter Cocks) (Hodder & Stoughton 1998) ISBN 0-340-74338-7
Triskellion (Walker Books Ltd [Feb 2008]) ISBN 1-4063-0709-2
Triskellion 2: The Burning (Walker Books Ltd [Feb 2009]) ISBN 978-1-4063-0710-8
Triskellion 3: The Gathering (Walker Books Ltd [Feb 2010])
Sleepyhead (Little, Brown & Company [Aug 2001]) ISBN 0-316-85697-5
William Morrow US [Jul 2002] ISBN 0-06-621299-5
Scaredy Cat (Little, Brown & Company [Jul 2002]) ISBN 0-316-85954-0
Time Warner UK [Nov 2002] ISBN 0-356-23206-9
William Morrow US [Jun 2003] ISBN 0-06-621300-2
Lazybones (Little, Brown & Company [Jul 2003]) ISBN 0-316-72493-9 ; ISBN 0-316-72494-7
William Morrow US (Jun 2004) ISBN 0-06-056085-1
The Burning Girl (Little, Brown & Company [Jul 2004]) ISBN 0-316-72574-9
William Morrow US (Jun 2005) ISBN 0-06-074526-6
Lifeless (Little, Brown & Company [May 2005]) ISBN 0-316-72752-0
Scorpion Press [Jun 2005] ISBN 1-873567-70-7
William Morrow US [Sep 2006] ISBN 0-06-084166-4
Buried (Little, Brown & Company [May 2006]) ISBN 0-316-73050-5
Orbit [May 2006] ISBN 0-356-24410-5
(HarperCollins (Aug 2007)) ISBN 0-06-125569-6
Death Message (Little, Brown & Company [Aug 2007]) ISBN 0-316-73052-1
Bloodline (Little, Brown & Company Aug 2009) ISBN 978-1-4087-0067-9
From the Dead (Little, Brown & Company Aug 2010) ISBN 978-1-4087-0075-4
Good as Dead (Little, Brown & Company Aug 2011) ISBN 978-1-84744-419-6
Retitled US The Demands (Mulholland Books Jun 2012) ISBN 978-0-316-12663-2
The Dying Hours (2013)
The Bones Beneath (2014)
Time of Death (2015)
Love Like Blood (2017)
In the Dark (Little, Brown & Company [Aug 2008]) ISBN 1-4087-0069-7
In the Dark contains Tom Thorne as a minor character.
"Dancing Towards The Blade" in Men From Boys by John Harvey (ed.) (Arrow Books [Sep 2004]) ISBN 0-09-946152-8
Other contributors include: Dennis Lehane • Michael Connelly • George Pelecanos • Jeffery Deaver • Lawrence Block
"Stroke of Luck" in Like A Charm by Karin Slaughter (ed.) (Century [Feb 2004]) ISBN 1-84413-373-7
Other contributors include: Laura Lippman • Lee Child • John Connolly • Lynda La Plante • John Harvey • Peter Robinson • Fidelis Morgan • Val McDermid • Karin Slaughter• Emma Donoghue• Denise Mina • Kelley Armstrong • Jane Haddam
"Introduction" in The High Window by Raymond Chandler (Penguin)
Rush of Blood contains Tom Thorne as a minor character. X
Die Of Shame (Little, Brown & Company, May 2016) ISBN 9780802125255 X
Die Of Shame contains Tom Thorne as a minor character.