Aberystwyth private eye Louie Knight returns in a new novel by Malcolm Pryce.

The celebrated ‘Aberystwyth Noir’ series already boasts six successful novels and a stage adaptation; now there will be a seventh book, thanks to Pryce’s persistence.

‘A Streetcar Named Aberystwyth’ is described as dark, funny, twisted and touching, presenting an Aberystwyth that never quite happened.

Reminding us of his background, Pryce said: “I was born in Shrewsbury and spent my childhood in Aberystwyth, taking notes. Much of my life has been spent working and travelling abroad.

“After leaving school, I worked on the assembly line at the BMW factory in Munich. I’ve been a hotel dishwasher, a deck hand on a yacht sailing the South Seas, an advertising copywriter, and the world’s worst aluminium salesman. I currently live in Oxford.

“I'm the author of the ‘Aberystwyth Noir’ books. - ‘Aberystwyth Mon Amour’, ‘Last Tango in Aberystwyth’, etc. I am about to release a new one, ‘A Streetcar Named Aberystwyth’.”

Malcolm adds that “for fun” he has been tweeting a spoof graphic novel about his struggle with Aberystwyth's Penguin Industrial Complex who tried to ban the book. Is this a case of art imitating life?

“Bloomsbury told me in 2010 that they did not want more titles in the series and so things went dead for a while.

“It seems like I got two emails every week, year after year, from fans of the books asking why there were no more.

“So I eventually I decided to write one and self-publish it on Amazon Kindle, which is what I have done.

“It will be exclusively available on Amazon in the first few months, with a print-on-demand offer available. Not sure what will happen after that; it’s a massive learning curve.

“The spoof graphic novel makes out that Bloom’s Brewery was ‘leant on’ by Aberystwyth’s Penguin Industrial Complex to ban the book because it contains a dark secret that could destroy Aberystwyth.

“The actual novel is a conventional one, seventh in the series and features Louie and Calamity investigating a dark secret of the Patagonian war - the reason why the town of Nueva Aberystwyth fell…”

Pryce has recorded an exclusive video of himself reading an extract from the new book for our website.

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