Sam Blake*  is originally from St. Albans in Hertfordshire but has lived at the foot of the Wicklow Mountains in Ireland for more years than she lived in the UK. Married to a retired member of An Garda Siochana she has two children, three cats and sole responsibility for a small ant farm while her eldest is in university in Swansea (learning to build rockets).

*Sam Blake herself is a character from the imagination of Vanessa Fox O’Loughlin who is the founder of the multi award winning writing resources website Writing.ie, The Inkwell Group publishing consultancy and is the founder of Murder One, Ireland’s International Crime Writing Festival.  Vanessa is a board member of the Society of Authors, led by Chair Joanne Harris, the UK based trade union that campaigns and lobbies at government level on issues that affect authors. She is also a fellow of the Royal Society for the Encouragement of the Arts, Manufactures and Commerce (RSA) – noteable past fellows include Charles Dickens, Benjamin Franklin, Stephen Hawking, Karl Marx, Adam Smith, Nelson Mandela, David Attenborough, William Hogarth and Tim Berners-Lee. A past chair of Irish PEN, she is the convenor of the Irish Chapter of the Crime Writers Association.

 Sam Blake's The Dark Room hit the bestseller list on release on 7th January and focuses on a country house hotel in West Cork. Hare's Landing is a house full of secrets where the past never dies. Pick up your copy here https://amzn.to/3j2IBET