The Hay Festival

I love the Hay festival. I love all literary festivals, but there is a special place in my heart for Hay. As a child, my parents would bring me to this beautiful little town with its dizzying array of bookshops, and would set me loose. For a nerdy little kid for whom the real world paled in comparison to the myriad worlds found in books, Hay On Wye was a land of dreams.
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New Pastures

For anyone who’s missed it, I have some exciting news. I have just signed a three book deal with Orion books. I am thrilled to be once again working with the awesome Fran Pathak, and to be diving into my first ever trilogy. Eek! … More New Pastures

Plotting and scheming…

Somehow it’s February. I’m not sure how that happened. Although apparently it is commonplace for it to follow January. But much of the past month has spun by in a whirl of my own deviousness, for I have been plotting. It’s not as sinister as it sounds and, whilst it is tempting to take a shot at world domination -seriously, how much worse could I be than what we’re currently dealing with??? – I have, for now, restricted myself to the world of books.
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In the beginning…

It’s January and that must mean that with a new year comes a new book. A fresh pukka pad. A healthy supply of pens (black, obviously). And an idea. People ask where I get my ideas from, as if us authors have access to some mysteriously hidden well of knowledge, curtained off from the rest of the general population. I don’t – unfortunately. But what I do have is a serious and untreated curiosity about the world around me. It is such a fascinating place. So many different stories unfolding all at the same time. As an author, my job is to take those in. To read them, to watch them, to see them unfold. And then, from within those stories, to find the nugget of an idea, the opening bars of the story I want to tell. … More In the beginning…

The lull

I have a problem. It’s not a new problem. In fact, it’s one that’s been haunting me for the better part of this year. It is painful. I am suffering … More The lull