Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
I am a lifelong fan of crime fiction in all its formats but in particular through the written word. I fell in love with the works of Agatha Christie as a teenager and have harboured a desire to write crime fiction ever since. Although I greatly enjoy the Golden Age of crime fiction I write more modern versions, but always with a good mystery at its heart. While you Were Out is my first work of fiction but I have written a True Crime book about my great grandfather who was a Scotland Yard Detective in the early 20th Century.
What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
While You Were out is my debut crime novel and was quite simply an idea that wouldn’t leave me alone. Most writers will tell you that very often an idea will just one day expire and not seem worthy of the effort, but While You Were Out literally kept me awake at night.
Do you have any unusual writing habits?
No, not particularly. I write wherever the feeling takes me and for as long as my cats stay off my lap. I do write quickly, though. And a lot all at once.
What authors, or books have influenced you?
Mostly Agatha Christie but also PG Wodehouse, Raymond Chandler, Dickens, Wilbur Smith.
What are you working on now?
The sequel to While You Were Out called HMP BlackRock or Her Majesty’s Prison BlackRock for non UK readers, set on an island prison 30 miles off the coast of Scotland, where Britain’s nastiest go to serve out their sentences.
What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?
Still looking for that golden goose. Nothing beats paying for a bit of exposure! Difficult to do when your budget is as small as mine but it has to be done. I’m hoping Awesome Gang will be my new favourite website!
Do you have any advice for new authors?
Don’t start tomorrow, or when you ‘have time.’ Start NOW. And don’t stop. Just keep going until you finish and then re-write until it gives you a headache and then re-write some more. Never give up. Writing can be its own reward.
What is the best advice you have ever heard?
Next year you’ll be grateful you started today.
What are you reading now?
Leaving Las Vegas, purchased by my girlfriend for my 50th as it was published in the same year I was born.
What’s next for you as a writer?
More writing! And lots of it. Hopefully a little success thrown in so I can go part time at work and produce more books!
If you were going to be stranded on a desert island and allowed to take 3 or 4 books with you what books would you bring?
And Then There Were None and The Murder Of Roger Ackroyd by Agatha Christie because they are the best crime novels ever written. Warlock by Wilbur Smith. Great Expectations by Charles Dickens.
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