Meeting the Sunderland

It’s nearly a year now since Under Leaden Skies was released. It seems both far longer and far shorter than that – I’ve certainly learned a lot in the last 12 months, and my writing has developed in ways I…

Weekend Writing Snippet

As anyone who follows me on either Twitter or Facebook is likely to already have noticed, I spent this weekend at Gladstone’s Library in North Wales on a writing retreat organised by my lovely publishers, Manifold Press. Over dinner on…

News & thoughts

First, some news: Under Leaden Skies was a finalist in the Rainbow Awards! (Category Gay – Historical) w00t! Yay, etc. Many thanks to Manifold Press for entering it (they enter all their books – one of the many reasons I…

Thoughts on Remembrance Sunday

Anyone who has read my book Under Leaden Skies has hopefully seen the dedication; for those of you who haven’t, here it is: It’s an odd thing, writing a tale which revolves around and relies on war as one of…

Sunderland flying boats

I was going to write here a post filled with all the awesomely fantastic facts I learned about Sunderland flying boats during the course of my research, but then I thought: really? I know I’m super-interested in them, but that’s…

Out in the wild at last!

So, Under Leaden Skies was released yesterday. I find I’m feeling a lot more higgledy-piggledy about it than I thought I would… I mean, I’ve known these characters for 4 years! I put their story to one side for at…

Cover Story

Having been hanging round with various writerly types for over 10 years now, I’ve heard my fair share of stories about book covers going wrong, or it taking an absolute age to find a design which both author and publisher…

A Small Celebration

A couple of weeks ago, I finally got as absolutely as far as I could on my own with my WW2 story “Under Leaden Skies”. After a last check through, I sent it off to the publisher I pitched it…

Settings, I think I hate them right now

I’m considering choosing which story to write next based on how many different places the tale takes place in. Having spent arggh-many hours finding out, reading up on, looking at pictures of, and in some cases visiting, all the different…

Different kinds of stories

I’ve been thinking a bit recently about my reasons for writing stories, and realised it can’t ever be pinned down because each story has its own reason for me writing it. Some stories are about exploring a mood, some stem…