Some people (having had their arms firmly twisted) have asked me how I came to write my first novel and how it got published. It still feels weird to talk about it ..like it has happened to someone else, but here goes.I actually started writing when I was four, my first attempt to get published being a joke sent off by my mum to the Topper (yes - I'm that old). When I was nine, I won a runner's up prize in a Daily Mirror children's literary competition. Thanks to an inspirational English teacher at the local comprehensive, I later got a place to read English Language & Literature at Oxford. Special interests included Jane Austen and hot rum punch at The Turf Tavern.
After leaving uni worked (briefly) in a food factory, as a copywriter, a regional journalist and now runs a freelance copywriting business. The best part has been writing non-fiction articles including interviews with authors, actors and sportspeople.
I never dreamed of writing any fiction - far too difficult, I thought (it was and is) and very stressful (it was and isn't quite so much now).
In January 2005 I met up with a group of wonderful women on the BBC Drama message board, and became one of the members of an internet literary/writing site called C19. My first piece of fiction was a 'fanfic' called, imaginatively N&S 2005. It was a sexy, funny ( I hope) ‘modern’ take on the Mrs Gaskell’s North & South, without the multiple deaths and politics.
Which all gives me an excuse to post another gorgeous bloke. Mr 'Overbearing Master' himself, star of North & South ....Richard Armitage. (Sorry, Richard if you ever come across this but you have to shoulder some of the blame...and what broad shoulders they are.)
