Comma Press: Writing Short Crime Fiction Course

I’m so excited to be teaching a new online writing course for Comma Press starting in May. You can book tickets for it here. About the course: This online writing course will give you the skills to write a great crime story. You will practice crafting memorable characters, writing believable dialogue, and bringing the world of your crime story compellingly […]

The Glass Delusion

I’m thrilled to have some new writing published in Needle Magazine, alongside some amazing poetry, prose poems and experimental pieces. My flash fiction piece is called ‘The Glass Delusion’ and tells story of the Russian composer, Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, who was afflicted by a psychological illness known as ‘The Glass Delusion’, which caused him acute stage fright on the opening […]

That Lockdown Novel

It had to be done. During the Lockdown, while everyone was busy homeschooling their kid and teaching their cat ballet and writing their Lockdown novel… I was doing the same (substitute dog for cat and close-up magic for ballet). Mine comes at the Lockdown from a slant, mind you. It’s as much about plants, climate change and the environment as […]

Polaroids and Poems

Since the Lockdown started, we’ve been making the most of our designated outdoors time. Living in Chorlton, we’re very lucky to have access to Kenworthy Woods through the back gate and it’s an amazing time of year, with the trees turning green again and the wild garlic in bloom. I’ve seen a few butterflies around and can hear the owls […]

The Lure of Abandoned Places

My follow-up to The American Girl is a mystery novel about Dark Tourism, a subject I’ve been fascinated in for the last few years. Dark Tourism is defined as “travelling to places associated with death and suffering”, although it’s not invariably as creepy as that sounds. Like any kind of travel, it has its good and bad sides, from people […]

An Interview With Mary Shelley

It was an honour and an all-round wonderful experience to be asked to judge the Dead Romantic Interviews writing competition for Edge Hill University’s Romantic Lives Conference. There were a lot of terrific entries and it was difficult to choose a winner. You can read the winning entries here. To kick-start the competition, I wrote my own interview with… of […]

Korean Translation of The American Girl

I was excited to find out that my novel, The American Girl, was going to be translated into Korean by the lovely people at Tomato Publishing. I’m even more thrilled now that I have my hands on the book. It really is the most gorgeous-looking cover… I’m also intrigued by all the footnotes explaining Twin Peaks, French food and Johnny […]

Virtual Book Tour

I’m excited to announce the dates for the virtual book tour for The American Girl. See the banner above for the where and when of upcoming reviews of my new novel coming from a range of amazing and talented reviewers.

Cake Magazine

Many thanks to editor Finn Jackson for asking me to write a feature article for the latest issue of Cake Magazine. When she wrote to me to say that the subject for Cake 7 was the body (human, animal, monster), “how we celebrate it, dissect it, wonder and rage at it”, I was intrigued straight away, but it was really her reminder of the […]

Scottish First Book of the Year Award

I was so thrilled when my publisher at Barbican Press, Martin Goodman, called to tell me I’d been shortlisted for the Scottish First Book of the Year (Saltire) Award. I travelled to Hoy and wrote The Monster’s Wife out of my fascination with Shelley’s novel, with Orkney as place and because of my sense of the developing character of “the Bride”. It was […]