I was born on top of a Cornish tin mine, in the far south-west of the UK. A magical county with a rich heritage, Cornwall continues to inspire my work.
Years spent outside the county have been dominated by the letter B. There was Bath, studying for my degree in German and Italian… Berlin, singing in rock bands… Finally, Birmingham, where in between enjoying curries and real ale I spent a decade writing articles, interviews and stories for all kinds of magazines, largely in the music and environmental press.
Unable to stay away, I returned to Cornwall’s ‘clay country’ and joined educational charity The Eden Project (www.edenproject.com). I took on all manner of roles during my eleven years with them – gardener, guide, administrator – and I also wrote features for their Friends magazine.
I have been writing since childhood, and still own little books I wrote at primary school, complete with lurid titles like Nightmare Hill and Terror Island. I have a long-abandoned trio of first drafts which would be of more interest to the denizens of my wormery than to the average publisher – but they did teach me an enormous amount about the art and craft of writing books.
My debut novel, The Time Crystals, published in 2020, is a story about ordinary kids who embark on an extraordinary time travelling adventure. During a very exciting phase for me, my manuscript reached the final five in the Young Adult category of the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award, garnering a wonderful review from Publishers Weekly, and it went on to win international contest The Next Novelist.
More recently, I was delighted to join Authors Reach Ltd. My first novel with them, The Mystery of Acorn Academy, is due to be released in March 2021.
When not writing, I love to work in my wildlife garden or go walking in the Cornish landscape. For the past few years I’ve been helping to build my own house, which has involved crash courses in new skills such as slating roofs, fitting insulation and laying flooring. As those who know me will attest, I’m not the most practical of people, but it’s been a fascinating challenge!
