Tag: fiction

  • Top Ten Joys of Writing Character

    Top Ten Joys of Writing Character

    Creating and writing character is the breath and blood of good stories. As Will Storr says in The Science of Storytelling, “It’s people, not events,that we’re naturally interested in. The plight of specific, flawed and fascinating individuals that make us cheer, weep and ram our heads into the sofa cushion. The surface events of the…

  • My Top Ten Inspirational Writing Haunts

    My Top Ten Inspirational Writing Haunts

    From tumble-down manor houses to tropical islands, from ruined abbeys to capital cities, places have always been a big inspiration for my writing. Here are my top ten inspirational writing haunts with some of the book extracts they’ve inspired. I visited this little island off the cost of Wales with my parents when I was…

  • Developing A Creative Curriculum Through Story Making

    Developing A Creative Curriculum Through Story Making

    I’ve just begun a two-year project with Bradford primary schools, working with children in Year 3 to develop their oracy skills and confidence through story making. Over the past couple of weeks we have visited the Land of Treasures and heard about the King Beyond the Unknown Ocean, who wishes to own light itself. Today,…

  • Free Audio Story: The Statue’s Curse

    Free Audio Story: The Statue’s Curse

    As it’s coming up to Halloween, here’s a free audio story for you to enjoy! Two churchmen fight to erase the memory of a local prophetess, with devastating consequences. This thirty-minute psychological ghost story draws on the legend of the famous English prophetess, Mother Shipton, and of the Petrifying Well, beside which she is said…

  • BBC Radio York interview for National Adoption Week

    BBC Radio York interview for National Adoption Week

    I was interviewed today on BBC Radio York for #NationalAdoptionWeek. We talked about the process of becoming an adoptive dad, the joys & challenges of adoption and how the experience inspired my new book Bea’s Witch: A ghostly coming-of-age story. What are your experiences of or questions about adoption?

  • How to Use Objects to Develop Character

    How to Use Objects to Develop Character

    Part of my writing process for my new young adult novel Bea’s Witch: A ghostly coming-of-age story involved using objects to shape the plot and develop the book’s main character. In this video, I introduce some of those objects and talk about my process. Let me know if you’ve ever used objects as a writing…

  • Page to Stage: Adapting a Book into a Play

    Page to Stage: Adapting a Book into a Play

    Being an author and theatre director, I spend a lot of my time either writing about fictional worlds or bringing them to life on stage. The perfect combination? Adapting my own book into a play! I’m currently in the process of bringing my first book in The Firebird Chronicles series, Rise of the Shadow Stealers, to the…