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What inspired you to start writing?
I'd never written anything other than commercial copy until going along to a local writers group. After two or three sessions of writing to prompts and scenarios, I'd written two short stories, the first of which was featured in the Northwich Literature Festival, 2025
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Can you tell us a little about your latest book?
Just Another Tuesday in Manhattan had started as a short story exploring adoption and the idea of twins separated at birth. The research into likely scenarios led to creating a journey of discovery for Andy and his twin Gino, both adopted into different families - Andy in London and Gino in New York. Together they discover more about themselves and search for their birth mother - leading to an emotionally charged reunion with their birth family in Dublin.
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How do you create your characters?
Now there's a question! I suppose many characters are probably based on aspects of myself, or on people I've come across over the years. I usually start by writing the bones of a back story for each main character and then a timeline for the story in separate tabs in a gdoc to refer and add to, as the story unfolds during the writing.
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What does your typical writing day look like?
I'm still working part time in marketing, so mostly my writing time is early morning before the day begins. I'll of course jot down ideas as they happen during the day.
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What has been the most rewarding part of being an indie author?
Most rewarding has been getting the feedback, firstly from friends and then in the reviews which have been so encouraging. It seems I've created something with this first novel that really resonates with all sorts of readers.
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What’s one challenge you’ve faced in your writing journey?
The main challenge is that I'm not writing full time.
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Do you have any favorite writing tools or apps?
Google gdocs are invaluable for organising info as I write. I'm sure there better database type apps but I've not felt the need for anything else - yet. For promotions, Canva is very useful - along with freepik and other free photo resources for book covers etc. And... social media of course!
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What advice would you give to new or aspiring indie authors?
Just write. If you've an idea for a story that you want to share, just write as a stream of consciousness until it starts to take on a life of its own - maybe the first 10,000 words. Then go back over what you've got so far and make notes on paper. If you have chapters already, then don't be precious over rearranging them, or adding a new start point. I've just done that with my second novel to get a more compelling start to the story.
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How do you handle book promotion as an indie author?
I started by contacting local bookshops and several of them are now stocking my book. I created a separate persona for writing in social media channels, and produced some video reels and creative in Canva. I've also reached out to reviewers across a number of websites and sent out review copies as books or epub/pdf versions.
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What’s next for you? Are you working on a new book?
I've two on the go at the moment. First, a couple who after Ben's serious back injury end up losing the business and decide to sell the house and move into a canal narrowboat - on backstories of adoption, art and furniture design. It will include interaction with a slightly scary Rominchal birth family and hopefully lead towards a heartwarming denoument. No idea what as yet!
Second, I'm trying to write from a different viewpoint about Charlie a gay woman and her BFF Jack a gay guy. I'm still working out where this goes, but she wants a baby and I'm thinking she will ask Jack to help - there should be opportunity to bring in some gentle humour along the way...
