1. Every author experiences that moment in their life when they make that decision to become a writer. How did it come about for you?

For me it happened naturally. I used to do a lot of sailing and had a very active life, regularly travelling round the country and even into Europe to compete. Then an injury put paid to that and I was stuck at home. My way of coping was to read – a lot – then one day I picked up a pen and started to write. When I filled one notebook, I bought another, then another, and only then realised I was writing a book – Dead Reckoning – the first pirate adventure book in the Valkyrie series. If I’d thought about it beforehand I’d probably have never reached the end – and it took a number of rewrites and a great deal of editing before it was ready to be published, but it was the start of my new life – especially when it was long-listed in the prestigious Mslexia novel competition – and I haven’t looked back since.

 

2. What ignites your passion for writing?

In a word, people. To understand how people live in different cultures and eras, what life is/was like for them, and to try to understand why people do the things they do to each other.

 

In the Valkyrie Series, I explore the seventeenth-century Caribbean – I’m fascinated by the way so many nationalities descended on such a small area in search of riches and freedom, yet enslaved two continents in the process. Added to that, pirate ships were the most democratic societies in the Western world at the time, yet were one of the most brutal and unforgiving – another dichotomy that intrigues me.

 

The Yorkshire Ghost stories explore the way the past so often dictates the present, although I’ve taken that idea further with hauntings. Thores-Cross examines isolation – so many villages, especially in my native Yorkshire, were isolated in themselves and I wondered what the psychological effect would be on someone if they were ostracised within that community.

 

3. What do you hope readers will feel when reading your books?

A wide range of emotions – the same range I go through when I write the books, e.g. fear to excitement, sadness to joy, hate to love, and vice versa. But my biggest hope is that they’re able to put themselves into my characters’ world and walk in their shoes, at least for a little while. The world is undergoing great turmoil at the moment, and always has – mainly due to diversity and intolerance; by understanding past conflict as well as human motivation and reactions, maybe we can start to look at our neighbours with a little more mercy and compassion.

 

4. In your opinion, what are the most important aspects of a novel, and which authors do you admire the most in each area?

I think the most important areas are plotting, characterisation, dialogue, exposition, hooks and a strong female heroine (okay, that last one’s subjective!)

• Plotting – Robert Harris. His books are so, so clever, and everything always fits together perfectly.

• Characterisation – Ken Follett. His characters seem so real that I feel I know and empathise with them within a few pages (and sometimes lines) of his novels.

• Dialogue – Emma Donoghue. She really brings her characters to life through the way they speak, particularly in Room – the way Jack describes his world demonstrates the speech patterns of a five-year-old perfectly.

• Exposition – Tan Twan Eng. His descriptions just envelop me like a loving pair of arms.

• Hooks – Stephen King. What can I say? He’s the master.

• Female Heroine – Zoë Sharp. I so like Charlie Fox as a character – brave, flawed and so very real.

 

5. What’s next in your series of Yorkshire ghost stories?

Knight of Betrayal which focuses on the four knights – Hugh de Morville, Reginald fitz Urse, William de Tracy and Richard le Bret – who broke the sanctuary of Canterbury Cathedral to murder the Archbishop, Thomas Becket, in 1170. They fled to Knaresborough Castle – just down the road from me – yet very little is written about them after the murder, and what has been set down contradicts every other account. In Knight of Betrayal I want to examine the reasons why they committed this atrocious act as well as the extreme level of their medieval sense of guilt and dishonour in its aftermath, which has horrific repercussions nearly a millennium later.

 

There are a number of other books planned for the series as well, all focusing on local places, people and legends, exploring the way Yorkshire men and women lived through the ages and the major historical events, industries and traditions that have shaped today’s Yorkshire – with a few nightmares thrown in . . .