Tell us about yourself and how many books you have written.
I gained a PhD in Engineering, hold numerous patents and have a career in technical management in high-tech industry. I began writing as another creative outlet after becoming ‘blocked’ as a sculptor and portraitist. ‘Renaissance’ is my first novel and the start of a series.
What is the name of your latest book and what inspired it?
‘Renaissance’ is an action, adventure thriller, set in a post-apocalyptic future, but not a high-tech dystopia, which you might imagine from my background. I have chosen instead a new middle ages, using tools and technology that hobbyists, and the few remaining professionals, could make work with limited resources.
I have always questioned sci-fi worlds where complete social breakdown is accompanied by huge consumption of energy and resources. It simply could not happen. The organisation, equipment, and specialist knowledge needed to produce and process oil is vast. This is not available to a depleted population that has survived a near-extinction event.
I also read a huge amount of history, especially medieval history and I have always been fascinated by the intensity, colour and violence of that world and how people sought to organise themselves, through religion, guilds and so forth. The social and political world of the middle ages was small, vibrant, and intensely alive, in part because people did not expect to live a long time.
I chose a post-apocalyptic setting for ‘Renaissance’ as a means of creating a small, close, world where I could develop characters that the reader might care about and also, in between the action, ask questions about our world, as much as theirs. I hope that I have been subtle enough in that aim not to detract from the pace of the plot or put my creations in a false position.
Do you have any unusual writing habits?
I don’t think I have yet acquired any odd writing habits, but I intend to!
What authors, or books have influenced you?
I think recently the biggest impressions on me have been made by Raymond Chandler and George Orwell. I am also a huge fan of C J Sansom’s Shardlake series.
Going back I read a lot of action novels, Alastair Maclean, Hammond Innes, Robert Ludlum, Fredrick Forsyth, Dick Francis. I am trying to write books that I would enjoy reading…
What are you working on now?
The second volume in the ‘Renaissance’ series, tentatively titled ‘Reprint’. I am really enjoying the plot at the moment and the new characters are mixing in nicely with some of the ones from the first book.
What is your best method or website when it comes to promoting your books?
I am very new to book promotion. It is extremely difficult to persuade people to take a chance on an unknown writer and in a sea of talented people I have not yet worked out how to get rescued!
Do you have any advice for new authors?
I think at this stage it would be presumptuous of me to give advice – my ears are open and my mouth firmly shut.
What is the best advice you have ever heard?
I think the only advice that has been correct so far is not to give up. It is tough to get going and it will always be tough to get going, but in the end you make your own luck.
What are you reading now?
I have just finished a couple of Jasper Fforde’s excellent ‘Thursday Next’ series and I am reading a history of the Royal Navy. Next up a brief introduction to Bronze Age Europe.
What’s next for you as a writer?
Complete the second book in the ‘Renaissance’ series, then possibly a comedy whodunnit that I have a plot outline for but not actually started.
What is your favorite book of all time?
Very tricky. I have read ‘Pride and Prejudice’ many times and probably will again, as I have the collections of Sherlock Holmes stories. Another that I love is James Clavell’s ‘Shogun’.
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