At the end of May, my short, YA appropriate, horror story Bone Sweet Bone, was released, and you can download that free, yes, free from this site. It's also available on Kindle for a small price, but if you fancy a freebie, head over to the 'Spooky Stories' section and download. All I ask is a Goodreads or Amazon review.
This is the intro to my slightly older spooky fiction set in the village of Silvervale so watch this space for more entries, hopefully soon.
My fourth children's picture book is in the process of being drawn, Tom Poyner, whom I worked with on What? No Cheesecake?! has sent me over some character designs, and they look great.
At the moment, we haven't got a timeline for this to be completed but we have discussed the possibility of another Kickstarter campaign to get it off the ground. More details to come.
Pages in the Wind are back on the road in early June. Heading out to Buxton For Books on 12 & 13 June, they will have physical copies of What? No Cheesecake?! up for grabs, alongside lots of other books from independent authors. So, if you're in the area, go and give Rebecca and Andy a visit.
And finally, the book I have been working on for the people at EE Stoke is nearly at the end of its first draft. We are now looking for an illustrator to get sketching whilst I finish up and move on to edits.
I'm keeping a lid on what the story is for the time being but I can say it's a chapter book for children aged between 7 and 11, and it's been a lot of fun to write so far.
So that's it for May, a lot done and a lot more to come. Until next time, I'll see you soon.
I started this month planning to continue work on my two ongoing WIPs but things didn't go exactly as planned. This wasn't a bad thing though...
At the start of the month, I caught up with Tom Poyner, the amazing illustrator of WHAT? No Cheesecake?! and we discussed another children's book.
It's a children's picture book that has been sitting on my shelf finished for over a year. Luckily, Tom loved the story, so I've finetuned it, and he is currently working on some character designs and storyboards to see if we can make this work. That's all I'll say on this at the minute, but expect to hear more on this as it unfolds.
This started a bit of a chain reaction, as it led to me looking through some of my other unfinished works. Amongst them I found another story I wrote last year. It was a short horror story which was submitted to a short story collection. Unfortunately, it didn't make the cut, but I couldn't help but read back through it, update it and adapt it. I was really happy with the end result so I sent it out to a few trusted BETA readers who gave it some good feedback.
I will be releasing this as a free short story in May titled Bone Sweet Bone. This will be the first small taster into my horror stories which will all take part in the village of Silvervale.
Another unexpected opportunity presented itself to me in May too. The people at EE Stoke, who were huge supporters of the Kickstarter for WHAT? No Cheesecake?! reached out to ask if I could work on a brand new story.
It's to help support a national digital safety campaign. The book will be to promote online safety, and with having 3 young children, it's something very close to my heart. I had to say yes and I've got to work on what I think is a pretty cool idea for a middle-grade chapter book.
In none writing news...
The awesome people behind Pages in the Wind are going to be stocking WHAT? No Cheesecake?!
I have a featured space on their site alongside some other awesome independent authors, and they will be selling copies at their stall at an upcoming event on 9 May in Warrington. For all the details and to check out other authors, head over to their site www.pagesinthewind.co.uk.
So, very little progress on the two ongoing WIPS, but 2 new, very exciting opportunities, a short story release next month and another place championing WHAT? No Cheesecake?! Not a bad month all in all I reckon.
See you soon!
Welcome to the new website. It's been a long time coming, but it is finally here.
On 5 March, World Book Day, 'WHAT? No Cheesecake?!' was finally released following the successful Kickstarter campaign I ran in late 2025.
During World Book Day week, I was lucky enough to be invited to schools across my home county to read through the book with KS1 children and host Q&A assemblies with KS2 kids.
It was an amazing experience and one I hope to replicate year on year, there was even work assigned to one school about the book and Steve the cheese giraffe which was so cool.
In the background, I have been continuing work on 2 WIPs, continuing the slow progress on my YA vampire novel and the other, well that's currently under wraps.
The rest of the month has been spent looking at ways I can get 'WHAT? No Cheesecake?!' out there, far and wide. The distributor I've used has got the book on some great online stores such as The Great British Bookshop, Waterstones and Amazon but I now have a Tik Tok shop where you can get books directly from myself. I also have copies in the local independent bookshop 'Vellichor Books', an awesome litte bookshop if you are ever in Stoke On Trent.
I think that's it for March. This is my first one of these updates, and who know's if I'll be able to keep up with doing one a month, but I'll give it my best damn shot. Until next time, I'll see you soon.