Well, November passed in a bit of a blur. I had a couple of really fun events this year during Book Week Scotland. I visited the lovely Strathearn Community campus where I talked about some of my favourite rebels in fiction, the power fiction has to give you a voice, and where I get my inspiration from. The following day I was at West College Scotland, Clydebank campus, talking to students (and some staff!), about the power of books and how a love of reading fired my imagination and inspired me to write. It was great getting to meet enthusiastic readers and talk to them about some of my favourite things: reading, writing, rebels and creativity. These are a couple of photos below from the events:

As well as attending interesting events I was working on more edits of my second YA book, (which is due for release early next year), as well as writing more of my third YA. I’m quite excited about both of these books!

The past few weeks I have been busy working on a different kind of writing project. I’m delighted that my collection of contemporary short stories, many of which have been previously published in literary journals or been placed in competitions, is now available on kindle. You can buy ‘Exposure’ here.

Working on this collection reminded me how much fun I have interchanging between longer novels, and short stories, (sometimes very short stories in flash fiction form). My short stories have more adult themes, and with my flash fiction in particular I enjoy experimenting with more lyrical styles of writing. Working with a shorter form can be just as challenging as novel length as you really need to make every word count.

I asked my talented designer friend, Rebecca Johnstone, aka Dainty Dora (see her website here), to design my cover and I couldn’t be happier with the beautiful result! See below. I have to also thank my Mum for supporting with the edits and technical side of production! (see my writer Mum’s website here).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And if that wasn’t exciting enough I’m going to be attending a massive Book Fair in Dundee on Saturday with over 30 other authors. I’ll be selling copies and signing copies of my YA mystery, Follow Me, and will also be running a story-building creative writing session for any visitors who want to use their imagination to delve into new worlds! If you’re in the Dundee area come along.