“A biochemist by trade, I also write historical fiction. My Bronte-inspired gothic mystery/sapphic romance is due out in November”
I grew up in Lincolnshire and have a degree and PhD in Biochemistry. Writing fiction in my spare time, I have had short stories published in literary magazines and was runner up in the Guildford Book Festival short story competition in 2010. I have also self-published Tales of Golmeira, a YA fantasy series with a lesbian protagonist, receiving two Red Ribbons from the Wishing Shelf Awards. In 2017, redundancy spurred me to focus on creative writing, resulting in The Secret of Matterdale Hall, a sapphic romance/mystery set in the Victorian era, published by Bellows Press. I live in Cheshire, UK, with my wife and two dogs.
I have always loved books that transport me into the past. Austen, Dickens, Trollope, the Brontes; I devoured them all. I love the settings, the characters, the writing, and the romance. However, these books were written in a time when it wasn’t acceptable to be gay, and I desperately wanted to read books that represented me. The lack of lesbian and gay representation in the literature of the past is a constant reminder that acceptance of homosexuality is recent (and still not complete). I grew up in the 1970s and 1980s, when being outed as gay could have serious negative consequences and the fact that this situation still exists today in so many countries is heart-breaking.
As well as a writer, I am a an avid reader of lesbian, historical and literary fiction, and I am always happy to enthuse about writers that I love.
