I took the still from my dash camera while driving my Morris Minor. I had just narrowly avoided hitting deer that had unexpectedly run out before me. Journeys can take many unexpected twists and dramatic turns. My writing journey has had its risks, fraught with self-doubt. Am I going the right way? Am I too old for this? I have learned that starting later in life is okay, and this is a case of better late than never.
I make no bones that I am new to this writing journey and don’t pretend to be an expert, but I’m learning as I progress and hopefully improve. So how did all this start?
Bedtime
It started with a love for comics as a lad, and an overactive imagination that never left me. Then, as my life went on, bedtime stories became an important part of my fatherly duties. I have had three children, and each one of them has had their own stories tailor-made for them. My eldest, Beth, had Morris Mole and Mr McGee the Rabbit, Caitlin had Dave the Fairy (that’s something I could still potentially work on), and Zac had the Rocket Shed. They loved them. I’ve known I could always tell stories, but was frustrated by not having the skills to put them down on paper.
A Children’s Story
I made a brief journey into writing a year after my second daughter, Caitlin, was born, sometime around 2001. During a period of sickness, I wrote a children’s fantasy book, all 78,000 words of it. I even tried to get it published but was unsuccessful. The agents and publishers I submitted it to liked the story, but my writing style needed improvement. However, after that attempt, I gave up and put it aside.
My Inspiration
The inspiration for my writing journey is my wife, Valerie. She encouraged me to write my first book and always said I should have kept going by reworking it. Later, she started her BA in English and Creative Writing at Chichester University back in 2005, about the same time I joined Hampshire Constabulary as a humble PC. During this time, and when Valerie later did her MA in Creative Writing—again at Chichester University—my eyes were opened by her love of literature, and by reading through her writing exercises for her degree. In addition, when reading and enjoying her work, I began to learn what makes good writing and what doesn’t.
However, I still wasn’t much of a reader, which hindered my writing journey. My background before policing was in software development and control systems. Creative in a different sort of way. I only read very technical books in my adult life. Hours of talking to Valerie about the books she was reading piqued my interest. These were works by Virginia Woolf, like Mrs Dalloway, or Oscar Wilde’s, The Picture of Dorian Gray. These were standard reading for many people, but the only books I had read were The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings, The Chronicles of Narnia, and The Day of the Triffids—fantasy and science fiction.
I picked up a few of the Agatha Christie Poirot stories a few years ago, and I had the urge to write something in the detective fiction genre, but I struggled to find a voice and an approach that suited me.
Breakthrough
A few years later, I bought a book by Cara Hunter called Close To Home (2017). She has produced six books to date. She writes her stories mainly from the lead detective’s perspective (DI Adam Fawley), in first person and present tense. I found something I liked about Cara Hunter’s stories that inspired me to have a go myself. As I had a police background, police procedure was not a significant issue for me, and I have a brilliant and encouraging wife who knows a good deal about writing.
I already had a character name—DI Angelis. I wanted to create something about him that made him different from other fictional detectives out there. So, I gave him a supernatural twist. He has the ability to read the memories of others and influence the thoughts of people in an emotional state.
I already had a character name—DI Angelis. I wanted to create something about him that made him different from other fictional detectives. So, I gave him a supernatural twist. He can read the memories of others and influence people’s thoughts in an emotional state.
The story’s plot came in early 2021, and I published Chasing Shadows in September 2021. I’ve now published Hide Her Away and my third DI Angelis novel, Take You Home, reaching a convenient place to take a break and assess where I am going from here.
The Journey from Here
I have recently developed a new bunch of detective characters for another series of books. The first story, The Dead Beneath Us, is the first in the Chichester Crime Mysteries series. I wrote this novel purely to fit the police procedural crime mystery genre. The first story follows a major crimes team led by DCI Beniamin Dinescu (blurb below). The others in the series will also follow DS Emily Summers (also on this team) and could alternate between the two of them as the main protagonists.
The Dead Beneath Us:
Our darkest places are never far away.
DCI Dinescu investigates the brutal murder of a teacher at a prestigious private school. As he unravels the case, he stumbles upon an unsolved mystery: the disappearance of a young girl in the 1980s. Confronting his deepest fears, Dinescu must uncover the dark secrets of the past to bring justice and closure to the present.
This is the first police procedural crime novel in the Chichester Crime Mysteries series.
Constant Improving
Also, I have invested in ways to continue improving my writing. I have attended a few writing courses, including Crime Writing at West Dean College, with tutors such as Lesley Thomson and Elly Griffiths. Followed by a course led by Greg Mosse on plotting a thriller.
My long-suffering wife is still a major source of encouragement to me, and, as luck would have it, she is a life coach who specialises in supporting writers.