Making up stories has always been special to me. When I was young, I was very poorly. I had a brain stem stroke, which meant I had to spend some time in hospital.

I quickly learned that imagining I was tracking down treasure or exploring a mythical land was much more exciting than what was happening around me! This taught me how important stories could be, how they have the magical ability to whisk you away into new worlds (which is handy when yours isn’t so good).

​When I eventually got a bit better, I was able to go back to mainstream school. I had my ups and downs, but in the end, I came away with good enough grades to get into university. I studied Creative Writing at the University of Derby and a Creative Writing MA at Nottingham Trent University. During this time, I studied things like fairy tales, magic realism, early child development, Norse mythology, and the old Icelandic sagas.