Author Interviews

Emma Finlayson-Palmer is a working class, autistic writer and artist who lives in the West Midlands with her husband and a multitude of children, cats, and chickens. She is a writer of children’s fiction, represented by Veronique Baxter of the David Higham agency, and author of the Autumn Moonbeam chapter books series and various short stories and flash fiction for children. Emma runs #ukteenchat, a writing-themed chat on Twitter, and edits, mentors, and reads competition entries for #WriteMentor and flash fiction entries for Retreat West. She’s also one-half of Word Witches as a children’s fiction editor.

Author of Dark Cheshire, Lesley’s interest in folklore began during childhood in North Wales. Moving to Cheshire, her long, varied career has included being a professional photographer, makeup artist, vocational assessor, jewellery designer, and holistic therapist. Previously published in various specialist magazines, Lesley’s articles have also appeared in Evergreen and online for the Huffington Post.

Based in Rochdale in Northwest England, I have been writing for about twenty years with my main interest being poetry. In the last few years, I left my last job as a teacher in a school for young people with behavioural and social issues to concentrate on my creative work as a self-employed (and perhaps semi-retired) writer and artist. I still love working with young people and am the part-time art and writing specialist in a small charity in Rochdale supporting young people through creativity to build their resilience and skills.

Matthew is a life-long learner, has worked in construction, education, banking, hospitality, and is a yoga teacher. He is amazed at how much he can learn and fit into his brain. Matthew found yoga to be very rewarding. He attributes looking and feeling young to practicing yoga (unless it is all the food with preservatives he ate when he was younger). Teaching took Matthew on a learning journey to five different countries, and therefore he likes to write adventure novels based on his experiences. Matthew currently lives in Sài Gòn with his wife and cats. His children are in different parts of the world. Matthew likes to spend time with his wife and family, jog, ride, swim, travel, be adventurous, enter the occasional triathlon, and learn.

Kevin Kuhens is the author of the award-winning Amazon #1 Bestselling Terror’s Sword, the first of his thrillers involving elite counterterrorism operative Kyle McEwan. His book has garnered significant recognition, including the 2023 Winner of the Mystery/Thriller Gold Medal from the prestigious Military Writers Society of America, among others.

Julie Brown is an author, essayist, and playwright. A California girl from the San Fernando Valley, she’s spent most of her adult life in Palos Verdes (near the port of Los Angeles) where she and her husband raised two sons, rescued many dogs, hosted countless backyard BBQs, and chased away hundreds of wild peacocks. When not writing, she’s doing laundry, gardening, baking, caring for dogs, and giving her grown-up sons advice (some welcome, some not).

USA Today bestselling author and award-winning writer Samantha Cole is a retired policewoman and former paramedic. Using her life experiences and training, she strives to find the perfect mix of suspense and romance for her readers to enjoy.

David Ellrod is a writer of science fiction, horror, and history, previously published in Aurealis Magazine, The Alethea, and Philologia, in addition to research content released on U.S. National Park Service platforms and Listverse.com. As a lifelong aficionado of both history and fiction, he remains most interested in how the former informs the latter. He lives in Maryland with his wife, four children, and two very excitable dogs. He can be reached online at https://ourfamilycanvas.wordpress.com.

I have been a writer my whole life. Early in my life, it was academic and short story writing. These days, it varies. Sometimes my work is of the professional sort, other times political, sometimes well researched, other times opinion or experience, but always in a voice uniquely my own. My articles and letters have appeared in legal industry magazines and newspapers, publications local to St. Louis, and in blog posts going back to the beginnings of blogs. Most of it is nonfiction.

Kaitlin Harvey is an experienced writer who works with words on the clock and off. Her first finished manuscript, The HAWKE Archives, will be undergoing a professional critique in the coming months, after which she’ll dive into the querying trenches to find the right advocate for her work.

Patricia Ranee is a writer from Brooklyn, New York, whose love for wordplay and writing began at the age of six. A quiet, shy child raised in a poor Caribbean household, she found reading and writing to be her place of solace; the oasis where she felt understood. Deciding to switch careers at the peak of adulthood, Patricia Ranee now focuses on a life of authenticity and creativity, aiming to inspire others with her words. The Duty Doodie Wife is her first completed feature film.

Lucien Telford is a British-born Canadian writer who burst onto the science-fiction thriller scene with his multiple-award-winning debut novel, The Sequence, in 2021. The book showcases Telford’s talented prose with a fast-paced style that keeps the reader turning the page. The Sequence, the first novel in a planned quadrilogy, explores emergent genetic technology using themes of morality, global power, and how these emerging technologies affect the human condition.

Nadean Stone was born in Blind River Ontario, Canada, and graduated from Windsor University in 1973 with a BA and McMaster University in 1976 with an MBA. She obtained her Certificate in Journalism in 2002 and her Certificate in Legal Management in 2011.

Erin Schalk is a writer, visual artist, and educator who lives in the greater Los Angeles area. Her poetry, prose, and visual art have been published in a variety of journals. Highlights include Writer’s Digest, The Petigru Review, The MacGuffin, The Woven Tale Press, Parentheses International Literary Journal, Willawaw Journal, and others. She is the author of (quiet, space), a journal that combines her art and poetry.

B Alan Bourgeois is an award-winning author and speaker. He created the Top Ten Author Series, which is currently a series of thirty books designed to help authors succeed.

As a nomad carnival vendor, I draw a lot of inspiration from my gregarious guests. In my travels, I have seen some strange things that give me a whole lot of strange ideas. A writer, an artist, and a dark thinker, I like to weave a visceral web of twists, terror, and wonder. My tales are burgeoning with treacherous environments, colorful characters with dangerous talents, and mind-bending story arcs. A touch of comical mischief follows as we journey the unknown wilderness in search of another scary story to tell ’round the campfire.

I’m a playwright who has been lucky enough to be a winner of the Derek Jacobi Award for New Playwriting, two-time winner of the UK Community Drama Festivals Federation for Best New Script, three-time Pint Sized Plays winner, and a range of other scriptwriting awards. I have also had short stories published by The People’s Friend, Your Cat Magazine, Cafe Lit, Writing Magazine, and more in over a dozen anthologies. Now it’s time for that novel.

Janet had her first film script optioned by Producer Steve Chicorel of Los Angeles-Beijing Studios. She has collaborated on two film scripts and a treatment of a TV drama feature for South Korea-based Cilium Film. She has adapted a Victorian melodrama for the screen, which has yet to be optioned.

I am a short and micro-fiction writer and occasional poet based in England. I am a late developer in terms of writing, having only shared my work with family until recently but now developing more of an outward profile. Professionally, I have worked for many years in information technology and the public sector on a wide variety of projects, some of which provide material for stories.

Julie Shackman is a feel-good romance author with the HarperCollins imprint One More Chapter. The Highland Lodge Getaway is Julie’s fifth book to be published with HarperCollins and her ninth novel in total.