I always wanted to solve a murder
You might think it’s a curious dream for a child, barely into his first year at secondary school?
I didn't.
You could blame my English teacher, Miss Burrows, who encouraged me to write short stories for homework.
But she only stimulated the ideas planted by Enid Blyton’s Famous Five series and the Chronicles of Narnia by CS Lewis.
I loved those books. They helped me cope with the isolation of living in a bungalow in the woods of a country estate, where my father worked. With no TV and no schoolfriends nearby, reading swept me into imaginary worlds where danger, mysteries and adventure had me reading beneath the sheets, well into the night.
I wanted to be the sixth member of the Famous Five, which should tell you why I struggled with Maths.
I wanted to be part of their adventures, free from adults and the constraints of the real world.
By the time I entered grammar school, there were so many ideas buzzing around in my head, I thought it would burst.
Thankfully, Miss Burrows managed to channel this energy into my homework.
Within months, my reading progressed to Ian Fleming’s James Bond series. While I had no aspirations to become a spy, the concept of good overcoming evil, which I learned from the Narnia series, took hold.
The desire to solve murders felt like a natural progression.
Winning a national short story competition at the age of twelve only fuelled the desire. For my 13th birthday, I asked for a typewriter.
To my surprise I got one.
My mother couldn’t understand why I wanted something that was essentially for girls, but I didn’t care. I was going to be a writer, solving murders.
A published author.
The ambition kept me going when rejection by publishers, and the demands of life, marriage and mortgage payments took the shine off writing.
While I may have struggled to write anything worthy of publications, the desire to solve a murder never left me.
Whether you call it persistence, determination, or a stubborn streak, my ambitions to solve a murder and become a published author, became a reality on 19th June 2016, when No Accident went on sale on Amazon.
The first novel in the Downland Murder Mystery series was the product of all the hopes, dreams and failures of my writing career, as detailed in my blog post, Why I Turned to Murder.
It distilled the essence of those escapes from reality reading brought to my childhood.
It embraced my love of crime fiction and TV dramas. The influences of Agatha Christie and Sue Grafton, Inspector Morse and Columbo seep through my writing.
They have ensured I write the kind of books I like to read.
When the idea to write a murder mystery first gripped me, I wanted to create something different from the derivative police procedurals and weary private investigators that filled the shelves.
Ideas filled my head. I imagined a TV drama, showing at 8pm on a Sunday evening.
Murders happen offstage. Strong characters and humour replace excessive violence, graphic language and sex.
We’re talking family viewing at the cosier end of crime.
No Accident, and the rest of the series, are for readers who want to curl up in their favourite armchairs and escape into a world of complex puzzles and mysteries that will keep them reading into the night.
At their heart is Kent Fisher, an ordinary person, who uncovers a perfect murder. Unfortunately, it’s only the start of his troubles.
Kent encapsulates my desire to solve a murder, to ensure good prevails over evil and justice is delivered.
Everything the teenage me yearned to achieve.