Coffee, the thought of creating new stories and hooking up lots of colourful crochet for light relief.

I'm very fond of DIY and crafting, and when the sun shines I can be found in the garden growing vegetables and planting out new and exciting arrangements on my small patch of land.

If I have a sudden interest, I search on key words and find new content to devour.

I do; I was eight years old and wrote a mystery story. I won first prize of a packet of sweets that made me sick because I ate them all!

I get a burst of inspiration (anything can cause this) I'll brew up the story in my head for a while and then begin to type away, sometimes I'll get the entire tale out with no problems and other times I'll have to coax some of the plot to fall into place.

When the book is finished I put the story away and then at some point in the future the editing will take place. My latest book to be published – the Wolf from the Ridge was inspired by a trip to Ontario back in 1994, the story was written in 2009 and at Christmas 2013, I began to edit it (20 edits for this one).

After learning to read, I expect the first real story was an Enid Blyton adventure book – although, I'm unable to remember which one. I was reading at age seven, writing my own stories soon after. I loved to read nature books and adventure books.

I am unable to draw a line, but I am very lucky to have an artist friend, the wonderful Liz Ascott, who takes three things from my book and works them up into a cover.

For the print versions of my books, I use design software to create a back cover and a spine from Liz's original painting.

Generally my favourite book is the one I'm reading at this moment (Angela Carter's Nights at the Circus) but if I had to list five books that stay in my mind:
Of Human Bondage – W Somerset Maughan
Bleak House – Charles Dickens
Mervyn Peake – Titus Groan
1984 – George Orwell
Island Magic – Elizabeth Gouge

I read anything and everything, anything that doesn't pique my interest is soon rejected.

As an impoverished writer I have only a clunky old PC, so anything I can't get to read on that, doesn't get read.

To be honest I don't use any tactics. I post my books, put all the links, Tweets and Facebook posts out there and leave the books to fly the nest on their own.

I love writing and tend to spend most of my time in my book nook (otherwise known as the cupboard under the stairs) walloping out stories on my ancient, letter-less keyboard – and this is most likely why I am still an impoverished writer and not a marketing-savvy, knocking back the cocktails in St Lucia, kind of writer!

My desk is a keyboard on a plank of wood suspended over two filing cabinets. I moved last year to a draughty old house that hasn't been updated since the 1950s. My dream of converting the attic and having a real desk is years away!

I grew up in Bristol, UK. I would say some aspects of the city creep into my writing, but since I could focus on a TV I have ingested a daily diet of American adventure movies and cop shows which tends to slant my world view, somewhat.

I started writing at around age eight, having learned to read I wanted to create my own stories. I wrote my first sci-fi story called The Squirrtel about an alien squirrel (I still have it somewhere, complete with awful illustrations). Then I moved on to bird books, cataloging what I saw in the garden and detailing habitat, lifestyle and feeding habits.

I rarely travel anywhere, but whenever I do, I am generally so blown away by what I see, a story will soon pop into my head. Some of the places in The Wolf from the Ridge we actually visited and the lakes, backwoods and mountains are still as fresh in my mind as when I saw them back in 1994. Uncle Trev's house was amazing and the bear cage was really there!

I publish on nearly all the online sites. I think this way of publishing is the way forward. As a writer you have to learn your craft as well as creating stories. The forums on the sites are wonderful, sharing the pains and frustrations of being a fledgling author are as salve on an open wound.

Publishers trawl the online sites looking for anything fresh, new, exciting, unusual. If your book is good enough they'll find it, if not keep crafting until you get it right. Publishers can select search terms for exactly what's in fashion. The in-tray is out, ebooks are already out there floating around in the bookyverse, hook-able and land-able.

Smashwords has the wonderful meatgrinder, I make it my personal challenge to get my book through first time (or possibly the second).
Smashwords seems to be far more tagtastic than other online sites. Titles get picked up by online retailers far most effectively and more quickly. Plus, Smashwords has a Ted to help authors who get stuck.

Writing is the joy. But the dream is to one day meet someone who has read one of my books and liked it.

Fans? The only fans I have keep me cool when I waft them about in the summer!

From the dusty shelf, next comes a teenage novel that needs editing. Getha Graves, Goth detective, Getha can never resist interfering, no matter how much trouble she finds herself in as a result.

Tolkien, Pratchett, Peake, Elliott, Orwell...