Blood River, my first Nightmare Vacations story, has a new cover to celebrate its second birthday and the imminent arrival of its sibling: Blood Point. With this new cover, Blood River is available in hardcover for the first time and includes a preview of my new story. Although Blood Point is not a sequel, both […]
August 1st marked the festival of Lughnasadh (loo-nasser if your mouth mangles those Irish phonemes). It’s the beginning of harvest season and a key date in Blood Point, my Irish Nightmare Vacations novel. Named after the pagan god Lugh, it’s another of those Irish festivals that sits between a solstice and an equinox. The big […]
Would you like to test drive the final drafts of Blood Point, my next Nightmare Vacations horror story? If so, register below to become a Beta Reader. Beta Readers are one of the last stops on the road from a story idea to a published novel. They’re a final chance to revise a book and […]
The weather might not agree yet*, but Lá Bealtaine is the beginning of summer in Ireland’s ancient Celtic calendar. It’s also the beginning of the countdown to launching a new horror story, Blood Point. Sign up to my newsletter for exclusive previews. Sandwiched between the spring equinox and summer solstice, Bealtaine, or “bright fire”, is […]
TripAdvisor’s top Dublin museums might include Guinness, whiskey, and Kilmainham Gaol, but no writer or lover of good stories should visit the city without a stop at the National Leprechaun Museum. Ireland’s storytelling tradition goes back to the dawn of Irish history, and the National Leprechaun Museum is a tribute to the nation’s wild oral […]
Mission accomplished! I have photographed the Kinnitty Stone. It’s an ancient Irish artefact uncovered during the extension of St Finnian’s Church, Kinnitty, in the early 1800s, more than 1,000 years old. It’s also almost impossible to find pictures online and it’s been a challenge to see the real thing. On Saturday evening, with the help […]
Irish folklore is horrible, and I mean that in the best way. Violence, sex and the supernatural entwine in epic tales of ancient history and everyday stories of ghosts, fairies and ordinary folk. Wry humour and dark twists are never far away. Despite Walt Disney’s best efforts, there’s nothing twee about Ireland’s fairies. There are […]
Blood River has been winning great reviews from advanced readers at ARC review sites BookSirens and NetGalley in its first month. My debut novel is currently riding high at 5 stars on Amazon UK, 4.4 on Amazon USA, and 3.71 on GoodReads. Here are a few of my favourite quotes. “A really interesting supernatural survival […]
It’s five years since Blood River‘s journey began, from a notebook in the Borneo rainforest to Amazon Kindle ebook. It’s a roller-coaster tale of supernatural survival horror, and you can buy it here. I’ve no idea how Blood River will fare with reviewers and readers, but it’s been an experiment from day one. It’s become […]
Blood River has taught me that bringing characters from my imagination to the page isn’t always easy. Writing courses spend a lot of time on character description but very little on character visualisation. Characters develop as their stories and the world they live in emerge through your writing. There comes a time when you need […]