: About Me

Formerly a journalist, copy editor and teacher, I began to write fiction in 2004. Since then, I've had stories and poetry published in magazines "Fictitious Force", "Northwords Now" and in "Midnight Showcase" as well as in webzines "Ruthie's Club" and "The Specusphere". I'm currently working on my first novel, "Snapshot".

I'm really not sure what I write, though my work has been variously described as "speculative fiction", "slipstream" and "literary romance". My favourite writers include Christopher Priest, Angela Carter, Peter Ackroyd and Oliver Onions.

I'm also a singer and musician. With my husband Alasdair, I founded Internet-based global music project Species 8472 whose song "A Tripwire" was recently shortlisted for an award by Channel 4 television in the UK.

As a freelance arts journalist, my non-fiction has been published widely in titles such as The Sunday Times, The Mail on Sunday, HMV Choice, Making Music, Zero and the webzine Subba-Cultcha and I've also written PR copy and website content for various musical artists in the UK and the US. My non-fiction travel guide "Living and Working in London" was published in 2000 by Survival Books in the UK.

A Londoner by birth, I relocated to the Scottish Highlands in 1999 where I try to live a self-sufficient lifestyle on an organic smallholding with my Scottish husband and our two sons.

My passion is ...

music.

I know too much about ...

my favourite musician, Chris Cornell.

My parents always told me ...

to learn to type.

My childhood ambition ...

to be a librarian. I wanted to be left to read books in peace.

My favorite memory ...

bringing my babies home for the first time.

Why I write ...

because, like Rilke, I'd die if I didn't.

What I am reading/watching/listening to ...

"London, City of Disappearances" by Iain Sinclair.

My first job ...

Saturday girl in Woolworths, age 15.

My best moment ...

Marrying my husband Alasdair.

My inspiration ...

Chris Cornell. The landscape of the Scottish Highlands. The sea.

Entertainment > Album Reviews Album reviews: Carry On, by Chris Cornell

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Chris Cornell Carry On Polydor A road trip into the unknown: the evolution of a legend Chris Cornell is an American icon. Through his reign as Soundgarden's dark grunge god to his stint at the helm of classic rock band Audioslave, he's never failed to push the boundaries of genre, whether turning base metal into alternative gold or teaching a rap-rock act like RATM the meaning of modulation. His ornate 1999 solo album Euphoria Morning failed to catch on, with its reclusive creator's deepening substance abuse problems perhaps contributing to its commercial collapse. Cornell's certainly not ...

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