I’m a 42 year old writer, living in beautiful North Yorkshire and represented by Jodie Hodges at United Agents.

Pre-children I’ve worked as a lecturer, done archaeology, taught children and teenagers about archaeology,  and helped catalogue old stuff in museums. I may be slightly obsessed with history!

When I was a teenager my obsession took an even more practical form: I used to do historical re-enactment, at Kentwell Hall and other places, and spent a lot of my free time dressed up as a Tudor. This was deeply uncool but enormous fun. It has left me with an experimental approach to research (also known as ‘Making your children eat historical food’, or  ‘Please, Mum, not Roman bread again!’) I can also dance La Volta, which is something everyone should try at least once…

I’ve always written fiction, but it wasn’t until 2012, when an idea came to me as a result of visiting a particularly atmospheric ruined abbey and reading one too many brilliant YA dystopians, that I knew what book I wanted to write. At the end of 2013 I finished writing Five Wounds, my Young Adult historical novel.