I’ve always wanted to be a writer, and wrote short stories and poems for myself when I was very young; I even wrote a science fiction novella when I was fifteen, which I hopefully sent out to every publisher in town. I didn’t think that I could make a career of writing, and so instead went into accountancy, and then into advertising. It was only when my first full-length manuscript attracted some interest from a well-known publisher back in 2003 that I decided to take some time off work in order to write full time. I left my job as an Advertising Account Director in 2004, and was lucky enough to sign a two-book contract a year later on completion of Bitter Sweets. This has been my dream job, as writing is something I do for pleasure; despite having had two children since 2005,1 have already written my second novel, and am now starting to research themes for my third.