About me

Hello. I’m a writer of games and fiction. I also teach, perform and run events. That just about covers everything.

My games work ranges from full-length interactive novels to the snappy audio drama of Zombies, Run! I grew up fascinated by Choose Your Own Adventure books and their gaming equivalents. I try to retain the energy of those early works while applying a more refined perspective to interactive storytelling. I’m happy working with transmedia, RPGs and hypertext.

My stories blend everyday realism with a strong strain of the fantastic and bizarre. I do relationship stuff, comedy, horror, crime, and lots that simply won’t fit in a box. My most popular story to date is a Glasgow hard man story where the hard man is a fish. It’s based on a real fish.

Getting off the page, I love to do readings. These aren’t the kind of dry events where you’re afraid to cough and afterwards you feel it was worth suffering through it to “get some culture.” I believe anybody who gets on stage has a responsibility to hold your attention and I do it by choosing my material carefully and throwing myself into its performance. Some of my material syncs to music.

I’ve played the Latitude festival, burlesque nights, the Edinburgh International Book Festival, Aye Write!, the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, punk gigs, a Hunter S. Thompson tribute event and a roller derby fundraiser. I feel that the performing writer should be able to hold their own with a musician or stand-up comedian. My regular mob is Writers’ Bloc.

I also teach creative writing and performance. I try to create a supportive, encouraging environment for newcomers while cracking the whip where necessary. I specialise in flash fiction.

Underword is my spoken word event. I first ran it during Fringe 2009, showcasing seventy-three writers and poets over twenty-two different shows and attracting a five star review. It returned in Feb 2011 for The Ghost of William Shatner and in June 2012 for National Flash Fiction Day. I enjoy hosting spoken word shows, so if you need a baldy ginger MC with a wardrobe of vintage clothes and a Glasgow accent, I may be just what you are looking for.

I don’t write poetry.