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There is a particular kind of silence that follows publishing a book.

You press the button. The page goes live. The cover appears where you hoped it would. Then, more often than not, nothing much happens at all.

No fanfare. No sudden enlightenment from the algorithm. Just you, a cup of coffee, and the slightly unreal feeling that something important has been released into the world and promptly ignored.

This is the part nobody really talks about.

Most indie authors do not live in a state of...

I sometimes catch myself scrolling and stopping, not because something interests me, but because something demands my attention.

A video. A headline. A moment clearly taken from someone else’s real life, often at its worst, now framed for quick consumption. I pause, feel a flicker of discomfort, then move on. And it leaves me wondering when that became normal.

At some point, almost everything turned into content.

Not just the good things. Not just the funny or impressive moments. But grief,...

England has a long and proud tradition of naming places in ways that make perfect sense to people who have been dead for several centuries.

Take Oxford Circus, for example.

I’ve been there many times. I’ve never seen a strongman, a trapeze artist, or even a confused clown. Just shoppers, tourists, and the occasional person standing still in the middle of the pavement wondering why everyone else looks annoyed.

The truth is rather less dramatic. “Circus” comes from the Latin circus, meaning a...

There is a phrase I come back to often. Three simple words. No drama. No noise.

Onwards and upwards.

I did not arrive at writing through shortcuts, hacks, or sudden inspiration. I arrived the long way round.

I started with paper and pencil at the age of eight. Not because I knew where it would lead, but because something inside me needed to put words somewhere safe. I did not know then that writing would become a lifelong companion. I only knew that silence felt heavier without it.

It took over...

There are people who say you should never love a machine.

They are wrong.

The love of my life was a Triumph 2000 Mk 2.

She was white, with a black roof, and she carried herself with the quiet confidence of something built to last. Not flashy. Not loud. Just assured. Civilised. British and very 1970s.

My favourite sort of day was simply driving her.

I would think nothing of setting off from Leicester at first light and pointing her nose towards Land’s End, or the Lake District, just because the...

Looking back, I’m mildly astonished by my younger self. Not in a boastful way. More in the same way one looks at an old photograph and thinks, good grief, was that really me?

I wasn’t a ladies’ man. I never thought of myself that way. I just seemed, mysteriously, to have a lot of girlfriends. Sometimes consecutively. Occasionally… not quite.

At one point I had two, and both turned up at the same pub on the same night. How I survived that encounter remains one of life’s unsolved mysteries. There...

There was a time, children, when a British holiday did not involve airports, security trays, or arguing over whether the seat reclined far enough. No. We went to Butlin’s.

For those unfamiliar with this particular corner of British heritage, Butlin’s was not merely a holiday resort. It was a social experiment. A place where optimism went on holiday and personal dignity stayed at home.

From the 1950s through to the 1970s, Butlin’s was the beating heart of British seaside joy. Rows upon rows of...

There was a time when ordering a steak was a simple affair.

Rare. Medium. Well done, if you were feeling reckless.

Those days, it seems, may be numbered.

With the news that scientists have successfully produced beef steak using a 3D printer, I can’t help imagining a future restaurant exchange that goes something like this:

CUSTOMER: “Can I have a steak, please.”

WAITER: “Certainly, sir. How would you like it printed?”

At first glance, this sounds like the opening line of a dystopian novel. But let’...

At some point in every serious discussion about existence, someone will ask the big question.

“What is the meaning of life?”

This is usually followed by a thoughtful silence, a sip of coffee, and absolutely no useful answer whatsoever.

I’ve given this some thought. Possibly too much. And having flirted briefly with the edge of things, I can now report back with confidence that the universe does not, in fact, provide a laminated instruction manual. There is no checklist. No final exam. No pop-up...

Near death experiences are usually spoken about in hushed tones. Soft voices. Meaningful pauses. The sort of conversations that happen late at night, with the lights low and the kettle already boiled.

I’ve had one. Or something close enough that the distinction hardly matters.

I didn’t float above my body. I didn’t see a tunnel full of departed relatives waving cheerfully like it was a family reunion. No choir. No booming voice asking awkward questions about my life choices. And sadly, no...

An Outside Observer's Notes on a Writer Called Tom Kane

A reflective note from an outside observer

If I were asked to describe Tom from a distance, I would begin with the quiet hours. Five in the morning. A cup of coffee going cold. A screen glowing faintly in a room where most of the world is still asleep. This is where he often is, not because he must be, but because that is where his mind feels most at home.

Tom is a writer, but that is only the surface description. Beneath it is a watcher....

It is a question that sounds as though it should be asked at two in the morning, preferably while staring at the ceiling and wondering where the socks keep disappearing to. Is there a theoretical relationship between quantum mechanics and an afterlife?

The short answer is no.

The longer answer is… well, it is complicated, fascinating, and surprisingly fun to think about.

Quantum mechanics is the branch of physics that politely refuses to behave. Particles can be waves, waves can be particles,...

Pain can be a terrible thing. Pain in all my bones, throughout my body, from the chemotherapy for my 80% invasive rare form of lymphoma made me cry at night. The only relief was a bath in very hot water. Pain like that is one thing, but mental anguish is quite another.

Physical pain announces itself. It has rules. You can point to it, measure it, medicate it, describe it. People understand it, or at least they try to. They see the hospital appointments, the medication, the scars, the fatigue....

Quantum Immortality

The other day on Twitter, someone asked an entirely reasonable, perfectly sane question:

“Do you think Quantum Immortality could be real?”

Naturally, I replied that I was writing about it in my next novel, The Ragged End of Time. Because if you are going to respond to existential dread, you might as well do it with fiction.

For the uninitiated, Quantum Immortality is the comforting theory that you never actually die. From your own point of view, at least. Every time something...

They lied to me.

Not maliciously, you understand. More in the same way people lie about dogs not shedding hair, or about a “quick look” in Lidl.

They said Cyprus was warm.

And it is.

At lunchtime.

In July.

At 5am in Paphos, on a winter morning in January, Cyprus reveals its true personality. It becomes a damp, shivering reminder that the Mediterranean has a sense of humour and that it enjoys using writers as punchlines.

This morning, I woke before dawn, as writers do. Not because we're disciplined,...

As humans, we all suffer setbacks.

Trauma. Stress. Loss. And sometimes a plain old slap in the face that life delivers without warning or apology.

Health issues arrive uninvited. A loved one dies. A much-loved pet leaves a silence that is louder than noise. Marriages end. Love goes unanswered. Dreams stumble. Plans fail. Effort does not always equal reward.

We are, in many ways, carbon-based punch-bags for life to practise its moves on.

No one escapes untouched.

The trouble is not the hit itself....

I have spent the last few months conducting what can only be described as deep market research. Not with spreadsheets or focus groups, you understand, but by watching the internet very carefully while drinking coffee.

Why? Because I am an indie author, and indie authors are, by necessity, part writer, part publisher, part marketer, and part slightly bewildered Victorian inventor muttering, “If I just turn this lever…”

Like every author who has ever stared at an empty sales dashboard, I wanted...

Time travel is one of those ideas that refuses to behave. The moment it appears in fiction, it starts asking awkward questions. Can you change the past. Should you. And if you do, who pays the price.

For well over a century, writers and filmmakers have used time travel not simply as a spectacle, but as a lens through which to examine regret, destiny, and consequence.

Time Travel on Television

Television thrives on the elasticity of time travel. Doctor Who treats time as a playground, yet...

"Twas Christmas Eve in the workhouse, and the rain was snowing fast. The barefooted boy with clogs on, stood sitting on the grass." David Banks grinned as he watched his two children's faces. Emily was a mixture of disdain and boredom. Jack looked confused.

"What are clogs?" the nine year old asked.

"Wooden shoes," Emily muttered. "Dad recites that every Christmas Eve. Don't you remember last year?"

Jack shook his head. "And what's a workhouse?"

"A place poor people were sent to in Victorian...

There is a moment in every indie author’s life when you realise that writing the book was the easy part. You think the hard work is chapters, characters, plots and deadlines. You believe finishing the final draft is the end of the journey.

Then you publish your first book.

And from that moment on you become, whether you like it or not, a full time, unpaid marketing department.

For ten years now I have written stories, novels and trilogies, all of which I am proud of. I have created worlds,...