FIRST BASE WRITER

'THE GORGE' IS OUT ON 19th SEPTEMBER 2025 Wellbeing tutor Laura Belmont's world is torn apart when her wheelchair-bound mother reveals a devastating secret: her fall in the Avon Gorge wasn't an accident—it was attempted murder by her own husband, Aiden. Shocking evidence of his infidelity only fuels Laura's determination to exact revenge—but Max, the charismatic Oxford classicist who's stolen her heart, warns her against crossing moral lines. The price of retribution will be losing the man she loves. A ghost from her past resurfaces. Ex-prep school classmate Katja, armed with questions about Laura's mother, begins to wield a mysterious agenda of her own, threatening to unravel everything. Emotionally charged, THE GORGE is a gripping psychological thriller of twisted loyalties and dangerous obsessions. If you like complex female protagonists, taut family dramas, and enthralling twists worthy of Gillian Flynn, Jane Corry and Ruth Ware, you'll be capt...

  SPECIAL COUNTDOWN OFFER ON "CLASS OF '13"! From Monday, 17th to Monday, 24th February 2025 there is a special Countdown offer on  "Class of '13" through Amazon.co.uk. ONLY 99p from 6 a.m. on 17th! The price then rises to £1.99 on 20th and back to the normal selling price of £2.99 at midday on 24th! BUY NOW! 

    Michael is a finalist in the Page Turner Writing Awards 2024 for 'Class of '13'. The release date for both the eBook and the paperback is 18th October 2024. The eBook is only £2.99 (UK) through Amazon ($4.00 in the USA).

  CLASS OF '13  IS COMING IN OCTOBER! 'Class of '13' is a domestic thriller, set in Bristol. Publication date on Amazon is planned for  18th October, 2024.  Uma thought she knew her flatmate, Jayna. But she didn't.  Not until she was murdered. Only then did she discover who Jayna really was. And now Uma's asking questions and she'll stop at nothing until she learns what's behind the killing. In spite of being warned off by the police.  In spite of people she once knew as friends standing in her way. In spite of others thinking she's to blame. And then she's forced to confront something from her own past, something she hoped had long been buried and forgotten.  But it hasn't. A scene from the novel: Clifton Village, Bristol More details here soon!

        The setting of  A Manner of Walking is based on the city of Bristol, and if you are familiar with the city you will no doubt be able to visualise some of the places described. A significant area of the Bristol of the 1920s has changed beyond recognition, due in great part to the bombing suffered during Word War II. However, the road close to which my family owned a blacksmith's business, Blackboy Hill, is still much the same as it was over a hundred years ago. The trams have gone, of course, taken out of service from the end of the 1930s, but it is still a busy thoroughfare, with shops and businesses on either side. Most of the buildings that were there in 1925 are still standing. See the photographs below. Blackboy Hill in the early years of the last century   Blackboy Hill in May 2016         In the story, the hill in question is called "Upstoke Hill" and Larkin's blacksmith business is situated in the fictitious Co...

When I started to write A Manner of Walking , I didn’t have a title. I didn’t have a plot as such. I had a setting: a blacksmith's shop; I had a time: the 1920s. The 1920s in Britain were a period of depression and mass unemployment, but other images came to mind, too. When I thought of the 1920s, I would think of the characters made famous by F. Scott Fitzgerald, including the Great Gatsby; of the society written about by Evelyn Waugh in “Vile Bodies”; of the Charleston and " flappers ", images of the "jazz age" and, among certain sections of the higher classes of society, a spirit of wanton abandon.          Like a lot of people, I was particularly attracted to reading about the " Bright Young People " of the day. In my book, these are epitomised by Penrose , my lead character, and the " Queen Victoria Square set ". You will read all about their mischief making.   There was one book I was keen to get hold of: "Society Racke...