I've read science fiction avidly from the age of about 11. Anything and everything, initially. Slowly I've become more selective and now have moved as far away from 'hard' sf as I can get. Probably the turning point for me was when I read Michael Moorcock's 'Jerry Cornelius' books in my late teens, and probably more significantly JG Ballard's 'Crash' about 12 years ago. It blew me away.

I would no longer claim to write science fiction, as I find the genre too restrictive. I prefer the term 'speculative fiction', as my writing generally has nothing to do with science, and may dip into horror, fantasy, mainstream (whatever that means) or whatever the story requires.

I can't list my favourite books, but (aside from those mentioned above) here are a few that have made an impression on me:

• Brave New World by Aldous Huxley
• Nausea by Jean-Paul Sartre
• Anything by Franz Kafka
• The Lost Honour of Katherina Blum by Heinrich Boll

There are probably many more, but these are the ones that spring to mind immediately.

In 1997 I sold D46 and Box Clever (twice), earning a grand total of $34. Box Clever has also been submitted to OMNI for their 1997 'Year's best Horror' anthology.

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