These are samples of my artwork and illustrations for some of the books I have written. I’m an author and illustrator.
Picture Books
If Bees Can Make Honey, Can Wasps Make Jam? (Picture Book)
Synopsis
This is as a 32 page (830 word) picture book. There’s friendship, silliness and blatant skulduggery.
Bradford the wasp is watching the bees making honey in the garden and wonders…if bees can make honey, can wasps make jam? He tells his idea to the other wasps.
The wasps set up their jam–making factory in the old shed at the bottom of Mrs Sugar’s cottage garden. They start by making strawberry, raspberry and gooseberry jam and then expand into blackcurrant, bramble and plum.
Soon other insects (including Leafy O’Leary the greenfly) come to help them. Caterpillars lie on their backs and use their legs to send the fruit along the factory shelves like a conveyor belt. Bluebottles stir the mixture, moths stick the labels on the jars, and fireflies and glow–worms work during the night shift. Even the bees come to help when they’re not too busy making honey.
Everything is fine until the spiders start making chocolate. That’s when the trouble begins. It takes a whole lot of cocoa powder to make the spiders’ chocolate. Mrs Sugar notices that cocoa is missing from her kitchen cupboard and goes looking for the culprits. The wasps get the blame because the spiders left a trail of cocoa to the shed, but Bradford, the other wasps and Leafy O’Leary prove it was the spiders who were making chocolate.
Mrs Sugar chases the spiders out of the garden and apologises to the wasps for blaming them. The wasps are also sorry for taking things from her kitchen and promise not to do it again without asking.
The wasps continue to make their jam, but now they always share their jam with Mrs Sugar.
This is written as a standalone picture book, but could also be part of a three–book series. Other possible titles include:
If Wasps Can Make Jam, Can Greenflies Make Toffee?
If Greenflies Can Make Toffee, Can Butterflies Make Cake?
Early Readers
School For Aliens (Early Readers – 6000 words) Click here to read a sample.
Ten year old Max discovers that there is a secret school for aliens in his town. The only person who believes him is his grandmother, Amelia Matilda Moon.
The story gets off to an exciting start when the aliens arrive at the abandoned old school at midnight in their silver spacecraft. A short time later they see Max, cycling across the playground, and end up becoming friends with him and his gran.
School for Aliens features three main alien characters, Gruber, Zzipa and Spich (who’ve accidentally chosen their new Earthling names from a tasty takeaway menu. Burger, Pizza and Chips have rearranged the letters of their names so they don’t seem like complete dimwits). These three main alien characters are learning all about the quirky and crazy ways of humans.
Other characters include two alien teachers, Henry Vermillion and Bob Magenta, and an alien cat called Tiddles.
Max and the aliens agree to keep their friendship a secret which results in plenty of mischief, mayhem and adventure throughout the book.
School for Aliens is a humorous and exciting book about an abandoned old school that’s secretly being used by aliens. It’s written as an Early Chapter book for children.
6000 words and illustrations.
Middle Grade Fiction
Secondhand Spooks – December 32nd (Middle Grade Fiction – 41,000 words) Click here to read a sample.
Twelve-year-old Murphy Moss has a fascination for ghosts, mysteries and anything creepy. He ends up working a few hours a week at the Secondhand Spook shop. The shop’s owner supplies ghosts, phantoms and other unworldly creatures to those who want to buy or hire them for special occasions.
The trouble starts when one of the Secondhand Spooks, Lucky Eddie, goes missing. Lucky Eddie has been darkled (captured by three evil ghouls known as the Darkles). The Darkles have a plan to cause chaos at the Creepy Castle when ghosts from all over the world gather to celebrate the night of December 32nd.
Murphy and his friend, Evie Snow, become involved in the trouble, along with a lively and fascinating selection of weird characters including: Raggety Wraith, Rattlebones the Skeleton, Mr Macabre the Horrible Highlander, the Spectre Inspector, Sebastian Knight and his ancient ghostly butler, Fossil, and Un-Dead Fred the cat.
Secondhand Spooks is filled with spooks, humour and all things ghostly.
Faeriefied (Middle Grade Fiction – 65,000 words) Click here to read a sample.
The faeries of Whispering Wood plan to modernise themselves so that people will start believing in them again.
They ask a sprite to teach them about new technology, and inadvertently enlist the help of Finlay, an elficologist, along with Mrs Bell who owns the ice cream shop, and her shifty cat.
They also try to hire a newspaper journalist to help with their publicity campaign, and unwittingly become the target of an unscrupulous reporter known as the Horrible Hack. Thankfully, they have the back up of the Wandflower faeries, led by Scabious Violetshifter, editor of the Faerie News, Winter Wolf-Bane his sub-editor, and faerie photo-journalist, Flaxy Blewit, together with Nettle-Wick the troll.
Apart from convincing humans that they exist to prevent themselves from fading, dealing with the Horrible Hack, and thwarting the press, the faeries have to fight the black heart, a faerie who is lurking in Whispering Wood with the darkest of intentions.
Written with a liberal dash of humour, the story is really about the interaction of the characters, showing the worst of faerie and human nature at its magical best.
Poison-Wynd (Middle Grade Fiction – 25,000 words) Click here to read a sample.
Poison-Wynd is set in present day Dublin, and the shadowy underworld, where extraordinary creatures haunt the city.
Thirteen-year-old Wil Dark is sent to Dublin to spend the summer with his unusual relative, Copper-man Carlisle, while his archaeologist father works abroad.
When Wil arrives in Dublin, Copper-man, a retired scientist and map maker extraordinaire, issues a warning that sends shivers through Wil. He is warned not to cross the new footbridge that spans the city’s main river if there is fog in the middle of it. It’s a strange warning, and Wil plans to adhere to it, but his plans are cast aside when shadowy figures threaten to hunt him down.
Poison-Wynd is packed with mystery, adventure, and phantom-like moths in an underworld deep below the streets of the city.
Wil Dark’s summer just got a whole lot creepier . . .
Wormhole Wynd (Middle Grade Fiction – 20,000 words) Click here to read a sample.
The story begins when twelve-year-old Ryley sees something very unusual.
A young woman (Aurora Gael) is believed to have taken off on a space rocket from the garden of a creepy old house in Cosmic Crescent, but finding proof of this is as elusive as the purple smoke that obscured her take-off. Ryley’s investigation leads him and his friends (Sylvie, Rafferty and Guy), on a twilight adventure to the house – and a meeting with the owner, Titanium White, a man who is said to be a myth.
To add to their adventure, they have to deal with the ferocious and unfathomable Umbrial Moss, the meteorite hunter. Fortunately Ryley’s dad, Ambrose, who is an astrobiologist, helps them. As does Fergus who owns the Freaky Forensic shop in the town’s mysterious Wormhole Wynd.
First book in a new series of Wormhole Wynd books.
Science Fashion (Middle Grade Fiction – 33,000 words) Click here to read a sample.
Budding fifteen-year-old fashionista, Evie, is persuaded to attend science class at school to help with her career aspirations of working in the world of fashion, jewellery, cosmetics and all things glam. Science isn’t her thing, but she accepts the challenge and knows it’ll help her achieve her dreams.
During her nerve-racking first day in the new class, she wears totally the wrong shoes and clothes, but discovers she knows more about science than she thought she did (reading her horoscope for years paid off when it came to naming the planets) and rightly guesses the answer to a question she was clueless about.
Oh and, that’s just for starters. There’s also intrigue, jealousy and boys. Hunter and Zak are gorgeous. Who knew boys like this were in the science class?
She’s also got dresses, skirts and tops to upscale and design – and her fashion show to organise at school as part of her art and design exam. Her two best friends, Neve and Reece, are going to model her fashion collection. With Neve wanting to be a private detective, Reece keen on being a newspaper journalist, and Evie’s dream of fashion fame, there’s plenty of excitement, mystery, romance and glamour in this modern, fast-paced story.
And there is a surprise…
Evie is astounded when she discovers she has a talent for science. Fashion is her passion, but will she change her career and work instead in science? Evie has the perfect idea – and she calls it Science Fashion.
Young Adult
Dublin Girl (Young Adult) Click here to read a sample.
When Ember O’Brien, heads to Dublin to work for a top glossy fashion magazine, she enters the ferociously fabulous world of editor Cynthia Summer.
Ember has a large number of followers who enjoy reading her fashion blog, and she is hired by the magazine to write for them.
Working at the magazine, Ember meets gorgeous blond fashion photographer, Marshawn. And the handsome, dark-haired Carter. The two young men become part of her world, but will Mars or Carter become part of her future?
Why Are All The Good Guys Total Monsters? (Young Adult) Click here to read a sample.
Seventeen year old Vesper lives in London. She’s been looking forward to enjoying a summer break at Orlaith’s house in Edinburgh. Orlaith is a family friend who lives in the city with her cat, Midnight. Orlaith’s house has a wonderful moon garden that is lit at night with lanterns, fairy lights and flowers that suit the evening light.
But when Vesper’s mother has to work on an assignment in New York and Orlaith goes to Glasgow to display her artwork, Vesper is left alone in Edinburgh where mysterious, magical and romantic things start to happen when she meets two beautifully handsome young men, Daire Grey and Sabastien L’Fae.
Vesper’s summer is one she’ll never forget…
I’m Holding Out For A Vampire Boyfriend (Young Adult) Click here to read a sample.
When seventeen year old Emme writes in her diary – I’m holding out for a vampire boyfriend, she thinks that her chances of finding one are slim to nothing.
But events at school, involving four handsome boys – Guin, D’ary, Cole and Von, and her best friend, Sophie, soon make her think again…
Set in London, this modern, atmospheric and romantic teen novella gives a whole new meaning to – be careful what you wish for.
