This is a question I’ve thrown around in my mind like a ping-pong ball ever since I was old enough to understand what fantasy actually is (the literary genre, that is – I doubt anyone under the age of twelve needs any lectures on the power of the imagination and the hours of fun that can be garnered from a muddy ditch, an old branch, and a raggedy piece of cloth: PIRATES AHOY!).
There was never any doubt in my mind that I wanted to be a writer…or, more specifically, that I wanted to write. But as to why I chose the fantastic as my canvas, who can say? The Lord of the Rings no doubt played a part, as did Fahrenheit 451, A Wrinkle In Time, and numerous other novels which wriggled their way into my brain and nestled in the darkness, content in the knowledge that sooner or later the gouges they made on my psyche would become apparent.