Name: Ben Ellis

Age: 35

Lives: Worthing, West Sussex, UK

Writing: I’ve always been creative in my spare time.  As a teenager I used to write bad poetry, then learnt the guitar and wrote bad songs and when I’d finished dredging the depths of dullness I  got interested in writing.  Parallel with this creative outlet was an interest in philosophy, sparked by ‘Sophie’s World‘, and I completed an evening A-Level course in the subject in 1998.

When I was 28 I got a job (internet marketing) in the US and lived in Detroit and then Miami for over 3 years.  This opened my eyes to political, social and cultural differences between the US and UK, compelling me to think about writing a novel based on what I could see and ideas of how things might progress.  This resulted in ‘Railroaded‘.

I’ve also written some short stories for some competitions and magazines which have been sent out.  When they come crawling back having failed miserably, I’ll put them online so you can see why.

Writing Courses: In 2004 I completed a creative writing evening course at a college in Detroit and also an online course run by Max Barry in 2007.

Favourite Book: I gotta say ‘iRobot‘, still remember the buzz of reading it.

Others?: Can I mention ‘Sophie’s World‘ again?  O’yeah, it’s my site.  ‘The Solitaire Mystery‘ by Jostein Gaarder is probably a better story.  Also, ‘Fatherland‘ by Robert Harris and ‘The Light of Other Days‘ by Arthur C.Clarke and Stephen Baxter – both have killer endings.  Can you argue with ‘1984‘?  No you can’t.  ‘The Martian Chronicles‘ by Ray Bradbury is a brilliant collection of short stories (never really rated Farenheit 451, maybe I should read it again?).

‘‘E’ a Novel‘ is hilarious and you really should read it if you haven’t.  Matt Beaumont’s other books are good too, I especially liked ‘Staying Alive‘.  I’ve also got a soft spot for Mike Gayle’s lad-lit.

Max Barry is top notch, I like all his stuff; ‘Company‘, ‘Syrup‘ and ‘Jennifer Government‘…in that order.  There I said it.  Check out ‘Machine Man‘, it’s an interweb-inovel-in-your-inbox-thingy.

Work: I’ve worked in internet marketing since 2000, started off doing SEO at an agency in Brighton, went to the US and got into affiliate marketing, came back and worked clientside which I hated (I was on Excel more than the internet) and then did a year as a web developer which polished my coding skills but got made redundant with the recession.  I now work as a temp in a manufacturing plant, enjoying being away from a computer at work and focusing on writing more at home.  See how it goes.

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If you got a question, any question, send it in or post a comment below and I’ll answer it here.