Confessions of an Author

What do you think will happen next? 1 What will happen next? Whenever there’s another terrorist attack, I wonder, what will happen next? Where is the world heading? I find books like ‘ A Handmaid’s Tale’ by Margaret Atwood, written in 1985 (and recently on television) fascinating. What will happen to our society in the future? With this in mind, I wrote a dystopian novel,  Counting Stars.  If religious extremism continues to result in terrorist attacks, how will society respond? Is it possible that governments will ban certain religious beliefs or behaviours – and what might society look like if that happened? How will the dawn of driverless cars affect those employed in transport? What will health care and education look like? Is there a way for poverty and famine to be eradicated? Yet people, in whatever society evolves, will be the same. Children will continue to be funny and naughty, teenagers will always rebel, parents will always love them. People will l...

What do you think will happen next? 1 Whenever there’s another terrorist attack, I wonder, what will happen next? Where is the world heading? I find books like ‘ A Handmaid’s Tale’ by Margaret Atwood, written in 1985 (and recently on television) fascinating. What will happen to our society in the future? With this in mind, I wrote a dystopian novel,  Counting Stars.  If religious extremism continues to result in terrorist attacks, how will society respond? Is it possible that governments will ban certain religious beliefs or behaviours – and what might society look like if that happened? How will the dawn of driverless cars affect those employed in transport? What will health care and education look like? Is there a way for poverty and famine to be eradicated? Yet people, in whatever society evolves, will be the same. Children will continue to be funny and naughty, teenagers will always rebel, parents will always love them. People will love, and laugh and have...

Counting Stars How would you solve the problems in today’s society? Just imagine: no more war, no more terrorism. Famine, poverty and crime are all things discussed in history lessons. Everyone has employment, health care and education. But at what cost? Imagine a future not so very distant. Think about what might be. I am excited to introduce Counting Stars, a dystopian novel set about 100 years from now. I took advice from an economist, a lawyer, and a scientist, asking what the world might look like in the near future. My rule was: It has to be possible even if it isn't probable.  I then began to create a world. Whatever the world might look like in the future, people will be the same. Adolescents will still ignore their mothers, wives will still moan about their husbands. So I created a family, and put them into the world. We have Lena, the reluctant heroine, her two children and Den, a man struggling with his own health. There is nothing special about Lena. She is li...