New Girl

It's always exciting to create a new character. I'm never quite sure just how they are going to appear. With Scarlet, I didn't have a clear picture. I knew she was little - as in 'Little Red Riding Hood' - and that she wasn't much of a social butterfly, having been brought up in the forest by her father and her gran - but I hadn't realised she was going to be quite so fierce and feisty! Of course, she had already appeared briefly in 'Cindy Ellery' as one of Cindy's group of friends. I rather liked the idea that these fairy-tale based characters knew each other. I saw her then as dark-haired, pretty and shy but, once I started writing her story, she jumped off the page quite forcefully.

Scarlet's story was also inspired by the experiences of someone I know who learnt quite a lot about forestry/landowning practices whilst working in that industry. As with most things there are the good, the bad and the downright shocking. Of course, we would all like things to be perfect but in the meantime, this writer has shamelessly used the failings of human nature and bad practices to create what, hopefully, is a good 'romp' if nothing else.