About the Author (written in the — always creepy — third person)

As a child Steph was influenced by Enid Blyton; ‘The Magic Faraway Tree’ in particular.

Dr Who then veered him of into Fantasy/Sci-Fi, from where he launched into the harder speculative fiction of Clarke, Asimov, Heinlein, Dick, Vonnegut, Stephenson & Banks. Along the way he immersed himself completely in Tolkien's Hobbit and Lord of the Rings, once spending an entire holiday mentally cross-referencing the Appendix of Return of the King with the Silmarillion.

Dabbling briefly with Clive Barker, he realised that horror was best kept at arm’s length.

His writing style has been described as Enid Blyton meets Lewis Carol as narrated by the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, with Kurt Vonnegut meddling in parts.

Shortly after commencing a psychology degree in his early twenties Steph realised he knew almost nothing about the outside world and made a concerted effort to start soaking up things like history and science.

His novels are neither Fantasy nor Science Fiction but rather an explorarion of the fractal territory between the two.

They’re not 'kids' books or 'adult'. They’re written for the curious, optimistic realists of the world; the book-worms who enjoy word play, rabbit holes and timeless adventures where things are never black or white…except most chess boards, all zebras and TVs from the 1940s.

The Frogbottom trilogy is a fusion of Steph’s literary influences and real life explorations, and a replica of none.