Tag: horror

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Yvonne Banham on the inspiration behind the Delores Mackenzie series

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As the series comes to a close, author of the Delores Mackenzie series, Yvonne Banham, shares how the deliciously dark trilogy all began…

by Yvonne Banham

The Delores Mackenzie books are uncanny paranormal mysteries set in the dark underbelly of Edinburgh Old Town: gothic, shapeshifting, ghoul filled tales with a moody demon gargoyle, lots of delicious food and a sprinkling of dry humour.

Delores Mackenzie and the Dead of Winter takes Delores, and co-students Prudence and Gabriel not only to the edge of their paranormal abilities, but also on a journey way beyond the Arctic Circle as they try to solve a haunting murder mystery without becoming the next victims.

I’ve always loved tales of the supernatural, especially since I heard about a ghost that ‘lived’ with us when I was really small. He’d say ‘goodnight’ to my sister, then tidy a few things away. Stories of magic or hauntings are very much my thing and it’s what I love to write. I don’t plot ideas; they usually begin with an image in my head triggered by an experience or memory, a glimpse of something, then I go with it for a while, see if there’s a story.

For the Delores Mackenzie books, it was a physical jolt, scary and exhilarating. I was running across a causeway from a tiny island outside Edinburgh towards the mainland. A wild storm was building as the sea water rushed in along the Firth of Forth. Just like Delores at the start of the first book, I’d left it too late and that causeway is treacherous. The gale-force wind was gripping me, dragging me towards the rapidly rising water as I tried to run. It was easy to imagine the storm as a wild beast or demonic spirit! By the time I reached safety, the idea of Delores was fully formed: smart, strong-willed, an outsider vulnerable to spirits who did not have her best interests at heart! I knew how she looked and wondered what dark creatures could have been chasing her. The power of nature shows up again in a big scene in the third book, coming full circle to those first moments of peril with Delores.

The gale-force wind was gripping me, dragging me towards the rapidly rising water as I tried to run.

Delores’ world needed a modern day but gothic setting, and Edinburgh Old Town was perfect. I was lucky to get to see inside the clocktower at the People’s Museum (which became The Tolbooth Book Store) and things started to come together. It was easy to imagine supernatural forces lurking in the shadows of the narrow wynds and closes, and in the lost streets and vaults hidden beneath the oldest parts of the city.

It was easy to imagine supernatural forces lurking in the shadows of the narrow wynds and closes, and in the lost streets and vaults hidden beneath the oldest parts of the city.

I had no idea that Prudence, Gabriel or Bartleby would exist until Delores dragged her suitcase into the Tolbooth Book Store and, as she moved through her story, characters and plot showed up around her. I took trips to the museums, galleries, antique and vintage clothing shops of Edinburgh to help with details. I love writing food for my characters and that comes from my younger reading passions. I was obsessed by descriptions of the witch’s house in Hansel and Gretal, the lure of Turkish delight in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (no coincidence that Prudence loves it so much!), anything with a banquet or a midnight feast.

Food is intertwined with life at the Tolbooth representing all kinds of things: love, care, grief, danger, even lighter moments like when Delores’ food is turned against her.

Delores’ adventures see her through a year at the Tolbooth, with the third book taking place at Christmas, which was a dream to write but also has some really emotional scenes. It’s partly inspired by A Christmas Carol, and also the wonderful Christmas in the Morrigan Crow series. But Delores’ world had to expand way beyond the confines of Edinburgh Old Town if she was to find out what had happened to her family. And there was still a murder or two to solve!

I have always been drawn to northern climates, cold places that feel like they’re clinging on to the edges of the earth, and it was amazing to be able to travel beyond the Arctic Circle to tap into that connection in a very real way. I found a home in Tromsø, Norway, for the dreaded High Council and the fiendish Psychic Adjustment Council, both huge dangers to Delores and her friends. It also gave me the best moment for Prudence’s big scene near the end of the series. I really loved writing that one!

It will feel strange to leave Delores and her friends behind, but that world will never be far away. Just a short trip into the Old Town. Or underneath it!

You can read Delores Mackenzie and the Dead of Winter (and the whole series) now!

Special Offer

The Delores Mackenzie series is published by Firefly Press. For a limited time they are offering a special bundle which includes all three books, a bookmark and an exclusive recipe for Cook’s Thumbprint Cookies (as seen in book 3!) You can grab the bundle for £20 on the Firefly website until the end of November 2026!

Book One

When Delores Mackenzie is chased home by a restless spirit, she is sent to the mysterious Uncles in Edinburgh Old Town to learn how to control her unusual ‘gifts’. Scared and alone, she finds her new home at the Tolbooth Book Store is full of curious surprises: some welcome, others less so. But when a sinister apparition threatens the lives of her strange new housemates, Delores must gather all her strength to save them.

Book Two

Paranormal students Delores and Prudence are being hounded by inquisitors after they broke the rules and helped rescue fellow student Maud from death at the hands of an evil spirit. Cruel inquisitor Magoria Jepp is searching for secrets at their home in Edinburgh’s Tolbooth Bookstore, but does she have an uncanny history of her own to hide? As Delores tries to save her friends, she attracts the unwelcome attention of a murderous Boçain, or evil spirit, intent on stealing her paranormal gifts. Can she defeat her enemies, and maybe her own family too, to save everyone she loves at the Tolbooth?

Book Three

When the ghoulish victim of a decades-old murder screams for justice from beyond the grave, paranormal students Delores, Prudence and Gabriel must travel from Edinburgh Old Town to far beyond the Arctic Circle, chasing after a mysterious book, a legend … and a killer.


But, with their every move being watched, will the friends find the answers they’re looking for before they become the next victims…?

Yvonne Banham

Yvonne Banham grew up on an island off the coast of Cumbria and spent lots of time huddled on the wild beach with a scary book. When she left school, she couldn’t decide whether to be a nurse, an artist, or a writer, so she tried them all but liked writing best. She believes in ghosts though she’s never met one, and after five gloriously spooky years in Edinburgh, she now lives in Stirlingshire with her husband and their bold little terrier Bertie. When she’s not writing, she’s either hiking in the nearby hills or checking out creepy locations in search of new stories.

PaperBound Magazine is an online magazine for the young, and the young at heart. We are dedicated to showcasing authors and illustrators for children’s and young adult fiction and we strive to deliver inspiring content, uplifting stories, and top tips for young and aspiring writers yet to burst on to the literary scene.

All our issues are completely free and run by volunteers, however if you would like to support PaperBound and the work we do, you can help us out by buying us a virtual book. We appreciate any support you can give us!

Don’t forget you can read with the latest issues of PaperBound Magazine – completely free – here.

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Helen Parry on her new novel, A Scrap of Moss and Magick

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Author of A Scrap of Moss and Magick, Helen Parry, delves into her love for folklore, and the inspiration of folk horror literature behind her novel.

by Helen Parry

The nights are drawing in, the leaves are beautifully dying and Hallowe’en is creeping towards us; suddenly we’re more aware of owls hooting and creatures scuttling in the dark undergrowth, of ancient buildings and sacred places, and of the myths and legends that infuse them.

Rural landscapes, cruel old traditions and the darker side of folklore are the lifeblood of folk horror, a term first used to describe a subgenre of British films of the late 1960s and early 1970s (The Wicker Man is perhaps the most famous of these) and more recently extended to literature.

Place is very important in folk horror and it is often set in lonely stretches of countryside – woods, moors – and remote villages or houses cut off from modern life and suffused with the occult. Eerie and atmospheric, it’s derived from the Gothic novel, but in folk horror, the forests are haunted and the witches are real. You might think of fiction by M. R. James, Arthur Machen, Zoe Gilbert, Andrew Michael Hurley, Melinda Salisbury… You might think of dark fairy tales or Scottish border ballads steeped in blood and ghosts.

The story is firmly rooted in fairy and folk tale. And there is magick – plenty of it – and a monster.

I would not call my children’s novel, A Scrap of Moss and Magick, folk horror exactly, although it has elements of it: an isolated country house, a land where the creatures of folklore are very real and hungry – when dusk comes, you should wear a necklace of rowan berries or turn your gloves inside out for protection from things that lurk in the darkness. The story is firmly rooted in fairy and folk tale. And there is magick – plenty of it – and a monster.

But while folk horror proper seeks to disturb and disorientate, to question humanity’s place in an uncanny, implacable world, I wanted to celebrate the beauty of nature and create a land which readers might find an exciting place to inhabit but which demanded they treat with respect. A land where trolls and mere-maidens, Black Shuck and Jenny Greenteeth, imps and redcaps and brownies, all exist. Almost Narnia – but sinister. Feed the troll but watch your step.

I spent a lot of time with Katharine Briggs’s Abbey Lubbers, Banshees & Boggarts: A Who’s Who of Fairies, a dictionary of folklore from Britain and Ireland, full of horrors. The Watkins Book of English Folktales by Neil Philip is packed with traditional stories, some humorous, others distinctly unsettling. These showed me another Britain, with the supernatural leaking through its seams, and this Britain is where A Scrap of Moss and Magick takes place.

Magical creatures, shape-shifting, books of spells, a strange old house…

But my starting point was actually: ‘What if there was a book like The Wolves of Willoughby Chase but with magic?’ (Because ever since I wept with terror when the wolf leaps at Sylvia through the train window, I have loved that book and all of Joan Aiken’s work.) And then I wrote down all the things I should like to read about in such a book: some brave but vulnerable heroines, magical creatures, shapeshifting, books of spells, a strange old house…

So I combined folk horror with the traditions of Gothic, particularly the amazing Uncle Silas by Sheridan Le Fanu, and also with traditional and historical fantasy. Not just the tour de force that is Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell by Susanna Clarke, but also books by the writers of my youth: Susan Cooper, Alan Garner, John Gordon, Diana Wynne Jones; the modern fantasies of Frances Hardinge, Lucy Strange, Philippa Leathley; and historical fantasies by Nazneen Ahmed Pathak, Gita Ralleigh and Hayley Hoskins.

These genres allow you to pass beyond the boundaries of what is possible, what is believable, into a heightened reality. Here, you have enormous scope to entertain your reader and explore even quite dark emotional terrain because of its distance from the ‘real’. And after you and your reader have played about together in your shared imaginary world, maybe you’ll both view our shared physical world with new eyes, new ideas.

A Scrap of Moss and Magick by Helen Parry is out 8 October 2026 | Paperback | £7.99 | David Fickling Books

A Scrap of Moss and Magick

Set in an alternative nineteenth-century Britain inhabited by folkloric creatures, and centred on two friends, Thirza and Cecily, in a strange old house full of magick and secrets, A Scrap of Moss and Magick thus weaves together folk horror, historical fantasy and Gothic fiction.

Helen Parry

Helen Parry grew up in an old house on a hill in Ipswich, where she spent most of her time reading, searching for magic portals and casting spells that never quite worked. She studied literature at university, worked in publishing in London and lived for a couple of years in Nigeria before moving to Belgium.
She now lives there with her family, some hens and the two most spoilt cats in the universe. When she isn’t daydreaming or writing, she teaches English to adults. A Scrap of Moss & Magick is her first book.

PaperBound Magazine is an online magazine for the young, and the young at heart. We are dedicated to showcasing authors and illustrators for children’s and young adult fiction and we strive to deliver inspiring content, uplifting stories, and top tips for young and aspiring writers yet to burst on to the literary scene.

All our issues are completely free and run by volunteers, however if you would like to support PaperBound and the work we do, you can help us out by buying us a virtual book. We appreciate any support you can give us!

Don’t forget you can read with the latest issues of PaperBound Magazine – completely free – here.

Uncle Zeedie - The Blood Texts
article, Blog, Blog series, Bookshelf, on writing, Writing craft

Halloween guest post: 3 Horror Writing Tips by Colm Field

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The Blood Texts author Colm Field unleashes his top 3 spooky tips on writing horror, guaranteed to make your skin crawl and the monsters lurking under your bed to run and hide! Check out Colm’s spook-tastic writing advice below, featuring an insight on his most recent novel Uncle Zeedie.

by Colm Field

I love horror. It can’t hide. In so many literary genres, the author can mask their intent (or lack of it) under snobbery and pretension – they just didn’t GET it! – but not horror stories. Nope, the horror writer has honest, objective goals – to unnerve, to scare, to entertain.

If writing is craft, then Horror can be Lego, provided you learn your blocks right. Jump scares, atmospheric scares, paranormal activity (the activity, not the film) … there are so many tools at your disposal.

Of course, those things aren’t objective really. What scares one person won’t scare another, and my fears might well bore you. You might have many goals in your writing, might even bristle at my philistine summation.

Yet while you’re probably right, and a writer should never over-codify their process lest their work lose its soul, I promise that the following 3 tips can help your next devilish inspiration find a page to torment.

Like all writing ‘rules’, they should be read then shoved back to the same part of your mind that remembers to brush teeth and brake at red lights. I hope they’re of use.

1) Horrors need 3 things: Monsters, Scares, and Cares.

Yep, I’m still being simplistic. But if you’ve had a great idea for a horror, only to find that it’s not getting any further in your head, you could do a lot worse than studying these three aspects of your story; the Monster, the Scares, and the Cares. The Monster is the thing we are frightened of, the Scares are the moments we, um, get scared, and the Cares are the characters we really don’t want to see hurt. I promise you – your story has them all, somewhere.

And not necessarily in equal measure. Come up with an exciting, memorable Monster, for example, and you might decide to inflict it on characters so tropey that their terror is immediately recognised, without all that effort spent getting into their psyche. Good for you – don’t worry about judgement here, we’re horror fans, we’re past all that.

But if you’re story still falls flat, then perhaps we do need more on the Cares … or maybe just more Scares. As Howard Hawks almost said, ‘A good horror is seven terrifying moments… and no boring ones.’

Or, you might have put all your effort into writing a complex and compelling love story, with characters rich in pathos and a drip drip drip of intangible dread. Wondering why your reader drifted off halfway through? Perhaps the threat to those characters is too wispy.

Develop your Monster a little more, give them some teeth to go with all that talk. Because if you exclude one part of this unholy trinity entirely, it will be missed.

2) Monsters don’t have to be monsters.

You know this already, of course. The thing that goes bump in the night can be a very human bully, a voracious plant, your protagonist’s own id. They may turn out to be not a monster at all, but horribly misunderstood. It’s common knowledge, so why am I telling you about it here?

Well, for me, it’s the question itself that is of interest. Who is scaring us here? Why are they scary? What does our fear of them say about us?

Sometimes the answers are straightforward. I just don’t want to be eaten! If your Monster is a straight up heinous villain, then don’t worry, there’s nothing wrong with that.

Indeed, adding layers of sympathy can run the risk of excusing their crimes. I’m sorry about your parents’ divorce, Billy, but you just cut off my arms with a plasterboard saw.

But if the answers run deep? Then asking these questions can make your story truly profound. In T. Kingfisher’s book What Moves The Dead, an organism that causes a sinister change to its victims is reflected in other transformations taking place; through war, crumbling inheritance, and cold science.

Indeed, the one constant in the book is that of the protagonist’s gender fluidity; a fact, nothing more nor less, a source of comfort and familiarity while all our other assumptions are wrecked.

I won’t give anything away, but my first thought upon finishing the book was, Was that about a monster? I couldn’t decide. I still can’t.

In my own Uncle Zeedie (plug alert!) the teenaged protagonists are scared that their family friend may be a serial killer. The story poses similar questions: If somebody is weird, does that make them dangerous, or you narrow-minded?

If you choose to ignore a red flag, are you foolish or simply trusting? The answers aren’t simple, but I loved writing the debate.

3) Think of your Scares as tools.

It’s a dark, dark night, in a dark, dark wood. You know your monster, you know your characters, you know their end. What Scare will you choose?

If writing is craft, then Horror can be Lego, provided you learn your blocks right. Jump scares, atmospheric scares, paranormal activity (the activity, not the film), repulsion… there are so many different tools at your disposal, provided you use them correctly.

Is this midnight nature walk early in the story? Then why not a terrifying mirror reveal, or even just a simple jump scare? Something leapt from the bush and… end of chapter. Yeah, it’s a cheap cliffhanger… but it’s only cheap if you do it again, and remember: we’re horror fans! We like a bit of tacky now and then!

Ooh, but later? After we learned the myth of the beast, the foul curse, the soul-sucking spectre? After the best friend has died horribly?! Right then, a jump scare might be as welcome as a fart joke at a funeral.

Now it’s time to bring in the power tools instead, bring in some repulsive body horror, or a bad trip-inducing surrealism, or maybe throw in the Monster’s POV…

I could go on, and you could probably think of more that I would miss. Scares are tools, don’t be afraid to treat them as such.

With these tips, please don’t think I’m reducing the joy of writing into an AI prompt. Horror is not an objective science – it is an ethereal art form that revels in the uncertain, and loses its potency when stripped to bare and cynical mechanics.

But the scary books that have gripped me of late – say, Boys In The Valley by Philip Fracassi, or Deadstream by Mar-Romasco Moore – they featured these recognisable elements, delivered with a new and terrifying gusto.

Should you be struggling with this wicked masterpiece, and these bare and cynical mechanics can offer you a way through that struggle, then please, know this. You are writing for horror fans. If anybody won’t judge, it’s us.

Uncle Zeedie is OUT NOW and published by UCLan

Uncle Zeedie

Uncle Zeedie is weird, but at least he’s rich and his house is amazing.
That’s what George and Lacey tell themselves when they arrive at his isolated mansion in the Welsh woods. Only, something here is worse than weird.
Uncle Zeedie seems unhinged, serving them rotten food, and skulking around at night. The house is decaying, blood stained, and stinks of sour milk. And George is seeing kids that aren’t there. They’re dead, these kids.
And if the rumours are right, Uncle Zeedie is the one who’s killing them.
The players are in place. The stage is set. Curtain up.

Colm Field

Who is Colm Field? Well, he was born in the witching hour, beneath a blood-red moon, and under a bad sign.
His first words were not fit to print. Now he scratches stories with yellowed fingernails, across the mouldering walls of the abandoned nuclear power station he calls home.
If you like what you read, we’ll dare you to find out more . . . 

PaperBound Magazine is an online magazine for the young, and the young at heart. We are dedicated to showcasing authors and illustrators for children’s and young adult fiction and we strive to deliver inspiring content, uplifting stories, and top tips for young and aspiring writers yet to burst on to the literary scene.

All our issues are completely free and run by volunteers, however if you would like to support PaperBound and the work we do, you can help us out by buying us a virtual book. We appreciate any support you can give us!

Don’t forget you can read with the latest issues of PaperBound Magazine – completely free – here.

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Halloween Special: ‘The Dark Within Us’ by Jess Popplewell

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Jess Popplewell chatted to us about her writing journey and her new YA novel The Dark Within Us!

Could you introduce us to your novel, The Dark Within Us, and the inspiration behind it?

Of course! The Dark Within Us follows Jenny, a 16-year-old girl who is having a rough time. She’s fallen out with her mum and is therefore sleeping on her auntie’s sofa, which is clearly unsustainable. She’s fallen out with her best friend and been dumped by her first boyfriend – so when she meets a boy at a party who claims she doesn’t have a soul, this makes a weird sort of sense. Maybe if she can get her soul back, she can fix everything else as well. So, she decides to go with Luc – who it transpires, is a demon – into Hell in search of her soul. It’s inspired by a lot of things – not only did I leave home quite young, I also used to host for a youth homelessness charity so the idea of teenagers surviving via sofa-surfing is something I feel very strongly about. The book’s set sort of roughly in 2006, which is when I was a teenager, so I’ve also taken inspiration from TV, books and music of that era, most notably the TV show Skins.

The book features a modern version of hell, inspired by Dante’s Inferno. Can you tell us a bit more about how you created this setting, and more about where the idea came from?

Yes! When I was a teenager, I was a massive Goth and obsessed with religious and mythological perceptions of the afterlife. Some people get into horses and dolphins, I was slightly more morbid. I was always specifically interested in the way that rituals and beliefs around death evolve across cultures and over time – so I liked the idea of a modern teenager confronting centuries’ old beliefs and conceptions of the afterlife, especially ones like Inferno that have had such an influence on popular ideas of it even today (particularly in the West).

Despite the supernatural elements of the novel, Jenny feels very real as a character. She’s going through things that many young people today will be able to relate to. How did you go about creating her? And what do you hope readers can take away from this story?

That’s a lovely thing to say, thank you! I have been known to say that Jenny is a cooler version of me as a teenager, but that’s not the whole truth. She was conceived more as someone I might have been friends with – I imagined her with my group of friends, and her personality was influenced by that. Also, as I mentioned earlier, I have some experience of working with young people, and I genuinely think teenagers are the most interesting people on the planet, mostly because they’re doing a lot of work all the time in figuring out how to navigate the complicated stuff life chucks at us. I wanted to show that through how Jenny navigates… some seriously complicated stuff.

There are some other wonderful characters in this book. From the twins, Chloe-Lee and Joey, to the Ferrier and even Zillah! Did you have a favourite character to write?

In some ways no, because I do love all the characters in this book (well, maybe not Amber), but in terms of fun, probably Chloe-Lee and Joey. They’re such cryptic little weirdos, and cryptic little weirdos are almost always my favourite characters in any media. I’ve written so much backstory for them that had no place in the book, they still pop up in my head all the time.

Could you tell us a little about your journey to publication?

Sure, how long do we have? The very first iteration of this book came about when I was 16. Over the years, characters have come and gone, plotlines have shifted, the relationship between Jenny and Luc has been wildly different, but the things that have always been the same are that Jenny starts out homeless, she goes to Hell because of Luc, and it’s heavily influenced by Dante’s Inferno and mythological references. I’ve written other things as well, but when the 2022 Chicken House Prize came around I knew this was the story to submit. For one thing, they ask for a full manuscript and this one was somewhat finished. I was in Reykjavik with a friend when I discovered I’d won, and Icelandic people seem to love ice cream an appropriate amount so we went out after the phone call and I had a mint choc chip in celebration. I met my agent through the prize as well, since she was one of the judges, and the whole process was incredibly positive. I’m so grateful the judges got what I was trying to do.

What would be your top three tips to any aspiring writers out there?

One: find a way to make time, whatever that means for you. For a long time I was working multiple jobs, or studying and working at the same time, and that’s the main reason it took me so long to write the book, because I just didn’t have the headspace for writing unless I was forced to by doing a writing course or my Creative Writing MA. It’s easier now because I know I’ve done it once and can do it again, but when you’re at that early stage it’s important to think about what you can do to make it happen.

Two: at the same time, don’t make yourself ill with the pressure. If you have lots of other responsibilities (parents, I don’t know how you do it!!), writing is often the thing that goes on the backburner, and that’s OK. Don’t beat yourself up over it. Remember that daydreaming the next scene you want to write before you get chance to write it… counts as writing!

Three: to help with the above, explore different ways of writing. Personally I use the notes app on my phone to jot down random dialogue snippets or an especially productive daydream. I like it because I can email it all to myself in one go when I’m next at my PC. I’ve also played a bit with speech to text dictation – I’m not great at the punctuation yet but it’s a great way to get quite a lot of work done in a short space of time, even if it all needs editing later on. You can’t edit an empty page, so something is better than nothing!

You can’t edit an empty page, so something is better than nothing!

Are you able to tell us about anything else you’re working on, or that we can look forward to soon? Will there be any other stories set in this world?

I usually have 7 or 8 projects on the go at any given time – some of them are just for fun, like a 5-book series planned out in a cyberpunk dystopia (I call those projects my palate cleansers), but I’m also working on a couple of more serious projects. I do have ideas for more stories set in the world of The Dark Within Us; I’d love to write a follow up inspired by the themes in Purgatorio, but we’ll have to see if that pans out!

.

Photo by João Daniel Pereira

Jess Popplewell

Jess Popplewell is the author of The Dark Within Us, winner of the Times/Chicken House Chairman’s Prize 2022. She’s also a careers advisor in Higher Education, and has a series of free Careers Advice for Writers videos on TikTok (@jesspopps) and her website (jesspopplewell.com).

The Dark Within Us is published by Chicken House and out now.

PaperBound Magazine is an online magazine for the young, and the young at heart. We are dedicated to showcasing authors and illustrators for children’s and young adult fiction and we strive to deliver inspiring content, uplifting stories, and top tips for young and aspiring writers yet to burst on to the literary scene.

All our issues are completely free and run by volunteers, however if you would like to support PaperBound and the work we do, you can help us out by buying us a virtual book. We appreciate any support you can give us!

Don’t forget you can read with the latest issues of PaperBound Magazine – completely free – here.

Blog, Blog series, Bookshelf, Interview, Interviews, on writing, Writing craft

Halloween Special: ‘Let’s Split Up’ by Bill Wood

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We spoke to author Bill Wood about the inspiration behind his new YA horror novel, Let’s Split Up!

Could you tell us a little about your book, Let’s Split Up?

Let’s Split Up follows a group of teenagers who investigate the murders of the IT couple at their school. Their search takes them to the supposedly haunted Carrington Manor. This book is my ode to Scooby-Doo, as well as 90s/2000s horror movies!

You describe the book as a nostalgic tribute to the TV and films of your childhood. What were your favourite films and programmes from that period?

Honestly, anything Scooby-Doo. I had so many old VHS tapes that I watched over and over. Power Rangers was also a big one for me, but that didn’t exactly inspire this book. Then, as I got a bit older, and dipped my toes into horror, the late-90s films were my obsession for a while.

There seem to be a resurgence of 90s/2000s themed stories making a comeback at the moment (Scream and I Know What You Did Last Summer, to name a couple). Are you excited that Let’s Split Up is finding a home today?

Definitely! My favourite thing about those 90s/2000s themed stories is the aspect of teen friendship. So, when I set out to write a ‘scarier Scooby-Doo novel,’ channelling this era was a no-brainer. It just felt so right.

We love that you have a character called Buffy in this book (Still the best TV show!). Are any of the characters in Let’s Split Up inspired by people you know, or other characters you’ve come across?

Other than my dog, Macey, who is in the book (I had to!), the rest of the characters are not inspired by anyone. I did try and subvert a lot of cliché characters from horror movies though. Cam, for example, is the jock of the group but he’s not completely useless like a lot of depictions. He’s got a heart and has a lot more to him than you might expect.

Let’s Split Up begins with a prologue reminiscent of many slasher/horror movies. Can readers look forward to any other horror tropes and conventions as they read?

For sure! I guess you can say there’s an element of the final girl trope in Let’s Split Up, but that’s also something I’ve tried to play with as well. Another big one is obvious from the title. Splitting up… But again, when the characters do have to split up, I tried to make a very good reason for it so you’re not screaming at the pages!

You have a background in film and screenwriting. How helpful was that when writing Let’s Split Up?

I started writing this at university, so it was all really fresh in my mind. I’m unsure if Let’s Split Up would be so inspired by film if I hadn’t started writing it when I did. But screenwriting is so helpful when it comes to writing dialogue because scripts are ninety-percent dialogue. I’ve found studying that for three years has really strengthened how believable my characters are.

TikTok is such a great social media because it connects you with people who enjoy the exact same things as you do, so you’re finding the ‘perfect audience,’ …

You have such a great TikTok following. What do you think TikTok brings to the book world that perhaps wasn’t there before? How does it help authors?

There’s pros and cons to it, of course, but it’s really helped with promoting the book. That’s a given. TikTok is such a great social media because it connects you with people who enjoy the exact same things as you do, so you’re finding the ‘perfect audience,’ if you will. TikTok also demystifies the author, if that makes sense. When I grew up, I never met any authors, so they seemed like these faceless people. Social media has definitely changed that.

Are you able to tell us about anything else you’re working on, or anything else we can look forward to soon?

I have a new YA mystery horror releasing autumn 2025. Like Let’s Split Up, it follows a group of teenagers. But this time around, we find ourselves in the Scottish Highlands…

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Bill Wood

Bill Wood was born and raised in Birmingham, England. He has always had a love for all kinds of media and graduated from Birmingham City University in 2023 with a degree in Film & Screenwriting. When not writing, he is often found with a book and an iced coffee in hand, or filming ‘bookish’ social media content for his TikTok channel billreads, where he has amassed a following of over 124K. He currently lives with his family and Staffordshire Bull Terrier, Macey.

His debut novel Let’s Split Up (Scholastic, 2024) has become an instant bestseller and is a nail-biting and perfectly formed thriller for the YA BookTok generation – think Scooby Doo meets Pretty Little Liars.

Let’s Split Up is published by Scholastic and out now.

PaperBound Magazine is an online magazine for the young, and the young at heart. We are dedicated to showcasing authors and illustrators for children’s and young adult fiction and we strive to deliver inspiring content, uplifting stories, and top tips for young and aspiring writers yet to burst on to the literary scene.

All our issues are completely free and run by volunteers, however if you would like to support PaperBound and the work we do, you can help us out by buying us a virtual book. We appreciate any support you can give us!

Don’t forget you can read with the latest issues of PaperBound Magazine – completely free – here.

article, Blog, Blog series, Bookshelf, on writing, Writing craft

Journey from Blogger to Author by Amy McCaw

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Author of the Mina and the Undead trilogy, Amy McCaw, writes about her journey from reader to blogger to author!

Being a blogger definitely gave me an advantage when it came to getting my first book deal. The contacts, publishing knowledge and events I went to all played a part in becoming an author.

I became a blogger after attending a workshop at the Young Adult Literary Convention (YALC) about starting your own blog. I’d wanted to create a blog for ages, but I lacked the confidence to take the plunge. The workshop was run by several bloggers, including the brilliant Chelley Toy and Andrew (Pewter Wolf). Doing the workshop walked me through the technical side of blogging and offered lots of practical tips. I’m so glad I started my blog, as this was the moment I really joined the book community. I’ve made lots of friends and had so many lovely experiences since then!

As a blogger, I was invited to various book events. This gave me a really good insight into the publishing industry through conversing with authors and publishing staff. It also gave me lots of contacts, which were useful when it came to reaching out to authors for blurbs and reviewers to read my book.

I was also asked to participate in lots of online book marketing. This was really helpful for when I became an author, because I’d been involved in lots of successful campaigns, and it gave me good ideas for my own.

The next big landmark in my publication journey was getting a place on the Write Mentor summer mentoring program. I learned about it on social media and was so excited to be paired with an author mentor, Marisa Noelle. There was an agent showcase at the end of the process, and I found it a great opportunity to polish my book and get my work seen by agents. Write Mentor are still doing amazing work for aspiring authors, and I highly recommend checking out what they offer.

While I was on the summer mentoring program, I attended the Young Adult Literature Convention (YALC). This was probably one of the most important decisions I made on my journey to become an author. There are lots of workshops about the publishing industry and opportunities to meet authors and publishers. This particular year, they were also running agent 1:1 pitching sessions. I pitched to several agents, but Sandra Sawicka really loved my idea and asked to read the book. She soon offered representation, which was another massive milestone.

After editing my book with Sandra, we went out on submission to publishers. Being a blogger had given me realistic expectations about how long this would take and what it would feel like to get rejections, so I felt really prepared for the process.

I’d been on submission for a few weeks when the next YALC came around. This time, I got talking to Hazel from UCLan Publishing. She asked Sandra to submit my book to her, and they offered to publish Mina and the Undead a few weeks later. Once again, being a blogger and attending YALC gave me a brilliant advantage.

Being part of the book community was so useful at every stage of the publication process and it has definitely helped me to navigate the often very challenging waters of publishing!

Mina and the Undead, Mina and the Slayers, and the most recent addition to the series, Mina and the Cult, are all OUT NOW and published by UCLan Publishing.

Amy McCaw

Amy McCaw is a YA author and YouTuber. She’s the author of the Mina and the Undead series, YA murder mysteries set in 1995 New Orleans. She also co-curated the A Taste of Darkness horror anthology with Maria Kuzniar. Her main interests are books, movies and the macabre, and her novels have elements of all of these. Unsurprisingly, she’s a huge Buffy the Vampire Slayer fan and has gone to conventions to meet James Marsters more times than she cares to admit.

If you want to talk with Amy about books or 90s movies, you can find her on Twitter, Instagram, Tiktok and YouTube.

PaperBound Magazine is an online magazine for the young, and the young at heart. We are dedicated to showcasing authors and illustrators for children’s and young adult fiction and we strive to deliver inspiring content, uplifting stories, and top tips for young and aspiring writers yet to burst on to the literary scene.

All our issues are completely free and run by volunteers, however if you would like to support PaperBound and the work we do, you can help us out by buying us a virtual book. We appreciate any support you can give us!

Don’t forget you can read with the latest issues of PaperBound Magazine – completely free – here.