Our speaker in October 2020 was Colin R Parsons, author of fantasy fiction for children and young adults.
Colin was born in the Rhondda Valley, where he still lives, and started writing when still a child. He took up his pen again later in life and his first book, “Wizards’ Kingdom”, was featured at the launch of the Borders book store in Llantrisant in 2006. Colin gave two talks and sold 100 books over the weekend, which is where his journey as a writer began.
He now writes fantasy, steampunk, supernatural and sci-fi novels for children and adults, influenced mainly by the works of Tolkien, CS Lewis and HG Wells. In addition to the the popular “Wizards’ Kingdom” series, Colin has written “The Curious World” series of fantasy children’s books, several novels for young adults and a YA fantasy short story collection, “The Black Shoebox and Other Strange Stories”, due to be published in 2020. He also writes children’s picture books in collaboration with Clare Thomas, as well as adult crime novels under his pseudonym, Jake Ridge.
Colin runs the Rhondda Book Fair and has done for the past six years. It’s a free event for the public to attend, with many authors in attendance and a special guest talk in the afternoon.
Colin has also been working with the agency Authors Abroad since 2013 and is booked to visit schools, running presentations and workshops in England and Wales. In what time he has in between he actually writes his books and has a YouTube channel where he makes videos to help children write stories with advice and tips.
Find out more about Colin on his website