Erin Curran from Crossgar has launched her first fantasy novel.
Taking the plunge into the world of fantasy writing, Crossgar woman Erin Curran (20) has penned her first novel called ‘The Seven.’
A former pupil of St Colmcille’s High School and currently studying media studies at SERC in Downpatrick, Erin said she has always been fascinated with creative writng for as long as she can remember.
Erin said: “It is everyone’s dream to write a book I suppose, and to me it is a major step as a creative writer. I started writing while I was in primary school and have not stopped since. My sister Alana too writes and has published a trilogy. I can remember once we skived off primary school saying we were sick when we both wanted the day off to work on a book we were writing, our Pirate Storybook. We went up to my late grannie Brigid’s attic. Even back then we had great plans. It certainly puts a spin on writing a novel up in an attic!
“My dad too used to write too and he would tell us stories but would twist the characters and plots so that they were different and we’d give off to him if he went too far. I suppose that was an important part of my creative upbringing.
“I enjoyed creative writing at school and doing my GCSE’s and have progressed from there. I always found the teachers at school very supportive. At the moment I’m taking a break from my SERC course. I have been enjoying the creative arts through media studies, photography and video work, and I still indulge in drawing.
“I wrote a few sections of ‘The Seven’ and when people read them they were very encouraging and I thought that they were just being polite. But they were impressed and it took me a long time to find my confidence publicly as a writer.
“Back in 2016 I started writing ‘The Seven’ but then it was just a hobby. Now I’d like to try and do a lot more and I’ve started my second work.”
Erin explained she does quite a lot of reading and has read through Jacqueline Wilson’s books and moved onto the Hunger Games and The Handmaids Tale and more.
” ‘The Seven’ is really an urban fantasy centred around the seven supernatural characters, but, one of them turns out to be different from the rest causing the dramatic tension in the novel. It is set in the modern day and the seven characters are from an imaginary city, Castlebrook, and they never seem to die, living for hundreds of years. So the novel is a journey through a number of exciting incidents and time zones with an unexpected ending.”
Erin has kept in contact with her old school in Crossgar and on World Book Day she and her sister Alana ran a writing session which proved very popular with the pupils. “It is a great way of encouraging young people to get into reading. It was a brilliant experience and I think it was all worthwhile as we received very positive feedback.
” ‘The Seven’ will be available in Waterstones very soon and the promotional marketing of the book will begin by the publisher, Pegasus Press.
“Overall I am very excited. Pegasus Publishing has asked me to write a prequel to ‘The Seven’ and I’m working on that at the moment with the opportunity of more works in the future. Because the characters cover so many decades and centuries it makes my job a little bit easier.
“Getting ‘The Seven’ into print is just a dream come true and I feel as though I just want to write more now and make a success of it.”
You can purchase a copy of ‘The Seven’ from Pegasus Publishing at: https://pegasuspublishers.com/books/erin-curran/the-seven
