How do you decide which form is the best vehicle for a story idea?  Sometimes it seems obvious, the subject matter cries out for the length and complexity of a novel, or it’s a sharp, closely focused snap-shot suited to short fiction.  Other times something that originates as an idea for one form ends up, through happenstance, to see life in another.

I’ve had experience of writing a book and then adapting it for TV (Blue Murder) and of taking a TV script of mine and reworking it as a novel (Hit and Run).  One of my TV pitches became a novel (Witness) and has since been optioned for TV though has not as yet got any further.  Another TV treatment was transformed into a short story for radio (Boom).

I enjoy working in different media.  In my previous incarnation as a community artist I worked in a multidisciplinary company and relished the interplay of ideas and the development of projects involving visual and environmental arts, film, music, drama and creative writing.

My latest venture is a collaboration with my partner Tim, who is a visual artist. He has reworked my short story DOA (originally published by The Do-Not Press in the anthology Crime in the City edited by Martin Edwards) into a graphic short.  My role in the process has been to pare back the story, originally around 1200 words, to its absolute essentials, and comment as a first reader on the images that give the story a new identity.

It’s an experiment and I expect it will appeal to a quite different readership from that for my full length novels.  All I can say is the drawings are brilliant.  Honest.  And yes, I’m biased.  You can see it here and make your own mind up http://tinyurl.com/pkfjyxk