About

Five things make my world go round: Dogs, Daniela, Travel, Aviation and Sport. My life has been a mixture of these, and I've written about each. But the road that led to writing was strewn with detours.

I was born in Australia and, apart from two childhood years in rural England, grew up in Sydney. I haven't lived there for a decade, but that magnificent harbour city will always be my home.

As a youngster I was a keen cricketer. One sunny Saturday I launched a hopeful hook shot at a vicious bouncer. "Did I hit it for four or six?" I asked the ambulance paramedic. "I think you missed it," was his reply. "Try not to speak." The ball had struck my chest and caused a cardiac arrest. I was clinically dead for two minutes. But we won the match, apparently, so it wasn't a complete disaster.

Once you're dead you've got little to lose, so I decided I was going to enjoy life. After school I studied aviation for two years and qualified as an aerobatics pilot. I loved flying so much that I wrote about it to share it with others. My interest in journalism had taken off.

I studied Communications and English Literature at Macquarie University in Sydney, then packed my life in a bag and set off to visit the places I had read about. I worked a variety of odd jobs to pay for all this: pulling pints, sorting mail, selling blenders and cleaning windows.

There's more money in windows than in writing. But it was too late. The bug had bitten. In one pocket - a passport. In the other - a pen. I knew I would write a book. I didn't know about what.

J.P. Donleavy, W. B. Yeats and James Joyce were my favourite writers, so I went to Ireland to learn more about them, or at least drink Guinness where they had. I fell in love. Not with Ireland. With an Italian. She invited me back to her eccentric fishing village in Puglia - the 'heel of the boot', where we lived for 4 years (including 1 in Milan) and I wrote HEAD OVER HEEL: Seduced by a Southern Italian.

In 2004 I moved to London, where I am currently writing a second book, working as a freelance journalist, teaching English, balding disgracefully, squabbling with my Italian mother-in-law, and spending far too much money on theatre in London's West End.

Oh, and I'm planning an astonishing cricket comeback. At 36 I reckon I could still play for the Australian eleven. If I can just master that hook shot …