I have a names page in a notebook with a few saved up for future books, if I can find the characters to suit them. I’m always looking at names on TV programmes or in books for ideas. Other times I have to make a list and choose.

Sometimes the names just come,like Seren in the Clockwork Crow, or Finn and Claudia in Incarceron. How do you choose names for your characters? I have room with a desk looking onto the garden, and that’s my usual place, though the good thing about writing is that you can do it anywhere. I try to write every morning between 9 and 1. I only decided to write a novel when I was about 19 or 20. I was about 11, and started with poems, at first in school and then at home. At the moment it’s an odd mixture – Meetings with Remarkable Manuscripts by Christopher de Hamel, The Fall of Gondolin by JRR Tolkien, and Anthony Trollope’s Autobiography! Could you tell us how you got into writing? She has been shortlisted for numerous prizes and awards including the Smarties Prize (The Conjuror’s Game), the Whitbread Prize (The Oracle) and the Tir-na-nOg Award (The Candle Man / Corbenic). Catherine is an acclaimed author and poet of over 30 books and we are delighted that she took the time to answer our questions.īorn in Newport, she graduated from the University of Wales and has worked in education, archaeology and broadcasting. The Clockwork Crow is Catherine Fisher’s latest novel – a beautifully crafted enchanted wintry tale for children.

Darkhenge