I can feel his influence most when I look back on the collection. I love the relatability of Haig's characters and his turn of phrase. I mostly read fantasy because I love rich world-building and complicated lore, but I think in terms of actual writing style I turn to classical literature and poetry - Wordsworth, Shakespeare, Dickinson, not that I claim to be able to emulate any of them haha! I love Thomas Hardy's pastoral descriptions, the vivid natural world, food, the countryside - that all features heavily in my work too.īut I'd actually say the writer who influenced the collection most was Matt Haig. Please tell us a little about your writing style. I hope that I've achieved that, and I certainly feel most proud of that particular story when I look back on the collection. I wanted Sunflower to be about chronic pain, which I suffer from myself, but I wanted to make sure the character wasn't a self-insert. Not just the story, but the response I got in speaking to other people who suffer from chronic pain. I am also extremely proud of the first story in the collection, Sunflower. It paved the way for future work and without it I never would have entered the world of self-publishing, or at least I would have convinced myself I couldn't do it for many more years to come. I treated The Weight of Rain as somewhat of an experiment, so any commercial or critical success is a complete bonus. I knew nothing about self-publishing in summer 2020 but I made it my mission to learn from others and read everything I could about the process. I think I'm most proud of having finished it. Name one thing you’re proud of having achieved with The Weight of Rain.

Other stories quickly followed and I decided to challenge myself in the summer of 2020 to finish it and publish it.

That also sparked the companion piece, Henna, and I started to think that maybe I should write a collection. I lost a friend and mentor a few years ago and I really wanted to write about grief and also intergenerational friendships. I started the titular short story, The Weight of Rain, before anything else. What was the spark that started The Weight of Rain?

The Weight of Rain by T.C. Emerys