Authors A to Z - Guy N Smith

I was born on November 21st 1939, in the small village of Hopwas, near Tamworth, Staffordshire, England. My mother was a pre-war historical novelist (E.M. Weale) and she always encouraged me to write.

I was first published at the age of 12 in the Tettenhall Observer, a local weekly newspaper. Between 1952-57 I wrote 56 stories for them, many serialized.In 1990 I collated these into a book entitled 'Fifty Tales from the Fifties'.

My father was a dedicated bank manager and I was destined for banking from birth. I accepted it but never found it very interesting. During the early years when I was working in Birmingham, I spent most of my lunch hours in the Birmingham gun quarter. I would have loved to have served an apprenticeship in the gun trade but my father would not hear of it.

My writing in those days only concerned shooting. I wrote regularly for most of the sporting magazines, interspersed with fiction for such magazines as the legendary London Mystery Selection, a quarterly anthology for which I contributed 18 stories between 1972-82.

In 1972 I launched my secondhand bookselling business which eventually became Black Hill Books. Originally my intention was to concentrate on this and maybe build it up to a full-time business which would enable me to leave banking. Although we still have this business, writing came along and this proved to be the vehicle which gave me freedom.

I wrote a horror novel for the New English Library in 1974 entitled Werewolf by Moonlight. This was followed by a couple more, but it was Night of the Crabs in 1976 which really launched me as a writer. It was a bestseller, spawning five sequels, and was followed by another 60 or so horror novels through to the mid-1990's.Amicus bought the film rights to Crabs in 1976, and this gave me the chance to leave banking and buy my own place, including my shoot, on the Black Hill.

The Guy N. Smith Fan Club was formed in 1990 and still has an active membership. We hold a convention every year at my home which is always well attended. Around this time I became Poland's best-selling author (indeed I still have various Polish websites dedicated to my books).Phantom Press published two GNS books each month, mostly with print runs of around 100,000.

I have written much, much more than just horror; crime and mystery (Gavin Newman), and children's animal novels (Jonathan Guy).I have written a dozen or so shooting and countryside books, a book on Writing Horror Fiction (A "&" C Black).In 1997 my first full-length western novel, Pony Riders, was published by Pinnacle in the States.

With 100-plus books to my credit, I was looking for new challenges. In 1999 I formed my own publishing company and began publishing a few of my own books. They did quite well and gave me a lot of satisfaction. Alongside this we have expanded our mail order secondhand crime fiction business. Jean, my wife, helps with the business. Our four children, Rowan, Tara, Gavin and Angus have all moved away from home but they visit us on a regular basis.

I would not want to live anywhere other than my present home. We are remote, and that is how I like it. I don't like street-lighting at night, nor the sound of traffic. I don't like cities and only visit one when it is absolutely necessary. I begrudge any day spent away from home.

My other interests are collecting (just about everything)!I have always been interested in tobacco; smoking and collecting pipes, tins and packaging etc. In 1976 I wrote a book entitled Tobacco Culture. In 2003 I entered the British Pipe Smoking Championship and beat the twice-British champion and British record holder by 60 seconds (my time was 1 hour, 38 minutes and 31 seconds). Thus I am currently the British Pipe Smoking Champion - a title I will defend in 2004!

My home is like stepping back in time and I like and I like to think that I am immune to political correctness and all the strange ideas which are thrust upon us today. I am the same as I have always been and I have no intention of changing. Funny thing, somebody or other would like to ban all my interests. I get the idea that there's people out there whose main purpose in life is to stop others from enjoying themselves!

I read a lot; my fiction preferences are vintage detective fiction and westerns.

Guy's website is http://www.guynsmith.com