I’m plagued with doubt about my ability to write because of being repeatedly told my grammar and punctuation were poor whilst at school. I actually cried when my editor said my grammar was excellent.
M G Leonard by David Myers
I used to be terrified of all creepy-crawlies, including beetles, but then I had an idea to write a trilogy about them and I learned that the imagination is powerful enough to turn around a life-long phobia.
I care passionately about insect conservation. I’m concerned about the dramatic drop in invertebrate numbers. Remember when bugs used to splatter on your car windscreen when you drove places as a kid? That doesn’t happen anymore.
I want to do everything. I have an idea a day, but it took me a long time to realise that you can only achieve something by concentrating solely on it until it is finished, and then you are allowed to move on to the next thing. I have a trunk of half-started projects.
Everything I make, I make for the child I once was and still am inside my head.
Singing and dancing are two of the best things you can do for your mental and physical health, but your children don’t like it if you do it in public.
I keep pet beetles, and have a tank of giant larvae on top of my fridge. It’s a long story.
I love swearing, although not in an aggressive offensive way, rather in a gleeful, passionate, explosive way, but sadly it can still offend sensitive folk.
I’ve been told I laugh like Sid James.
I remember the terrible recession of the 1990s. My family home was repossessed and it makes me very debt and risk averse. This affects everything I do and makes the financial stresses of being a writer real.
Battle of the Beetles, the final part in M.G. Leonard’s ‘Beetles’ trilogy, following the best-selling Beetle Boy and Beetle Queen, is out now in paperback published by Chicken House at £7.99.