Andrew Hanson was born in Shrewsbury, England in 1970 and grew up in a house filled with books and stories from writers such as C.S. Lewis, Ursula K. LeGuin, Alan Garner and J.R.R. Tolkien. His passion for worlds beyond ours grew during his teenage years, dabbling with writing short stories influenced by the writers James Herbert and Stephen King. In his twenties he started a novel, but it was left unfinished as he pushed on with life. Studying English Language and Literature at Salford University in the early 1990’s, he was mesmerised by the diversity of narrative form from writers such as Kafka, James Joyce and Angela Carter, as well as the raw, vivid poetry of Ted Hughes and Seamus Heaney. After his degree he started a family, sharing his love of books and imaginary worlds with his daughter. Seeing the delight on her face, he knew that one day he would return to writing.
A couple of years ago the novel he had tried to write earlier came back into his imagination. The focus had shifted from a Horror theme to Crime and he started to revise the concept further. He devoured books on the subject of writing: story structure, plot elements, point of view, character arcs, suspense and mystery. He read books detailing the elements of thrillers and how to write them. And he also underwent training in both The Story Grid Method and John Truby’s 22 Steps of Story.
He also studied Novel Writing with The London School of Journalism.
Andrew currently lives in Lincolnshire with his wife and their cat Nala. He quit his busy and stressful day job as an accountant to concentrate full time on writing his first novel, The Head Factory, which is due for completion some time in 2022.
Andrew Hanson 