Interview with Nathan Snow

1. Did you always know you wanted to be a writer?

Being totally honest, I left school in the mid-late 90s, I had no real idea what I wanted to do.  Even when I studied Creative Writing in the early-mid 2000s it wasn’t seen as a possible career option or something that had a chance of happening.  I was happy enough to be able to buy cheap second hand computers and eventually make a blog where I planned to release my first book.  That never came to fruition as the ideas changed or computers broke etc.  I was in my 30s before Kindles or Indie publishing took off.

2. What was the inspiration behind ‘You’ll be back’?

Two things coincided, the first was getting in touch with an old college friend from the early 2000s, he had published a fair bit on the Kindle store, he challenged me to write 2,500 words.  The second part was the idea of a fictional radio station, and the idea that a new owner would come in and turn everyone’s lives upside down.    I’m a bit of na radio geek and knew that was the sort of thing that could quite easily happen.  The original idea was going to be the same timeframe from both Nick and Nat’s perspectives

3. What came first, the plot or characters?

In the case of You’ll Be Back, the characters existed.  The idea that Nick could have all the events after returning to Manchester were brought in later.  I could have done it from the perspective of four different characters but it would have meant 20-30 characters to keep a track of, which would be too many.

4. How did you come up with the title to your book?

I wanted a title that no-one had used before, but was still short and snappy, no more than about four letters.  I didn’t like ‘You’re Going Back’ or “Starting Again’ even though they fitted.  I wanted something that reflected that everything Nick did had some element of bad luck and misfortune, so it is sort of like fate saying to him that he can go to London, but he’ll be back. 

5. What was the most enjoyable part of writing this book?

I contacted my childhood hero, a guy called Steve Penk to ask him about radio from an insider’s perspective.  He got in touch and gave me so much useful information, I couldn’t have finished the book without him.  I never thought he would reply, let alone take time out to speak to me on the phone.  I remember saying that even if I didn’t sell any books, young me would still think that was very cool.

6. ‘You’ll be back’ is your debut novel, do you have any more books planned?

Yes.  The next book is a bit of a departure from You’ll Be Back, it will be provisionally titled ‘Lessons In Time Travel’ and I hope to release it in 2022.  It will be about a high school English teacher that accidentally travels back to 2002.

7. What books or authors have most influenced your own writing?

When I started studying Creative Writing it was all about Nick Hornby and Mike Gayle.  More recently I have been a big fan of Catherine O’Flynn (What Was Lost was a brilliant book), Keith A Pearson, Adam Eccles and anything that combines travel and sarcasm.

8. What do you like to do when you are not writing?

 Well, a day job and writing don’t leave a huge amount of time.  I am a huge fan of motorsport and have been for pretty much my entire life.  I was/still am a huge music nerd, some things will never change! 

The only tv shows I like involve either comedy or travel.  In normal times I love travel and cinema but that’s all been sidelined for now.  I am also in the middle of a house renovation but that’s more necessity.

Get to Know the author; This or that:

• Sunrise or sunset
  • Sunset, as I am rarely awake at sunrise.
• Sweet or savoury
  • Sweet, I have an immense sweet tooth
• Sun or moon
  • Moon as I get sunburned very easily
• Early bird or night owl
  • Night owl, I hate getting up early
• Take a risk or just relax
  • Just relax, I am very risk averse
• Park or beach
  • Depends where has shade where I can read 
• Family time or me time
  • Depends what mood I am in, I love being around my family but sometimes I like a bit of time to myself
• Bar or cafe
  • Cafe, I hate too much noise
• DIY or buy
  • Buy, I am a DIY disaster and my own worst critic
• TV series or movies
  • TV series,  I love sitcoms but after half an hour or an hour I want to do something else or watch something else, if I watch a film it has to be something I really want to watch rather than just to pass a couple of hours.