Anthony Ferner
Anthony Ferner is the author of Inside the Bone Box (2018) and Small Wars in Madrid (2024) both a part of the Fairlight Moderns series.
Anthony started writing fiction back in the 1990s. His first novella, Winegarden, was published in 2015 by Holland Park Press. Anthony’s been a member of the Tindal Street Fiction Group in Birmingham since 2010.
With a degree in Politics, Philosophy and Economics from the University of Oxford, and a doctorate in Sociology from the University of Sussex, Anthony had a career in academic research. He was a professor of international business until his retirement in 2014, and has published numerous research articles and monographs on the behaviour of multinational companies.
Anthony is married, with two sons. He now lives in the Midlands. His interests include skating, Spanish and Latin American literature and languages.
A short Q&A with Anthony Ferner can be read below:
How did you start writing?
Sometime in the early 1990s, a friend and I decided to write feature film scripts. We wrote several. Nothing ever came of them, but learning how to craft them was a valuable apprenticeship for writing fiction. Maybe twenty years ago, I twigged that the chances of getting a script made into a film were virtually zero, so I started on novels instead.
Did you always want to be a writer?
Not really. I wrote stories as a kid, then barely anything more until my forties. From about the age of thirty I felt the need to do something creative alongside my academic research job. For several years it was art. Then I ran out of artistic ideas and turned to writing.
Do you have a writer’s habit that helps you ‘get in the zone’?
I sometimes like playing Indian raga music (like Anderton). When I’m writing, its hypnotic rhythms can help the fingers skim over the keyboard.
Read our full interview with Anthony about his novella Inside the Bone Box here, and the interview about his novel Small Wars in Madrid (with an exclusive extract) here.
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