Welcome to The Write Stuff Callum. Take it away!
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“Where did you get the idea for your book?” – It’s a question any writer will be asked countless times throughout their life. In some cases, we can pinpoint the exact moment when inspiration struck, while often it’s something as whimsical as an elusive dream or a brief conversation that triggers the construction of an entire imaginary world.

With my first book for example, I was simply watching a news report about a country in absolute turmoil. I remember thinking that it seemed like something from a story; far removed from most people’s lives and yet shocking in its reality. Thus, the plot of The Vessel began to form: A dystopian world, a depleted population, a corrupt government, and one woman at the heart of it all, determined to expose the truth. It’s not to say that what happens in The Vessel was happening in that news report, but it’s interesting nonetheless to remember the exact circumstances in which the idea first formed.

With my second book, False Awakening, it was much more random. There was no specific instigator this time around; the plot surfaced simply as a result of my imagination running wild one day. The image of a girl waking in hospital with no memory of what happened to put her there came to me and it soon blossomed into a story that is equal parts a psychological mystery thriller as it is a girl’s struggle to find her voice and place within the dynamic of her family.

With my poetry, it’s even more far-reaching; from the most intimate of thoughts to the most striking of views (I’m lucky to live in the gorgeous Scottish countryside). Really, with a poem, anything is fair game.

I’d love to know what inspired any of your own plot ideas. Did they hit you one day as a result of a specific incident or were they the amalgamation of several smaller threads of thought?

Callum McLaughlin is an eternal insomniac and crazy cat person in training.

Born and raised in the Scottish countryside, he works as a freelance writer, author and poet, taking his biggest inspiration from the world around us.

Though passionate about music and nature, his first love is literature and when he isn’t writing his own books he will most likely be found reading someone else’s.

You can connect with him on Twitter or his blog, and can find his published works on Amazon UK, Amazon US and Goodreads.