My writing life began during the 1980s when, as a producer and director for TVNZ, I developed scripts for TV commercials, promotional videos and road safety documentaries. Later, I turned to fiction, finding a lucrative niche writing short stories for women’s magazines. In 1998, my wife and I moved from Christchurch to Blenheim, where I was employed as advertising features writer and sub-editor at the Marlborough Express newspaper. After about a year, I decided that newspaper advertising no longer pressed my buttons, so I left to start a website development company. In 2010 I had an idea for a novel inspired by Charles Dickens’ Oliver Twist. After four years of (pleasurable) slog, I completed The Art of Dodging, the story of the Artful Dodger’s life after he had left the pages of Oliver Twist. I’m now working on two new manuscripts: the ‘back-story’ of Fagin, also from Oliver Twist, and the first of series of spy novels set against the backdrop of the British East India Company. The Art of Dodging is available on Kindle at Amazon Kindle, ePub at Kobo Books, and paperback at Amazon Books. Or visit my website at philipmorrell.com. I live in sunny Marlborough with my wife, Suzie, and our two cats, Zöe and Honey. When I’m not writing or don’t have my nose buried in a book, I can be found in the garden playing with my succulents and cacti.

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