The 2015 site refresh — words, mountains, imagination

This website has been through a number of incarnations since it was first established on the 21st of March 2007. It completely changed direction exactly three years ago, when I reforged my old walking and climbing blog into a website suitable for an author. The last major redesign occurred in December 2012.

The old design has served me well, but my requirements are a little different now. In 2012 I was just starting out as an indie author and was searching for my audience. That meant keeping a very narrow focus on my subject matter (19th century history and the culture of mountaineering in Britain and the Alps).

In 2015 I find myself not only an author in my original genre, but science fiction too — not to mention non-fiction articles for various publications. I also work as a freelance editor. In short, I have a lot more ground to cover than I did three years ago.

The changes made in the 2015 site refresh


I have spent the weekend rebuilding, repainting, and restructuring my website. I’ve got rid of some clutter and emphasised other areas. There’s an added biography and bookshelf. It’s my hope that the refreshed look — which is designed to be new but familiar — will serve me better as I use this platform for every aspect of my working life, not just my mountain fiction. I think it’s also cleaner and easier to navigate.

The tagline, suggested by Neil Reid on Twitter, is now ‘words – mountains – imagination’. I believe this reflects my role far better than ‘writer of mountain fiction’, which was starting to feel a little restrictive.

What isn’t going to change


I remain committed to my core genre of historical mountain fiction. Most of my readers enjoy the outdoors and I am certainly not going to make any changes to remove that key focus. I may not have as much time to write as I would like, but work continues on book II of my Alpine Dawn cycle. I hope to publish The Invisible Path this year along with a wealth of other outdoor content.

So this is not truly a redesign, more a lick of paint. I look forward to continuing to serve my readers throughout 2015 and beyond.