Anne Grange
has 1 follower and is following 2 people
Hi! I'm the author of Outside Inside, which is a crossover Young Adult novel set in counter-cultural Britain. Miriam runs away from her job in a building society and meets Paul, a disillusioned ex-animal rights activist.
I've been writing seriously since my teens. At school in Derby, my teachers were regularly bemused by my increasingly... more »
I've been writing seriously since my teens. At school in Derby, my teachers were regularly bemused by my increasingly... more »
Hi! I'm the author of Outside Inside, which is a crossover Young Adult novel set in counter-cultural Britain. Miriam runs away from her job in a building society and meets Paul, a disillusioned ex-animal rights activist.
I've been writing seriously since my teens. At school in Derby, my teachers were regularly bemused by my increasingly long and ambitious stories. When I was eleven, I wrote my own historical sitcom which was a total rip-off of Blackadder. I don't think I actually showed it to anyone! I spent my teens learning the drums and guitar and writing songs. Music became an increasingly important part of my life. I was one of those archetypal teenagers listening to the John Peel radio show (and also Mark Radcliffe) under the duvet. I learned about Madchester, the rave scene and sex and drugs and rock 'n' roll and wished I was old enough to join in. I bought Select magazine every month, as well as NME and Melody Maker.
All my music was on tape but the only opportunities for new tapes were at Christmas and record tokens on my birthday as my pocket money was fairly meagre. In the early 90s, we traded tapes at school and amongst friends. If someone (or their older brother or sister) had a particular album, we'd give them a blank C90 cassette. It would usually end up with something else as a bonus on the other side, to fill up the space.
When I was fifteen, one of my friends taped me Levelling the Land by the Levellers, a band which have been a big influence on me. 'Outside / Inside' is actually the name of a song from their first album. I found out about the road protest movement and new age travellers (who were big news in the early nineties) and was instantly fascinated. I became politically active, spending my sixth-form years on anti-nazi demonstrations, protesting about the Criminal Justice Bills and various other left-wing causes. It was about this time that I got a flash of inspiration about a vegan inheriting his uncle's butcher's van and giving a lift to a naïve young runaway.
Instead of becoming a full-time protester, I went to university in Sheffield to study English Literature. We were the last generation of students without thousands of pounds of tuition fees hanging over our heads. I had a great time living the student dream of long lie-ins, sharing various dilapidated houses with friends in Hunter's Bar, partying, dying my hair and going to lots of gigs. But I suppose one of the more serious things I did at university was to become a more dedicated vegetarian and campaign on animal rights issues. It was all very sensible though: lunchtime stalls in the Students' Union - nothing like what Paul and his friends in Outside Inside get up to!
After university, I had grand ambitions of being an arty layabout, but somehow my work ethic kicked in! My first job was with an experimental theatre company. I'd be answering the phone while on the other side of a thin partition, the rest of my colleagues would be pretending to be gorillas. After that, I worked for a music education charity. I wasn't playing much of my own music at this point, but I went to so many gigs that I'd regularly turn up at work with a terrible hangover, wanting to curl up under the desk! Throughout this time I was writing, finishing a first draft of Outside Inside that, in retrospect, reads like a bad episode of Eastenders!
For some reason, I thought that I needed to become a bit more sensible, so in 2001, I started teacher training. I learned a lot about children's and Young Adult fiction but for various reasons, teaching just wasn't for me! After dropping out of my NQT year early, I was thrilled that this meant that I could go to Glastonbury after all! I have an almost unbroken record, having attended Glastonbury festival every year since 1993 (apart from 1994 when I went to Reading instead)!
I then spent a happy three years working for an educational charity in the very multicultural area of Burngreave, Sheffield and enrolled on Sheffield Hallam University's acclaimed MA in Writing. The funding for regeneration and community projects started to dry up so I ended up temping and I've now been handling claims for a large utility company for a scary amount of time! However, I've had the time and stability to complete my MA, which included the first successful draft of Outside Inside.
Since 2006, I've been regularly volunteering with Oxfam as a festival steward. I've gained valuable experience and I've made an amazing and ever-growing group of friends, as well as being able to go to festivals and see amazing bands for free! My festival stewarding experiences help me to feel like part of the world of Outside Inside again and give me fresh inspiration.
However, I'm now settling down a bit and live happily in Sheffield with my boyfriend, an enormous collection of books and some tigers, bears and leopards! I'm currently working on my second novel. I hope it will take less time to finish than Outside Inside! « less
I've been writing seriously since my teens. At school in Derby, my teachers were regularly bemused by my increasingly long and ambitious stories. When I was eleven, I wrote my own historical sitcom which was a total rip-off of Blackadder. I don't think I actually showed it to anyone! I spent my teens learning the drums and guitar and writing songs. Music became an increasingly important part of my life. I was one of those archetypal teenagers listening to the John Peel radio show (and also Mark Radcliffe) under the duvet. I learned about Madchester, the rave scene and sex and drugs and rock 'n' roll and wished I was old enough to join in. I bought Select magazine every month, as well as NME and Melody Maker.
All my music was on tape but the only opportunities for new tapes were at Christmas and record tokens on my birthday as my pocket money was fairly meagre. In the early 90s, we traded tapes at school and amongst friends. If someone (or their older brother or sister) had a particular album, we'd give them a blank C90 cassette. It would usually end up with something else as a bonus on the other side, to fill up the space.
When I was fifteen, one of my friends taped me Levelling the Land by the Levellers, a band which have been a big influence on me. 'Outside / Inside' is actually the name of a song from their first album. I found out about the road protest movement and new age travellers (who were big news in the early nineties) and was instantly fascinated. I became politically active, spending my sixth-form years on anti-nazi demonstrations, protesting about the Criminal Justice Bills and various other left-wing causes. It was about this time that I got a flash of inspiration about a vegan inheriting his uncle's butcher's van and giving a lift to a naïve young runaway.
Instead of becoming a full-time protester, I went to university in Sheffield to study English Literature. We were the last generation of students without thousands of pounds of tuition fees hanging over our heads. I had a great time living the student dream of long lie-ins, sharing various dilapidated houses with friends in Hunter's Bar, partying, dying my hair and going to lots of gigs. But I suppose one of the more serious things I did at university was to become a more dedicated vegetarian and campaign on animal rights issues. It was all very sensible though: lunchtime stalls in the Students' Union - nothing like what Paul and his friends in Outside Inside get up to!
After university, I had grand ambitions of being an arty layabout, but somehow my work ethic kicked in! My first job was with an experimental theatre company. I'd be answering the phone while on the other side of a thin partition, the rest of my colleagues would be pretending to be gorillas. After that, I worked for a music education charity. I wasn't playing much of my own music at this point, but I went to so many gigs that I'd regularly turn up at work with a terrible hangover, wanting to curl up under the desk! Throughout this time I was writing, finishing a first draft of Outside Inside that, in retrospect, reads like a bad episode of Eastenders!
For some reason, I thought that I needed to become a bit more sensible, so in 2001, I started teacher training. I learned a lot about children's and Young Adult fiction but for various reasons, teaching just wasn't for me! After dropping out of my NQT year early, I was thrilled that this meant that I could go to Glastonbury after all! I have an almost unbroken record, having attended Glastonbury festival every year since 1993 (apart from 1994 when I went to Reading instead)!
I then spent a happy three years working for an educational charity in the very multicultural area of Burngreave, Sheffield and enrolled on Sheffield Hallam University's acclaimed MA in Writing. The funding for regeneration and community projects started to dry up so I ended up temping and I've now been handling claims for a large utility company for a scary amount of time! However, I've had the time and stability to complete my MA, which included the first successful draft of Outside Inside.
Since 2006, I've been regularly volunteering with Oxfam as a festival steward. I've gained valuable experience and I've made an amazing and ever-growing group of friends, as well as being able to go to festivals and see amazing bands for free! My festival stewarding experiences help me to feel like part of the world of Outside Inside again and give me fresh inspiration.
However, I'm now settling down a bit and live happily in Sheffield with my boyfriend, an enormous collection of books and some tigers, bears and leopards! I'm currently working on my second novel. I hope it will take less time to finish than Outside Inside! « less
- member since February 29, 2012
