What Made Me A Writer by Kirsty Ferry

I asked Kirsty Ferry, author of The Witch’s Stone published by Boldwood Books on 4 June 2026 to tell my readers what made her into a writer. Over to Kirsty …

I’ve always enjoyed writing, ever since I was a child. English has always been my favourite subject and making up stories from my imagination has been one of my ‘things’ for as long as I can remember. I was also an avid reader, and I think that does help shape you as a writer – even if you exist on a diet of Enid Blyton or Richmal Crompton or Sweet Valley High or the Sweet Dreams series in your formative years, you’re reading words and seeing how they fit together to make a story. I’m afraid the first time I read a Winnie the Pooh book though I threw a little strop and said I was going to write to the publisher because there were so many spelling mistakes in it! ‘They have spelled Owl wrong! They’ve put Wol instead!’ I remember yelling, brandishing the book! I suppose I should have known then I’d go into a Quality job when I was an adult. I have an eagle eye for typos even now!

I’d say the books that made me the writer I am today were the Victoria Holt and Mary Stewart books – all those wonderful Gothic mysteries with wailing heroines bursting out of turreted castles and French chateaux on the cover had me going shopping for a book in the morning to Newcastle and parking my bum in a seat at home all day to read it. And rinse and repeat the next week! Ah the joy of having nothing better to do as a teenager on a Saturday! I was desperate to write something similar.

And then the epiphany moment – Wuthering Heights. Reading that as a young teenager was a whole different experience to reading it properly (and all the way through, not just reading part1) for my degree. Wuthering Heightsmade me fall in love with dark Gothic romance and Byronic heroes, and I knew I wanted to write that too. I know it’s a controversial opinion in some circles (I’m in plenty of Brontë fan groups and there are a lot of purists in them) and I absolutely know Wuthering Heights is not a romance – now – but when I was a teenager I was swept away with it. I mean, come on, she died and haunted him and then he died and they reunited! Perfection. Which is why I absolutely adore the new film. Emerald Fennell explained that her film is her interpretation of it, from when she read it as a teenager, and only read part 1 as well. And Jacob Elordi is, in my opinion, a perfect Heathcliff. And yes, I had reservations about Margot Robbie as a blonde Cathy – but she nailed it. I’ve enclosed a photo of my latest copy of Wuthering Heights and the matching journal I got from Haworth Parsonage a few months ago. It’s so pretty….

And now, I feel like I’ve written something that satisfies the dark Gothic romance part of my personality. And it’s a timeslip. And it has a witch in it! It’s Weyward meets Wuthering Heights. I’ve done similar books in the past, for example my Cornish Secrets series (book 1 started life as a Victoria Holt mash-up in the 90’s which I eventually wrote up properly) along with my Hartsford Mysteries series; but they are very much more on the romantic spectrum and love is the thread that pulls them together, although we do encounter ghosts and mysteries and murders within the pages. The Witch’s Stone is very much more about revenge and that dark, wild, indescribable attraction between two fairly feral characters. (Jacob, if you’re reading this, you’d be a splendid Lucian!) . I thoroughly enjoyed writing every word of The Witch’s Stone and I really hope that my readers enjoy it as well.

About Kirsty Ferry

Kirsty is from the North East of England and won the English Heritage/Belsay Hall National Creative Writing competition in 2009 with the ghostly tale ‘Enchantment’.

Her timeslip novel, ‘Some Veil Did Fall’, a paranormal romance set in Whitby, was published by Choc Lit in Autumn 2014. Many of her subsequent Choc Lit books have since been re-published by Joffe Books, including her popular Cornish Secrets timeslip series. Kirsty now writes dark, witchy, Gothic timeslips for Boldwood, with her first Boldwood book being ‘The Witch’s Stone’.

Kirsty has a BA (Hons) in Literature, and subsequently achieved a Masters with Distinction in Creative Writing from Northumbria University in 2016.

You can follow Kirsty on her Facebook Author Page and also on Instagram @kirstyferrybooks

About The Witch’s Stone

Some legends never die – they wait for you to come home.

When Jess Morgan arrives in Northumberland to research the history of a crumbling chapel, she’s drawn to the legend of the Brinkburn Witch – a woman said to appear when blood is spilled near an ancient standing stone. But the longer Jess stays, the stranger things become. Whispers echo through empty corridors, shadows move where none should, and the boundary between dreams and memory begins to blur.

Over a century earlier, Eliza Stratford turned to the witch for help after a violent betrayal – and sealed her fate with a terrible bargain. Now her story, and the secrets she died to protect, are surfacing again.

As Jess unearths the truth behind the legend, she begins to suspect her own connection to the past runs deeper than she ever imagined – and that some ghosts will do anything to be remembered…

Atmospheric, haunting and rich with dark folklore, The Witch’s Stone is a spellbinding gothic timeslip mystery where the past refuses to stay buried.

Available in ebook, paperback, audio, hardback and large print paperback – Buying link here

And if you enjoy The Witch’s Stone, the next book, The Snow Witch is out on 3 September 2026 and available to preorder now.

This is the blog for Morton S. Gray, a writer of romance with a mystery to solve The Secrets of Borteen Bay Series set in the fictional seaside town of Borteen for Choc Lit Publishing an imprint of Joffe Books.