A vivid imagination is paying dividends for writer Gavin Williams, as David Whetstone discovers.

IT has been an exciting summer for Gavin Williams, a North East writer who has successfully put his eggs in several baskets.

He is working on the novel which recently earned him a Northern Promise award from New Writing North while also preparing to direct the film which was one of the winners in a Northern Film & Media competition called Shorted.

His tale is one of persistence and compromise and should interest anyone who sees creative writing as an easy way to fame and fortune.

Gavin, who is 41, was born in London but came to the North East as a toddler. His parents were teachers and he grew up in a house full of books. His dad was into science fiction which became one of his favoured genres too, although horror and fantasy also fascinate.

Since graduating in English from Loughborough University he has dedicated himself to writing, although he did work in shops in the early years to pay the bills.

“I’d written since a very early age and sold my first short story when I was still at university,” he says.

“I always wanted to be a writer because I was always interested in stories and I think I’m quite imaginative.

“What you tend to do as a writer is make connections, looking at things to see if they fit together.

“For instance, what if two of your friends from different walks of life got married or had a relationship?

“I get a lot of ideas from public transport or from walking around.”

Gavin started off writing prose and in 1999 a novel, Hush, which he’d written with a friend, was shortlisted in the British Fantasy Society awards.

He then focused on the screen, encouraged by a new writing bursary from Yorkshire Television.

He was commissioned by Newcastle-based Pilgrim Films to write a film and by Channel 5 for its Urban Gothic strand.

A film called Baited Breath, which he wrote for HTV, featured a troubled teenage girl who finds solace in fly fishing (this inspired by an article he’d read).

That got made but too often in the world of TV and film, having done the work and despite being paid, a writer’s work gets shelved.

This happened to Gavin’s fantasy espionage series, The Kin, which was taken up by a Los Angeles outfit who fancied they could interest US TV networks. Nothing came of it.

“You can get demoralised,” says Gavin, “but nothing is ever wasted. I might turn it into a novel. There’s a lot of cross-pollination.”

His positive outlook saw him, a few years ago, divert his attention away from London and America to the North East, where he decided to apply for everything going.

Since then his writing has appeared in many different venues across various media. He successfully branched out into directing and wrote the novel version of a hit video game made in the region.

As a storyteller, he has decided the story is more important than the medium: “The ambition always is just to get my stories out there.”

The novel idea which earned the Northern Promise award is What Big Teeth, a futuristic fantasy in which the grimmer fairytale creatures – “dragons and evil witches” – emerge from a mysterious hole in Scotland and start to ethnically cleanse the country of its inhabitants.

The film, Sleepworking, imagines that hard-pressed folk, after a day’s graft, can be sent out at night to do menial jobs in an unconscious state.

You can meet Gavin and tap into his vivid imagination at the Lit & Phil in Newcastle on August 30 at 6.30pm.