Frequently Asked Questions

The Phoenix Files

What happened to the characters after the end of the series?

I don’t want to say too much about this, but here’s a video I made after Doomsday was released, answering a few questions about the end of the series:

Will you ever write a Book #7, or a new series with the same characters?

Probably not. Right from the start, I plotted out The Phoenix Files as one big story with a beginning, middle, and end. That story took six books to tell, and I feel like it ended with a pretty definite ending. If I ever did write another Phoenix Files book/series, it would only be because I’d come up with something I thought was just as original and compelling as the story I tried to tell the first time round; anything else would feel a bit too much like tacking extra events onto the end of a finished story.

Is the Phoenix Files ever going to be made into a movie or a TV show?

Maybe, although I wouldn’t hold your breath! Movies and TV shows are notoriously hard to get made, and someone would have to be willing to throw a lot of money at a Phoenix Files series to make it work. (Side note: If you are a rich movie studio who wants to adapt a series of young adult novels into a blockbuster movie franchise, CALL ME.)

Where can I find the Phoenix Files books?

The Phoenix Files series is currently available in Australia, New Zealand, the United States, the UK and Turkey.

If you’re having trouble finding a particular book in one of those countries, your best bet would be to either have a look around online, or ask your local book store/library to order a copy in for you. If those options don’t work, you could try getting in touch with the publisher to see what the deal is.

Unfortunately, as much as I’d love to help you out personally, emailing me is not going to get you very far – I’m just the author; I’ve got no control at all over where/when/how the books get published or distributed.

Other Books

Apart from The Phoenix Files and The Gateway, have you written any other books?

Before I wrote The Phoenix Files, I got my start as an author writing books for the Zac Power series, under the shared “H.I. Larry” pseudonym.

I also wrote this terrible One Direction fan fiction for the amusement of some Year 8s on a camp. (You’re welcome.)

What are you working on at the moment?

Right now, I'm working on a couple of different projects, including a new kids' novel and my first non-fiction project. I'll let you know more when I can!

Writing & Publishing

How did you get your first book published?

My “first book” story is a bit of an unusual one. I’d always thought being a writer would be really fun, but I never thought it was something that I’d actually get to do for a living.

But a friend of mine from church, Rowan McAuley, was already a published author. She and I would quite often talk about writing, and one day she told me that her publisher was looking for new authors to help out with a series called Zac Power. I’d never heard of the series before, but I did a bit of investigating, and then had a go at writing a Zac story of my own. I sent it to Rowan, and she passed it on to her publisher… and I assumed that would be the end of it.

But then, a couple of weeks later, the publishers got in touch and said they wanted to turn my story (“Volcanic Panic”) into an actual book! It took four or five redrafts and a whole lot of editing to get the book up to scratch, but we got there in the end. From there, I went on to write 11 more books in the series, all under the name, “H.I. Larry.” Somewhere in the middle of all those books, I pitched the idea for The Phoenix Files to my publishers. They agreed to publish that series too – and I’ve been writing it ever since!

And that’s the thing about my story: I never “earned” this job, and I definitely haven’t done anything to deserve it. The whole thing has just been one huge gift. All that’s left is to be incredibly thankful for this amazing work that God’s given me to do, and to keep on working to create stories that are worth the time and the enthusiasm that you guys pour into them.

More Questions?

At the moment, this is just a short list of the questions I seem to get asked the most often. If there’s something else you’d like to ask me, feel free to get in touch!