It would be easy to say I’d like both, but if I had to choose, I’d pick critical acclaim.

Though, given the content of my work, I have a different version of critical ‘acclaim.’ Of course I would like critics and columnists praising my work and its influence, as well as teachers sharing it with their students etc. but I think I would be missing the point if I just received praise from everyone.

I dream of right-wing pundits like Fox News dedicating segments attacking me as the greatest source of moral decay since women gained the right to work. Critical acclaim for me means making such a controversial impact that it will ruffle the feathers of the other side, the side my writing exposes the horrors of.

Broadly speaking, my writing has slowly developed to centre on strong and quite explicit political themes and messages because it has no doubt been influenced by the other aspect of my life, as a revolutionary socialist.

Themes of alienation and exploitation at work features heavily drawing from my own experiences as well as the drudgery and finality of working-life, as almost an antithesis to creative pursuits. This can be seen in whom my antagonists are, often bosses or other figures of power such as politicians.

Also, I address themes of oppression of minority groups, and antagonists often reflect some of the discrimination based on race, class, sexuality and gender that tend to burn a fire in my belly.

I would love to write for a living but of course, I have to pay, rent, bills, feed myself and have a little extra cash to keep me sane as I’m addicted to buying gadgets.

I work full-time in an office. The details of my job aren’t important; all desks jobs are essentially the same boring waste of time. But I do manage to sneak in writing, blogging and brainstorming in my work hours, even finishing most of my 2009 National Novel Writing Month novel at work last year.

That said, I think work is often my biggest barrier to finding the time to write, as it often sucks my mental energy, as well as physical time and I really wish that time spent at my desk was spent at my home desk, writing away uninterrupted with looking over my shoulder to find my boss wondering why I’m writing about them with blood dripping from their mouth.

I guess you would put me at the rawer end of the scale when it comes to writers.

By far, the easiest part of writing for me is spewing out that first draft, opening a vein as the saying go. I’m rarely dry of ideas, images, and inspiration; things that piss me off and make me want to write about. I enjoy writing heavy, hard-hitting, often graphic tales that extract maximum emotion.

But it’s when it comes to refining these tales for the reader that I can struggle. Often what I imagine in my head isn’t what the reader gets on the page. Refining writing so the concepts make sense to others can often be hard, as well as the struggle for editorial prowess.

I normally would consider myself as writing within the broad and sometimes difficult to define field of horror. Generally, my work is dark and can often be graphic.

Whilst my general outlook toward the world is hopeful for the future and far from cynical, I also see the state of the world at the moment as grim, but not unchangeable, and so I enjoy the horror genre as I think it can most closely reflect how I see the reality of the world, even if this is often exaggerated.

I’m drawn to darker themes, even before I became political and whilst this often puzzles me and others, and my strongest emotions are often outrage, anger at fear at the state of the world and I like that horror gives me an opportunity to write creative warning signs to people and try and shine a mirror on the world, even if my mirror is slightly warped and exaggerates the blemishes in particular.

But I struggle with these types of themes in the genre leading toward defeatist endings and my desire to often some hope can often jar radically with the other, darker side of my writing. Also, the pressure on horror to break free of perceived clichés or common tropes whilst continuing to feed them, makes it hard to express my views in new ways, or at least make my stories distinct from just another violent or dark tale.