Let me introduce myself to you:  I’m Sonia Neale, author, freelance writer and day-jobber.  Most writers need a real job to pay the bills and I’m no exception.  I type, file, answer phones, make coffee, run errands and gossip with the girls.  I’ve worked as a fast-food deep-fryer, display-home, office and school cleaner (I cleaned the classrooms my two boys were educated in – much to their horror and embarrassment), call centre operator and newspaper deliverer.  I’ve volunteered at animal shelters and with the Red Cross looking after babies while post-natally-depressed Mums have a well-deserved day off.

I’m happily married to David for the past twenty-three years culminating in a lot of ups and downs and between us have produced three beautiful children, Melissa (19), Matthew (16) and Christopher (14) and we survive (sorry, live!) in the Northern Suburbs of Perth, Western Australia where the sun shines all year round and I constantly long for wintry days full of snowy blizzards.  To give you an idea of what we are like, my family lies somewhere between Packed to the Rafters and The Osbornes. 

I first got interested in writing when I was 8.  After the teacher read the class The Hobbit I decided to rewrite it.  At 14 I fell in love with James Herriot and my fate was sealed, I wanted; no, had to be a writer.  At 20 I wrote a very sad science fiction novel about a post-holocaust New York where a giant mutant python was running rampant threatening the lives of a group of survivors.  My next writing project, at age 27, was a first and last attempt at a Mills and Boon novel but I just wasn’t cut out for flowery romance and bold blades of passion.  I was more a disturbed realist so I wrote half a novel about a warring couple with a disabled child which got savaged by the writers club I was with at the time; and it was a well-deserved mauling - the manuscript was terrible.  After I had my three children, I changed tack, found my niche and wrote The Bad Mother’s Revenge, first serialised on ABC720 Perth radio and turned into a book and published by ABC Books in 2006.  My second book, Death by Teenager was released in April, 2009.

This all came about because I suffered post-natal-depression back in 1996 and was encouraged by my therapist to write down my thoughts and feelings.  Some writers can only get inspiration in Paris, sitting in a park, with a view of the Eiffel Tower, on a sunny, windless day.  But the rest us grasp whatever limited time and space is available.  At the time of writing my book five of us shared one computer.  I used to write in an exercise book on the toilet (a far cry from lolling on the banks of the River Seine) but even then someone would bang on the door demanding I find them some socks or jocks or lunch money.

I’ve always had to write to the background of family rows, dogs barking, doors slamming, electric guitars blaring, clothes dryers roaring in the middle of summer and two teenage boys always trying to outdo each other with rude jokes three feet from my sensitive and delicate ears.

I now attend University part-time studying Psychology and Counselling.  I have a Cert IV in Psychoanalytic Psychotherapy.  These, along with reading any and all books, are my passion.  I am over, to the point of loathing; cooking, ironing and any form of housework.  I alternate between wishing my kids would leave home and hoping they will stay with me forever.  Ditto cats and dog but my husband is more than welcome to stay.