I am thrilled to have interviewed author Francis H Powell, who shared with us details of his writing life, his book ‘The Fish King and the Two Wise Ghosts‘, which was released on 12th April 2023, and answered a few fun questions. This post contains affiliate links.

Born in 1961, in Reading, England Francis Powell attended Art Schools. In 1995, Powell moved to Austria, teaching English while pursuing his varied artistic interests adding music and writing. He currently lives in Paris, writing both prose and poetry.

In fact the idea behind the book came from a drawing my son did. My son is an avid drawer. He did a picture that looked like a king holding the hands of two ghosts. The king looked like a fish, so I came up with the idea of “the Fish King”.

Originally I wrote a long poem, then decided to transform it into prose. Ah the start of the book, the king is looking for a suitable wife. He meets somebody called Princess Chipolata, who tries to steal the crown jewels. He is informed about this by the two wise ghosts, who he doesn’t believe at first. Then he puts a post on the Fish Kingdom’s social media (Fish Hook) and he gets some unlikely and unsuitable suitors. Most of this story just arrived in my head and I kept on building the story, until it came to a suitable conclusion.

The title came before the story.

Because the book is set under the sea, I had to come up with suitable “fishy” names, like Sharky and Captain James Piranha. The names of the ghosts had to sound traditional and regal, so I chose Henry and John. There is also a Countess Von Dolphin and a Leanora Sharkeyes.
For the villain I chose Princess Chipolata. Names need to be quirky, funny and memorable.

I didn’t remove any sections, but I did change my original work into prose.

I wanted to produce something for my son, who is now ten years old.

I am not sure when I started this precise project. At first I wanted to produce a poetry book, using my sons illustrations as the starting point.

Quirky, witty, imaginative.

The feeling you put in a lot of work, but don’t see much return.

If you have children aged six or above, this book will make you laugh.

Not really, my dog is a rescue dog, when I want to write stuff, he demands I take him for a walk. He does act as an unpaid model, for some of my book promotion and I did write a poem about him called My Quirky Dog, about his unusual habits.

I like to re-evaluate what I have written in the morning, when I am fresh. I used to write a lot of things on the back of work photo copies, when I was teaching.

Mostly in my living room, but to do art work, in a little office. I like peace and quiet and to be able to concentrate.

I would be in the background dancing at the Fish King’s party.

“When are you going to write about owls, we owls are bored of reading about fish.”

A big thank you to Francis H Powell for sharing his writing life with us and for a wonderful interview.