Raymond Nickford

In my novels and collected stories I've tried to explore the lives of dysfunctional characters, some based on case studies that I read from the works of psychotherapists, particularly Alfred Adler and Sigmund Freud, while I was reading for my degree in philosophy and psychology but, more so, from my observation of troubled people in true life, though via an imaginative leap to the fictional characters.



My fascination with character study led me to my degree in Psychology and Philosophy from the University College of North Wales and then as a  college lecturer in English Literature which, combined with a fascination for the atmosphere I found in Daphne du Maurier's "Rebecca",  all drove me to become a full-time writer of character studies, atmospheric mystery and suspense, with underlying romance and family/relationships.



Troubled souls; the outsider, the lonely, any driven to extremity, have been indispensable for my novels.



Meet the author :



https://www.facebook.com/raymond.nickford25



Of my novel based in Cyprus, "Aristo's Family", Barbara Erskine, best selling author of River of Destiny, has generously commented on the "beautifully observed characters, intriguing and atmospheric scenes and, above all, the suspense which made me want to read on".



A Child from the Wishing Well features an eerie music tutor, her young pupil Rosie and Rosie's paranoid and inept father, Gerard. I was consumed by the question : Could Gerard, the paranoid father, in the end fight his mental illness to grow closer to his daughter, Rosie, who is, emotionally, alone?



I confess to a passion for plump, docile tabbies and am moved by the music and life of the composer Edward Elgar, my interest leading me each year to a cottage in the Malvern Hills and to the Three Choirs Festival.