Book after Book

By Michael J Ritchie Published by Unbound Digital Synopsis: English teacher Dexter feels like he’s being taunted by the universe. Everywhere he turns he’s accosted by wedding invitations, housewarming parties and tables for two. Every last one of his friends is settling down with their other halves, while Dexter spends his evenings marking schoolbooks with his ginger cat for company. The thing is, he doesn’t even mind being single; he just wishes his friends were too. After another wedding ends in a drunken disaster, Dexter is musing on the situation and wondering what he’s going to screw up next, when he gets the shocking reminder that he’s not the centre of the universe. An alien spaceship has landed on the continent and when first contact is made, it’s anything but friendly. Humanity’s numbers dwindle immediately, and the survivors are left to do exactly that – survive. Dexter gathers his friends and they all set off on a mission across the country, each with the goal of p...

Hi Michael ! First of all, I would like to congratulate you on the publication of The Third Wheel , which I have recently enjoyed via its serialisation on The Pigeonhole! Can you please briefly tell us what it is about? A: Hello! Thank you, I’m glad you liked it! The Third Wheel is about Dexter, a twenty-something who is coming to terms with the fact that all of his friends are coupled up and moving on with their lives, but he’s single, lonely and feeling left behind. He doesn’t subscribe to society’s notion that you need to find “The One” and would rather have his friends back to spend time with. However, when aliens invade the planet, it puts a lot of his problems into perspective as he and his friends are left to survive in this new world, and suddenly Dexter’s singleness might just be his greatest asset… Did you have the plot entirely figured out when you started writing the book or did it take an unexpected turn as the characters grew on the page? A: Very little of the ...