Hello. My name is Andrew and this is my website. I see it as a kind of junk shop, full of all my stuff. Because, it seems, I do a lot of stuff. I write novels, short stories, and screenplays, and am also a filmmaker, having directed a (very) low budget post-apocalyptic feature film in 2011, and more recently, writing and directing, or just writing, several short films.
My journey has been a winding one. I was born in Derby, England, in 1975 to working class parents, and grew up with an interest in the supernatural, the films of Spielberg and Lucas, horror movies, hanging out down the video shop, and making handy-cam films with my mates on Saturday afternoons (we remade the likes of Teen Wolf, Die Hard and Back to the Future all in my mate’s back garden – the films were as good as you can imagine.)
I left school in 1991 not really knowing how to read or write, with no clue as to how to deal with the big wide world (see my novella, Dead Leaves), and moved from one job to another. Over the years I’ve worked as a window fitter, a rail-track worker, a factory worker, a carpet salesman, a car cleaner, a delivery driver, a bricklayers’ labourer, a shop assistant, and a care worker, among others. None of them stuck.
I saw them all as stop gaps while I worked on my own projects, to the continued detriment of my bank balance.
In the late 90s I played lead guitar in a rock band. We got signed, made a single, played London, thought we were famous, and, subsequently, imploded. I do, however, still maintain we had some pretty good tunes.
I wrote and directed the aforementioned low budget feature A Reckoning in 2011, which starred Leslie Simpson (Dog Soldiers, Doomsday) and writer/director Axelle Carolyn (Tales of Halloween, The Manor). The film was acclaimed by many who saw it. Unfortunately, only about twelve people saw it.
That film took me two years to make and kind of took me out of the filmmaking game for a few years.
After this, at the age of 37, I wrote a debut novel – the acclaimed supernatural, coming-of-age tale The Electric, which writer Stephen Volk described as ‘A terrific read. Absorbing, resonant, emotionally satisfying and quite magical.’ That one is about a cinema that shows movies made by ghosts. This novel has been optioned by a US film company and is currently in development.
This was followed by the novella, Dead Leaves. This one was set in the early eighties, during the video boom and the subsequent crack down on so-called video nasties. The book centres on a group of disillusioned working class kids and their search for the notorious ‘video nasty’ The Evil Dead.
Dead Leaves was a runner up in the This is Horror Awards in 2015.
Both books were first published by small press Boo Books – The Electric in 2014 and Dead Leaves in 2015. In 2018, a new paperback edition of Dead Leaves was released by Black Shuck Books.
Since then I have written a pocket book collection of ghost stories entitled Winter Freits (2018), the mythic children’s Christmas story The Winterman (2020), and the full on horror novel Society Place (2021).
I have recently completed a YA survival thriller entitled Aftershocks, and am at work several new project, both for the page and the screen.
I am an Arts Council Grant recipient for my writing.
My happy places are reading, listening to music, watching movies, being with family and friends, and enjoying the simple pleasure of being at home (leaving the house is overrated).
If you like what I do, please consider “buying me a coffee” HERE. It would be very appreciated.
Please enjoy this junk shop.
Thanks for reading,
Andrew David Barker
(Author photographs on this site were taken by Lee Allen and Cassie Leedham)
