How I wrote my first novel

I wrote my first novel when I was 8. It was about ponies, unsurprisingly as I was obsessed with ponies and the only books I read were pony books. I wrote the novel in two exercise books – the kind we had at school – and drew a cover on the front. Then, in true Blue Peter fashion, I covered them in sticky back plastic, and handed them to my mum, asking her to send them to Puffin so they could be published. Puffin never wrote back.

Years later, I discovered why. Mum had never sent them. She’d f...