大象传媒 Scotland - 大象传媒 Scotland - 鈥楬orrific situations give you a lot of inspiration鈥� 鈥� the one-time crime scene cleaner who鈥檚 become a hot new writing talent

鈥楬orrific situations give you a lot of inspiration鈥� 鈥� the one-time crime scene cleaner who鈥檚 become a hot new writing talent

29 August 2018

We’ve all had jobs that we’d rather forget, but emerging writing talent Chris McQueer has had some truly awful ones.

Cleaning up rooms where murders have occurred was interesting for a while, but not enough to keep Chris in the role. Several other jobs followed – labourer, hair dresser, working in a sports shop – but none of those presented a career path either.

It wasn’t until plucking up the courage to share his gift for writing that things really took off for Chris.

Writing With Chris McQueer | Into It

Chris McQueer talks about how he got into writing.

Working in the gruesome surrounds of crime scenes was an odd source of inspiration for Chris.

“Cleaning up the blood after people had been stabbed and stuff was horrific, but at the same time it was brilliant: being exposed to quite horrific situations – as horrible as it sounds – gives you inspiration and a lot of ideas for stories.”

It鈥檚 like baring your soul to people 鈥� letting them see the inner workings of your mind.

Along with a lack of long-term job prospects, Chris also lost his flat and his dog died — all of which plunged him into a depression. That period saw Chris lose touch with his friends and phone in sick to the jobs he hated.

Something had to change

Chris decided to try out one of his ‘weird’ short stories on his mum. She was so impressed that Chris decided to read his stories to a live audience at a spoken word night.

“I was really worried people were gonna think I’m some kind of weirdo.”

But Chris needn’t have worried. The crowd loved his refreshing short stories and the generous applause he received as he left the stage was “was one of the best moments of my life.”

He quickly attracted attention from book publishers, who were keen to create a book of Chris’s short stories.

“I just couldn’t believe it! That’s not meant to happen to people like me.”

‘Hings’ has since been named the Best Short Story Collection at .

A far cry from mopping up blood, Chris now considers himself incredibly lucky to have ‘the best job in the world’.

An animation for Chris McQueer鈥檚 short story Crisp Packets

Contains very strong language.

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