Steve Corkhill

Born in Liverpool, UK, Steve was named by a public vote in the bar of a pub in North Wales. After an enjoyable education where 'satisfactory' results reflected his passion and aptitude for sport, he started his working life training as an accountant in London, UK. His interest in audit soon waned and he changed jobs, only to be made redundant while he was on holiday.

So he followed his childhood dream, trained as a schoolmaster and moved into a position in the glorious World Heritage City of Bath, UK. After a fairly rapid rise through the ranks he took his first major career gamble and accepted a 50% pay cut and an 85% reduction in holidays to move into the burgeoning personal computing industry.

It worked. It was quickly evident that there was an enormous gap between the technical specialists and the desires of their customers to have something they could use. Steve’s particular skills and values were well suited to fill the role of mutual translator, specialising in making systems work for businesses across all sorts of sectors. It meant learning every day of his life, which he loves.

At a party one day, he realised that his time with clients meant that he was missing out on his children growing up. So took another career gamble. He resigned and went self-employed. FlatBear Limited was born and, as part of with it, a plan to develop an internet based publishing arm.

There followed years of study, investigation, wistful dreaming and ennui. The day job was working well and the indie publishing dream waned. He was shocked into action in 2013 and the result was a series of books under the name of Barney Hegarty, written to learn and trial the publishing process. That broke the “one day it will happen” barrier.

Receiving his very first payment for international sales changed the game. He was hooked. He wrote and published “Reboot For The Worn Out Professional”, a book he had been planning for years after seeing colleagues suffering burnout and stress in their high intensity jobs.

One day it turned out he had a heart defect. He went through open heart surgery, where a truckload of beliefs and presumptions were first shattered then realigned. The novel “How To Recover From Open Heart Surgery” is the direct result.

At the time of writing he still lives in the glorious World Heritage City of Bath, UK. It has been easier to base himself there and travel the world than to continually move around after the work. Apart from that, it’s beautiful.

He is still married to the woman he wed in 1982. She’s beautiful as well.