Steven Anthony Lomas

I have a brain injury from a car accident that happened on Saturday 7th February 2004, the day my management career ended. At the Dorchester Hotel in London in December 2015, I was presented by Headway (the national brain injury charity) with the Alex Richardson Achiever of the Year award. I didn’t set out to win awards. I had a car crash and spent years dedicating myself to coping with the results of my accident: epilepsy, frontal lobe brain damage, deafness in one ear and anosmia.

I had to leave behind a management career with Asda and immerse myself in learning. It is against my work ethic to sit around claiming benefits, achieving nothing. I studied for a few years, and I now hold two degrees and a master’s in creative writing.

Perhaps it is the traumatic brain injury that has unleashed my creative side?

In the Spring of 2014, a story came to me out of the ether. I started writing. I named the story Decades after the Joy Division song. The first 10,000 words was my dissertation for my master’s, which I passed with merit. For eight years I was writing this story, during which time my wife had a liver transplant and both my parents died, about a man from Manchester with a brain injury, his life before it, marriage, paternity fraud, and divorce.

They do say the first novel is autobiographical. It's 67,000 words approx.

In January 2023 I found an agent. His name is Scott Green and in October 2023 he secured me a publisher for my first novel, Ukiyoto Publishing House.

Decades was published on the 3rd of November 2023.

I do see my career beyond that of a novelist. Second novel almost finished, three movie script ideas on the go, and two ideas that would be TV comedy gold starring Karl Pilkington and myself. One reality TV, the other a scripted sitcom I'd like to write with Ricky Gervais or Karl Pilkington, though selling these ideas to their agents isn't easy!