Hello

I’m Robert Dinsdale, the author of novels including ‘Once A Monster’, ‘Paris by Starlight’, and ‘The Toymakers’.

I have been writing for as long as I can remember – I received my most prized possession, my first rejection letter, when I was twelve – and, after a string of awful jobs not nearly memorable enough to form part of an author biography, I was lucky enough to publish my first novel in 2009. Since then I have kept writing into that space between history and fable, exploring the borderlands where the real world and wonder collide.

My breakthrough novel ‘The Toymakers’ is a chronicle of life, death and the imagination set in a revered Edwardian toyshop; ‘Paris by Starlight’ is a fable of refugees, renewed magic, and the end of worlds; ‘Once a Monster’ is a continuation of the Minotaur myth, set among the shifting shadows of Victorian London.

An expat Yorkshireman, I currently live in Leigh-on-Sea with my excellent daughter, where I continue to dream of one day returning to the old country. Until then, there are books to write.