Aneeta: Dennis, thank you for agreeing to this interview.

Dennis: Hi Aneeta. I’ve been looking forward to this and I hope that I can make it interesting.

Aneeta: Let’s start with a little about you. Tell me about where you grew up, what you do for a living, where you live now and any other information you’d like to share with my readers.

Dennis: Well, I am now retired from a lifetime of working in the Haulage and transport industry.

I live, with my wife Elaine, in the Manchester suburb of Blackley Village, where I have lived for fifty years. I was actually brought up, just after the 2^nd World War, in Newton Heath, another borough of Manchester, where I lived with my parents and sister in a prefab.

Besides writing I like to paint, using oils, water colours or acrylic paints

Aneeta: How did you first get into writing and storytelling?

Dennis: Because of the career that I followed in the haulage industry, numerous and diverse things happened along the way. When I would come home at the week-end I would regale my friends and associates with humorous stories and escapades that I had experienced or seen. The people that made up my audience for these impromptu revelations often commented that I should write a book concerning all these adventures and mis-adventures. After much deliberation and once I had retired and had some time on my hands I decided to do just that.

Aneeta: I understand you are the author of two books - This Truckin' Life & The Railway Years. Please describe these two books.

Dennis: This Truckin’ Life is the first book that I undertook; it is an anecdotal work made up of many recollections and reminiscences. The main slant of the book is to the humorous side but the humour is interspersed with informative and more serious chapters. It covers a forty years  years period, chronologically set out, of the life of a truck driver, documenting his life on the road. It delves into the methods resorted to in order to survive and make ends meet in a world where the truck driver is considered the lowest of the low. It tells of hard times and good times in what was then considered a man’s world where hard, relentless toil was the order of the day. The working hours were long and unsocial, the remuneration low, there was no power steering and all loads were sheeted and roped.

Aneeta: One of the problems I have, when telling my tales, is to make sure that the structure and plot are OK. Do you ever have similar problems, and if so, how do you overcome them?

Dennis: In the type of tales I tell the most important problem that I have to deal with is that of chronology. Because I am stretching my mind back up to forty or more years it is difficult to place things within an exact chronological order. I have, on occasions, used what can only be described as writer’s license and I have placed situations where they sit most comfortably.

Humour is a great leveller and I try to use it a lot in my writings. My works are not mysteries or novels and so the main thread throughout these works is the humour.

I can only hope that people will laugh out loud when reading them as I do when reading the likes of Tom Sharpe. Humour can be found in most situations even, when on the face of things, they appear deadly serious.

Aneeta: Now, one of the things a lot of storytellers tell me is that they find it hard to be motivated and inspired to write. Do you ever face this problem and if so, what do you do?

Dennis: Motivation and inspiration come from many sources; a flashback of memory, a gentle nudge in the right direction from an unsolicited comment, people asking: ’Do you remember the time when….?’ and many other instances, so no, I do not see this as a problem at the moment., although things may be different if I try to turn my hand to fiction.

Aneeta: You use a pseudonym, Laurie Driver. While I think it’s so interesting since it relates to the subject matter of your stories, can I ask, please, why use a pseudonym at all?

Dennis: To be honest, Aneeta, the using of a pseudonym seemed a good idea at the time, borne from the thought that my true moniker, Dennis Smith, seemed a little bland and unlikely to stick in one’s mind.

Aneeta: As you know, this website caters for storytellers. What advice would you share with people who would like to venture into storytelling?

Dennis: Give it a go. Nothing is born from nothing; if you think you have a story to relate, put pen to paper, fingertips to keyboard and give substance to your thoughts. You never know, you could be the next JK Rowling.

Aneeta: Dennis, this is all I have to ask. Is there anything you’d like to add?

Dennis: Thank you, Aneeta, I have found this a very interesting and exciting occasion. One isn’t often given the chance to express one’s views in this manner and to reach out to people of a like mind

Aneeta: Dennis, thank you.

Dennis: Not at all, it has been a great pleasure and I look forward to seeing the interview in print.

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