A NEW author who traded lie-ins for hours of writing before heading off for his day job is finally seeing his hard work pay off with the publication of his debut novel next week.

David Goodman, 42, grew up in Longniddry and returned to the village four years ago. He works at a bank designing mobile banking apps but has somehow found time to write a book and fulfil a childhood dream. 

He told the Courier: “I started writing when I was in my teens and I wrote the whole way through university, mostly short stories and stuff. At first it was really inconsistent.”

In 2005, he finished his first attempt at a book. He said: “It was about 83,000 words long and it was very bad. 

“I tried for a little while to get that published and didn't get anywhere with it, mostly because I didn't really know what I was doing.”

Over the next 14 years, David penned a number of other books but did not take them any further than the writing stage.

In 2019, he decided it was time to choose between fully committing to this goal and taking it seriously, or leaving his author career dreams behind. He chose the former.

He said: “I started getting up at about half five in the morning five days a week and writing in very early mornings.

“And that was the thing that enabled me to finally produce a lot of books and also find time to do all the publishing stuff like finding agents and writing pitches and all sorts, which takes almost as much time as the actual writing does.”

David got an agent in 2021 and had seven short stories published.

His first two full-length novels did not sell for various reasons but third time was the charm for David as his next book, A Reluctant Spy, was successfully sold to an editor.

The book features undercover agents and a deadly mission, and previews have already generated a buzz, with former CIA field agent I.S. Berry calling it “a twisting, edge-of-your-seat tale”.

At the moment, David owns a single copy of the book sent by his publisher and he said: “I can't quite believe it's real.

“I'm carrying it around the house like a newborn!”

Writing is finished and many rounds of edits have been completed, but David’s life isn’t slowing down yet with a busy few months ahead attending signings and engagements across the UK.

He is travelling down to Brighton this week to sign special edition copies for a subscription box, and on publication day he will be in Edinburgh’s Blackwell's bookshop for a launch event.

The next day, he will dart off to Stirling for Bloody Scotland, a crime and thriller book festival, to do a reading as a featured new author. 

David said: “Quite an exciting week, definitely. And then after that I'll go back to my day job and probably struggle with the comedown after!”

But despite being thrust into this hectic new life as a published author, David is not ready to slow down quite yet and has already started working on a potential sequel. 

A Reluctant Spy is set to be released by Headline Publishing Group next Thursday (September 12) and is available for pre-order: headline.co.uk/titles/david-goodman-7/a-reluctant-spy/9781035416011