Phoenix Convention

AJ Healy, the author of the Tommy Storm books (see www.tommystorm.com) was born and raised in Dublin, Ireland.

By the age of three, AJ had taken a drug overdose (accidental[1] ), crashed the family car through the garage (probably accidental) and been suspended twice from school (no accident).

When AJ was five, his father left the family home and emigrated, leaving his mother (Marguerite) to bring up AJ and his younger brother alone, until she remarried six years later — subsequently introducing another baby boy to the family (not accidental).

Having completed school and a BComm, AJ travelled the world, working in Australia, before taking a job with Goldman Sachs in London.  Two years later, he left Goldmans to start a brick factory in one of South Africa’s townships.  After a series of mishaps and adventures (including being held-up at gunpoint and losing a number of lorries) AJ returned to Europe, involving himself in a variety of ventures.  In October 2001, at the age of 32, AJ ditched the world of entrepreneurial endeavour (and vice-versa) to follow his life-long passion — getting up late and writing stories.

AJ had put aside a number of years' worth of savings to fund his writing efforts but, due to bad luck (or complete stupidity), he lost all these savings at the start of 2002.

Slightly peeved, humbled and surviving on berries & own-label beer, AJ shut all financial worries from his mind and wrote Tommy Storm.

AJ self-published Tommy Storm in 2006.  It sold 3,000 copies in Ireland before Quercus bought the rights and relaunched the book in 2008.  The sequel, Tommy Storm and the Galactic Knights, was published by Quercus in Oct 2009.