My interview tonight is with a 15 year old time travelling apprentice wizard whose early adventures were immortalised in the book Leap of Faith... released last by Crooked Cat Publishing and are now continuing in Trouble With Swords. It’s none other than Tertia, one of the founders of The Temporal Detective Agency.
Tertia, it’s a pleasure to be talking to you again today, especially as the first time I heard your name was 10 years ago. Mind you as you travel in time you haven’t aged at all, while I (allegedly) have the odd grey hair now.
Er... what are you doing?
Counting the odd grey hairs. Could take me a week or two, I reckon, and Marlene would definitely have to take her shoes and socks off!
Amazing! The tape recorder’s on so tell me about you and your cousin Unita.
You mean Neets? What’s to tell? We originally came from near Camelot, where our families had small farms until they were burnt to the ground by the Black Knight. He was a nasty bit of work. Then we travelled through Merl’s Time Portal to the 21st century and here we are!
Hang on. A Time Portal? What’s that?
You wrote the bleedin’ books. Why’d you need me to tell you? You’re the writer guy!
I know, but many of my blog readers won’t have read Leap of Faith yet let alone Trouble With Swords, so they’ll be stunned that time travel really exists and is being used by a couple of teenage girls. Humour me.
Okey Dokey. Neets (that’s my cousin Unita to you) and I sort of inherited Merl’s cave and with it came her Time Portal. And, like, we’re going to use it aren’t we?
Merl? I don’t think I know her.
Yeh. You know, Merlin the wizard. She’s Merl to me. You must have heard of Merl Grey tea? She invented that years ago. So anyway, we started the Temporal Detective Agency with Merl’s sister Marlene.
Merlin had a sister? Merlin was a woman?
‘course she did. A dumpy red-headed little thing. Blimey, you must have known she was a woman, you wrote about her! I helped her do her man-disguise for a couple of years. (Read the book!). Oh yeh, and then there was Galahad, who started the Olé Grill chain of Spanish themed restaurants. He came with us and acted as the front for the Agency. Made a fortune into the bargain.
But why did you come here? Why didn’t you stay in Camelot?
It’s obvious. We moved to the 21st century because the cases were much more interesting and mostly because the toilet facilities are SOOOO much better. Flushing loos and toilet paper. Bliss! Besides which it took you nearly ten years to get us into a book and Neets and I wanted to have a little chat with you as to why it took so long. I mean.... scribble, scribble, scribble, and it’s done! What took you so long?
Never mind that. We’ll have a chat later. If you came to the future, how come you still live in a cave?
Don’t get huffy, writer mate! It may be a cave to you, but it’s home to me, Neets, Marlene, Galahad and the cats. You think Dr Who invented the “bigger on the inside than it is on the outside” bit. Come off it, we were years ahead. Actually centuries ahead. Hot and cold running waiters. Our cave is a bleedin’ mansion! So many wings, it’ll probably fly away!
Tell me about your names Tertia and Unita. They're unusual.
Not really. They're not our real names - which incidentally I'm not going to tell you - but Merl had a terrible memory, so instead of always getting our names wrong she gave us numbers. She only ever had three apprentice wizards at a time so they were always called Unita, Douvet and Tertia. Get it... One Two and Three. Simple!
What happened to Douvet then?
We don't like to talk about it. She was a nice kid, but got mixed up with the wrong crowd.... druids! Word has it she's appearing in our fourth book though, so we're on the look out for her.
Ok, let’s move on to the Agency. Is it profitable?
Depends what you mean by profitable. Er... no! Mind you, we don’t turn work away and we have a motto “No job too small. No fee too big”. Catchy, isn’t it? Well, we thought so anyway, but we’re still working on the fee bit. Mind you our clients tend to be royalty and you know what they're like with money. Ask them for a few quid and they just look blankly at you.
In Leap of Faith you have some pretty hair-raising adventures battling ship wreckers and smugglers. Can you tell us what happens in Trouble With Swords?
No way, José! If I tell everyone what an incredibly hair-raising set of adventures the Agency had in Camelot, Ancient Rome, Elizabethan London and Egypt they won’t need to buy the bleedin’ book. If I told you we met two Roman emperors, Cleopatra and Shakespeare, we'd be giving the game away. Get your head screwed on, writer man, Blimey!
Good point, Tertia. So will there be other books about you and the other members of the Agency?
You’re asking me? Look, we’ll have the adventures, no problem, because we’re having fun. But it’s up to you to put finger to keyboard and tell the world what we’ve done. So what’s the answer, smart guy?
When you put it like that, Tertia, as long as you and the Agency are having adventures and I enjoy writing them up for you, there’ll be more Temporal Detective Agency books. Deal?
Right! Now let’s get back to the party and have some fun before Neets’s cats eat all the virtual food and Marlene drinks all the booze! Are we done?
I suppose we must be if you put it like that.
Great! Only last thing, and I’m only going to shout this once... BUY THE BLEEDIN’ BOOKS. You can get them at the following links.
Leap of Faith is available as both an eBook and paperback on Amazon at
Both books are also available through most independent bookshops in the UK and on line through Foyles, Waterstones and Lovereading4kids.
Richard's website is:
Richard blog is at
With the exception of the odd fight, few events bring people together more than a wedding, and few people are more proud than the bride's father!
