Robert Rankin is the best selling author of thirty three novels. He is described as The Father of Far Fetched Fiction, Far Fetched Fiction being the name he ascribed to his work in the hope of getting his own special shelf in bookshops. This was not to be and so his books now reside in the Science Fiction section where they find themselves comfortably at home. Rankin’s fiction is certainly not for everyone, being almost impossible to actually categorise (apart from the fact that you will find it in the SF section) it leaves some folk absolutely baffled, but his unique prose style and fantastical plots have gained him a faithful and loyal readership.

Which is just the way Robert Rankin likes it, really, as being an unashamed child of the sixities, he was determined from the very beginning to “do his own thing” and do it his way and he has now been doing it for over thirty years.

His work has inspired numerous contemporary writers, some of whom have most shamelessly helped themselves to his original ideas, (we name no names but you know who you are), but like the Murphys Rankin isn’t bitter. In fact you could say he’s a bit like Marmite, in that you either love him or hate him. And also like Cornflakes, as you might well not have sampled him for a while and forgotten just how good he is.

In 2012 in the company of his wife Raygun and son Robert he formed his own company Far Fetched Books to publish the e-book versions of the first twenty-three books in his backlist and will soon be self-publishing a new Brentford Trilogy. It is not really possible to sum up Rankin’s work in a few paragraphs, so why not pop over to Amazon and sample his work, join him or Far Fetched Books on Facebook, or visit him at an event and chat with the man himself? He’ll give you a big hello, bung you a freebie and try to convince you that you really need to buy his books.

Go on, what’s the worst that could happen?