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Adrian Stride was born in England during the mid-1960s, which was all the rage at the time.

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He now lives in the New Forest, where he writes about history, humanity and the absurdity of a species that considers itself reasonably well organised.

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Adrian writes what he describes as extended comic metaphor: using humour, characters and absurd situations to explore philosophies that are considerably less absurd.

His work sits somewhere between science fiction, philosophy, alternative history and comedy, although it doesn’t always play nice with the establishment. The humour is not intended simply to lighten the subject; it is part of the way the questions are phrased.

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Adrian believes serious questions should only be trifled with a spoonful of serious comedy.

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Writing with dyslexia

Adrian is stupid and lazy, according to his school report. Dyslexic apparently wasn’t an option.
His first encouraging experience of English at school came when a teacher praised an original story as entertaining, clever and funny. He was subsequently reported to the headmaster and caned for plagiarism.

Caning was commonplace at the time. The accusation left the more lasting mark.

He never won an argument with either his brother or his sister. Their brains had their own vehicles, while Adrian’s used public transport.
To combat this, with the aid of a simple wiring diagram, he changed the way he processed information from specifics to metaphors. So the Battle of Trafalgar occurred just after dinner time (18:05), and the bathroom break at Waterloo was ten minutes later (18:15).

This system works fine for dates, names and hit lists.

Less so for writing.

Spelling and grammar problems were silently removed by technology. Their whereabouts are presently unknown. Phrasing and structure came with age, as did aches, wrinkles and offers of life insurance. The only things that remained from his youth were the questions, the metaphors and the humour. They took on a life of their own…
The Trivial Matter of the Universe.

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The journey to The Trivial Matter of the Universe

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The character of Alfred first appeared in an earlier novel about his unlikely career as a police officer.

Although that book still requires considerable work, and possibly legal representation, it produced a fully formed Alfred: intelligent, ambitious, morally flexible and entirely certain that any situation could be improved by placing him in charge of it.

Adrian soon realised that an ordinary setting was too small for Alfred. He needed history, government, artificial intelligence, questionable institutions and a universe large enough to contain his ego.

Adrian obliged.

The book was proofread. Many, many times.

“Be good. And if you can’t be good, don’t get caught.”
— Alfred, c. 50 BC

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