My name is Alex and I have the coolest job in the world (or at least, I think it is). My job is to sit down at a desk and try and think of a story that nobody else has ever told before. There are lots of clever people in the world so it’s difficult to think of something that no one else has thought of but it’s very very fun.

The trick is to use your imagination. I can close my eyes and travel anywhere in the world. I love learning the names of new places and imagining who lives there – my favourite place at the moment is called Saskatchewan. I don’t know anything about it, but it sounds good. And I also like imagining what it would be like to live in a different time. It seems like life would be very different for a caveman or a viking or a queen. And it would definitely be very different to live in the future as a space pirate or a robot or an alien. Whenever I meet someone new, I think to myself: what’s your story?

Everyone has an interesting story to tell. If someone doesn’t seem interesting to me, it’s not because they are boring – it’s because I haven’t asked them enough questions to find out the interesting bits. Sometimes, though, people don’t want to tell you what they are thinking about – maybe they’re shy – and that’s why I like reading stories too. Because with stories, you can see into other people’s heads. I’m not saying I want to see people’s brains because that would be gross. But once someone has written a book, they can tell you what they are thinking about across a whole ocean, or across a thousand years. When I write a book, it is like a little piece of me, and when someone else reads it, it is like we are becoming friends, even though we’ve never met. And I think that makes it a pretty cool job.