Ben Dixon is a father of four children, teacher of French and the author behind the hilarious world of Neil Peel. He grew up in Yorkshire, grew up a bit more in Leicestershire before moving to settle in Surrey. The Heroic Truths of Neil Peel was his first novel, published in 2020. Neil Peel’s Holiday was the sequel published in 2021 before the Lower Piercing saga concluded in 2022 with Neil Peel’s Rival. He lives in Guildford with his wife, Sarah, and children, Sophie, Isabelle, Max and Kiera.

He was inspired to write humorous books for Young Adults because nobody else seemed to be doing it! Sue Townsend’s The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole was and has remained popular, so why isn’t anybody writing in the same genre? It doesn’t make sense when most young people love comedy films that there are so few funny books for them.

His other hobbies include running (slowly), playing guitar (like a rock God!), reading books of all sorts (favourite authors are Guillaume Musso, Gregg Hurwitz, Robert Harris, Harlan Coben, George R. R. Martin, John Hart, Carlos Ruiz Zafón and Stephen KIng (Stephen Prince?)) and finding out as much as possible about as many films as possible (keen cinema lovers will spot references galore in the books).

You can read an interview with the author about his inspiration and writing process conducted by the website Not For Vanity here. You can also watch his TV interview for Creatives on the Couch that aired on Sky TV in February 2023 here.

Ben balances his writing with a teaching career and has plans to convert the Neil Peel series into script form. Follow his social media or sign up on the Contact page for updates with future projects.