There is no single pathway to writing, but we all have at least one story to tell!

My interest in stories began in my teens, through two different influences. A bunch of us school friends would occupy the garden swing when things were going slow, and we’d make up stories as we rocked to and fro. I was inspired enough to write a short story for a national magazine.

I wasn’t successful, but I did learn from the editor that Breakfast at Tiffany’s wasn’t a place you went to for a Full English menu. Another early influence in my teens was Walter Scott’s historical novel Ivanhoe. I found his writing style a bit archaic, but the story fired my imagination, full of romance, chivalry, the good and bad, loss, overcoming, and homecoming. Inevitably, my friends and I all ‘grew up’, higher education and ‘real work’ intervened, and four decades passed before I was able to research and write about an historical event fifteen centuries ago.

There I encountered the singular C6th legend of English slave boys meeting Gregory the Great at the slave market in Rome. Over the years, I ventured to Rome several times, and also, with my wife Gill, to key places all over France associated with Augustine’s mission to England. I also travelled through France following St Augustine’s C6th route with friend and colleague. Peter Ingrams, We did our research, took the, photos and kept the diary. I wrote an historical book, Augustine of Canterbury: Leadership, Mission and Legacy, about a monk from a monastery in Rome on a stupendous journey to reach England and share good news. Followed by, a pilgrim’s travel guide for anyone interested – Following In the footsteps of Augustine through France, The research laid the foundation for the historical novel series. I hope you’ll enjoy!

More About Rob Mackintosh,

MA (Theology) Oxford; MBA Cranfield University, UK.

Rob was born in East London, South Africa in 1946. His father was an English airman in the RAF, and his mother a South African serving part-time in the Naafi in East London during World War II. Although Rob’s family moved home several times in his first nine years (his father was by then in the Civil Service), his school education was mostly at Kimberley High School for boys, and his undergraduate years at Rhodes University, Grahamstown.

(’66-68`) After a year in Town Planning in Kimberley, and later working for the South African Railways, Rob took an academic path through Business Administration, completing an MBA at Cranfield University UK (’77-’78) before returning to lecture at the Graduate School of Business in Cape Town.

(‘90-’93) Rob’s call to ordained ministry came in 1983 while still in Cape Town, and he left South Africa with his family to prepare for the Anglican ministry at Oxford (MA Theology; Ripon College Cuddesdon; ’83-‘86).

A three-year curacy in Cannock followed, then twelve years as Rector of Girton, in Cambridge. (’89-’01) Rob left parochial ministry in 2001 to serve as Executive Director of a newly formed Leadership Institute for clergy at all levels in the Church, until 2006.

He accepted the post of Director of Ministry & Training in Canterbury Diocese for the next eight years, until retirement in February 2014.

In 2016 Rob was awarded the Canterbury Cross by the Archbishop of Canterbury for Services in Leadership Development for the Church of England. Rob has two sons, and lives with wife Gill in Sandwich, Kent, United Kingdom.

Rob published Augustine of Canterbury, Leadership, Mission & Legacy, Canterbury Press, 2013, and in retirement has taken up writing historical fiction. He launches a new series, A Legend of the English with his first historical novel, The Legend Begins In 2021.