A NORTH-EAST poet and playwright who hit the headlines with her unique random sheep-generated poetry has now turned to a life of crime.

Valerie Laws made headlines worldwide when she came up with the idea for Quantum Sheep. Using paint that farmers use to mark their flocks, Valerie sprayed words onto live sheep at a North-East farm. As the sheep grazed they wandered into different patterns creating poetry in motion. The poems formed by the sheep were then written down.

Not only did the sheep produce random poetry, they also demonstrated the principles of quantum mechanics.

Now Valerie has moved from lambs to the slaughter, with the publication this week of The Rotting Spot, her first crime novel.

The novel is about skull collecting, the prophecies of William Blake, binge drinking, Geordie charvas, family secrets, friendship and rivalry.

The action is set around the fictional coastal village of ‘Stonehead’, but many of the locations in the novel will be familiar to visitors to the Whitley Bay and Seaton Sluice areas.