A FORMER nurse could become the next JK Rowling as her writing career takes off.

Vicky Chatten, from Middlesbrough, wrote her first novel, The Bonding, while her son was in hospital - never thinking it would make it to the book shelves.

However, The Bonding has been accepted by publishers PublishAmerica and is expected to go into print next month.

The 37-year-old, of Aldergrove Drive, Easterside, said: "I didn't expect it to be published. I only wrote it because I felt like it."

The book, aimed at teenagers and adults, is four stories set in 100 years' time in a world swamped by pollution and war.

A group of gifted, telepathic children team up with genetically-engineered dragons to save mankind.

Ms Chatten started writing last January, while her son, Kieran, now ten, who was born with club feet, was undergoing hospital treatment. It took her only four months to complete the book.

She said: "It's always been in my head. I was bored, and it was something to do. The first story took three days to write and I just carried on. I didn't expect it to go far."

Ms Chatten, a former auxiliary nurse and family support worker, said friends were surprised when she revealed she had written a book.

"I don't think anybody believed me because it was out of character, and I kept it quiet," she said.

Her second book is also due to be published and she is busy penning her third and fourth novels.

"I hope people enjoy reading The Bonding as much as I enjoyed writing it," she said.

"I don't expect anything out of it. All I want is to be able to sit in a book store and say, 'I wrote that'."