Though his submitted story about a 17-year-old boy named Charlie was not selected, it caught the attention of agent Alice Sutherland-Hawes, who suggested Dean try writing children's fiction.
[2] Dean signed his first two-book deal in 2020 with Simon & Schuster Children's UK, through which he published his debut middle-grade book Me, My Dad and the End of the Rainbow in 2021.
[8] In 2022, Dean published his second middle grade book The Secret Sunshine Project[9][10] and his first young adult (YA) novel The King is Dead.
Regarding the latter, Dean had long been "intrigued by the Royal institution... How, through no achievement other than birth, one person or family can be given so much power" and wanted to put a character like himself in those shoes.
[15][16] Dean sat on the judges' panel of the 2024 BBC Young Writers' Award alongside Katie Thistleton, Jeffrey Boakye, Katherine Webber and Nicola Dinan.