He grew up on Royal Parade, Parkville, and attended Errol St Primary School, where he wrote for a student magazine.

[5] Phelan's first published book was the 2005 non-fiction work Literati: Australian Contemporary Literary Figures Discuss Fear, Frustrations and Fame (John Wiley & Sons).

His first book, Literati: Australian Contemporary Literary Figures Discuss Fear, Frustrations and Fame, was released by John Wiley & Sons in 2005.

Set mainly in New York City, Washington, D.C., and France, it tells the story of Fox investigating a series of murders in Europe linked to a forthcoming hack on NSA computers.

The fourth Lachlan Fox novel, Liquid Gold, was published in August 2009 and is set in the US, Pakistan, and India.

It was during these early years as a novelist that James completed his PhD in Young Adult Literature, which lead to his next creative venture.

[8] Phelan wrote a series of post-apocalyptic young adult novels called the ALONE trilogy, consisting of the novels - Chasers, Survivor and Quarantine - and features 16-year-old Jesse and his three close friends, who escape from a crashed subway train to find New York City in ruins after an attack.