Smith's first published work was a poem published in the Leicester Mercury about Native Americans. He was still a pupil at junior school at the time. By the time he had moved to secondary school, he had had several fan fiction short stories published in "Cosmic Masque", the fiction magazine of the Doctor Who Appreciation Society and this encouraged him to submit two short stories to Marvel UK's "Doctor Who Magazine". These were published in the "Brief Encounters" section, some of the last stories published before the feature was discontinued.