A Challenger's Song

A sensitive and lovingly told story mixing fact, action, letters, journals, song and oral history.
Pearson writes with a rich clarity and intelligence about his great grandfather, Charlie Collins, the boy who ran away to sea to become head stoker on the celebrated scientific expedition of the HMS Challenger (1872-76). Finding his feet as a blacksmith back in Brighton with wife Mary and family, we learn about the joys, hardships and everyday heroism of their lives within the grand sweep of 19th Century history.
Andrea Watts, writer and creative writing tutor

In 1872, HMS Challenger, powered by sail and steam, left Portsmouth for an epic voyage of ocean exploration. A Challenger’s Song combines a lifetime reimagined with a fresh account of the voyage seen through the eyes of the crew and scientists, drawing on their own letters and accounts.

‘I had read about the voyage of HMS Challenger before, but this combination of imaginative reconstruction and factual information for me shed a new light on life for those on board ... my appreciation of the men and boys whose hard work kept the Challenger going, and made possible the collection of samples which led to a transformation of our understanding of the deep oceans, was increased enormously ... The sea shanty section at the end is a nice bonus!
Angela Colling, Editor, Ocean Challenge.

A Boy Named Tigger

Adoption is a wonderful opportunity to give a child a loving parental relationship to grow up in the comfort of a home and family. One hears or sees TV programmes of how successful adoption can be! A Boy Named Tigger tells the story of a little boy torn away from a loving family environment to be adopted at the age of four by a couple struggling to get back on their feet after the second world war.

He went to a mother who had a split personality and tried to control every aspect of Tigger’s life subjecting him to mental torture at times. Growing up he managed to tear himself away from his mother and start a new life, gradually clearing his mind from the unhappiness of his childhood and embarking on several successful careers. The writing of this book was the therapy he needed to eventually clear his mind.

A Boy Full of Emptiness

"Leo tells the stories of his life as though he is living them all over again; it is an extraordinary gift. Every scene comes to life: every fragrance, every bad smell, every delicious morsel of food or stinging slap becomes real.”

Pete Townshend, The Who

This book is rich with the story of a boy born in the 1940s and coming of age in Lucca, a walled town in Tuscany still retaining the feeling of a medieval community. His narrative immerses the reader into the life of funny and sensuous adventures in an Italy suspended between Fascism, the war and the economic boom of the sixties. The story ends with the author travelling to England in search of riches and fulfilment.

A Bit of Good Luck

A young man slings his duffel bag over his shoulder and begins a journey of a lifetime.

In this true story, young Frank learns more in a day than all his life up to that point but, ironically, he’s left with more questions than answers! Do lobsters whistle? Are sleep and driving mutually exclusive?

Now, over 50 years later, Frank recalls that day, the highs and lows, the stops and starts and the emotional end to his odyssey. With his mission to meet up with his father at the opposite end of Ireland, this funny, yet poignant story paints a landscape that is fading over time and will leave you wondering where life’s true characters have gone. Have they really disappeared? Or are they waiting patiently, thumbs out, waiting to be picked up again?

Readers will never predict the trials and tribulations of Frank McGurk in 1960s and ’70s Ireland – neither did Frank.

Where exactly is no man’s land? Was the smuggling run ‘a washing machine too far’? And what were Frank’s true dealings with the oil sheikhs from the Middle East?

Potholes without the plot holes, A Bit of Good Luck (and other short stories) evoke a bygone era where a journey was an adventure, and the open road was an open mic for every character to stand up and take a bow.

A Bare Chronicle of Existence

On the very same day as his brother, Arnold enrolled to serve in WW1. He signed up for the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserves and in April 1915 set sail on HMS India. A few short months later, he found himself floating in the North Sea. This is his story and the story of the men who found themselves interned in Norway for the remainder of the war. It is a story of loneliness and love. Of conflict and of isolation. It is a story from WW1 that is rarely told but one that deserves to be.

50 Shades of Awkward

There comes a time when you look at yourself in a dirty bathroom mirror and think, this cannot be all there is. I am speaking directly to the heart of every woman who, at this very moment, feels invisible, unloved, unworthy, trapped, tired, ugly, awkward, aimless, chubby and old. This book is for you.

Eight years ago, I was married for the third time to a guy I met on the Internet and barely knew. This is a raw look at life through the eyes of a middle-aged woman as she comes to grips with parenting, dating, divorce, dieting, financial and mental health meltdowns, and her brutally honest way of dealing with it all.

Through horrific mistakes, gut-wrenching pain and laugh-out-loud life mishaps, I hope it will help you see that life isn’t at all bad.

3 Boys, 2 Dogs, 1 (Ex) Husband and Absolutely No Idea

‘I never thought, when I met my husband at 18, got married at 25, had my third baby at 30 or even two years ago when I started writing this book, that I would find myself in the position I am now… a single mum to three boys, two dogs with a now ex-husband.

This is a brutally honest account of life since I weed on that stick. Pregnancy, haemorrhoids, cabbage leaves, mum mates, tantrums, holidays, hormones, sex, dogs and divorce.

This is definitely not a guide to parenting but it may make you feel a little less alone on the journey.’

284 Munros

Since the Rev A E Robertson first accomplished the feat in 1901, over 6,500 people have registered their “compleation” of the Munros with the Scottish Mountaineering Club. There are records for the fastest round; for “compleating” in a continuous walk, or in a single season; for the greatest number of rounds; etc.

David Barraclough took a more leisurely approach, taking 51 years and 164 days to walk 2,086 miles and climb 690,000 feet between ascents of Sgùrr nan Gillean, his first Munro climbed when he was fourteen, and Beinn Dòrain, his 284th. David’s book is more than a diary of his achievement. He includes descriptions of the often non-standard routes he took to the summits and tries to rationalise the many changes that have been made to the Munro listings over the years. Beyond the mountains themselves, he discusses the effects on both access and the environment of the dams and enlarged lochs associated with hydro-electric power schemes, and the more recent threat to the wildness of Scotland’s more remote areas from industrial-scale wind farms. Throughout the book, David’s lifelong love of the Scottish mountains shines through.

1996

It’s 1996, apartheid is in its death throes, I meet Daniel by chance in Johannesburg. Together we hatch a plan to escape the country and embark on a road trip across the USA. It is clear we are trying to escape ourselves and our dysfunctional white upbringing.Near the end of the road trip, which acts as a primer for a much larger individual trip around the world, I meet Kim. I write to her with my insights, thoughts, and feelings throughout my world trip, she never once replies. The journey exposes my upbring and my country of birth for the dystopia it was, and I use my various experiences whilst venturing into former communist countries and populist South American dictatorships, to analyse and explain the unbearable whiteness of being during those days in South Africa. The story takes a surprising twist at the end of the trip with me going to see Kim, where I come face to face with a horrible truth.

1984 – Diary of a 16/17-Year-Old

Transport your mind back to 1984 – an era where there were no mobile phones, no internet, no nothing...

Immerse yourself in this poignant diary of an innocent 16/17-year-old... living every day to the max! 

Enjoy reading her intriguing, witty and delightful diary... 

1958

In 1958 three brothers and two ladies embarked on a road trip of a lifetime. Travelling for four months, starting in Cape Town across Africa through Europe and finishing in London in a VW Kombi, they got to see and do things that most people will never get the chance to. It was a foolhardy trip, with the most inappropriate and basic of equipment by modern standards, yet the pioneer spirit, companionship, raw tenacity and finding of a soul mate saw them overcoming all obstacles. This book is the daily diary account by 26-year-old Joan as she describes her maiden voyage of sights, companions and recounts the numerous travelling challenges detailing an era long gone.

10 Days of Dad

Dad and I rarely saw eye to eye. We fought so much when I was growing up, I think we yelled ‘I hate you’ more than ‘I love you’.

But Covid-19 changed all of that...

It was meant to be an enjoyable holiday, the cruise of a lifetime, but really it was the giant floating petri dish that allowed Covid-19 to dock on Australian shores.

Through tragedy, came forgiveness and second chances.

Dad, you are a cockroach – an atomic bomb couldn’t kill you...a virus named after a beer has no chance...