Final Settlement

Life during South Africa’s apartheid times had been idyllic for the white residents of a small village in the picturesque Nede Valley. Ken Chandler witnessed this when he moved there from England. However, he thought things would need to change following the abolition of apartheid and he saw that the nature and governance in the nearest towns and smaller townships had changed rapidly to suit the needs of the Zulu and Indian residents, but nothing had changed within the Nede valley.

How they were to maintain a “whites only” village was a major concern for its residents, but how were they to achieve this? Would it be amicably achieved or would they need to resort to violence? Eventually, change was brought about in the village, but not in a way that anyone would have envisaged.

Family Business

Evolving Perspectives

This book has been split into three separate parts. You can read each part as a separate book. They can also be read in any order.

These parts share characters and events, so after reading one part, you will find additional insights and perspectives in the other parts. The order you choose to read the parts will produce slightly different results regarding how you will feel about the events that unfold.

The book is designed to be an easy entertaining read filled with interesting well drawn characters. I have tried to include a real sense of place for the two principal cities in which the book is set: Brighton, UK, and Sydney, Australia.

The three parts are as follows:

Connect – A cyber-thriller based on what happens to a woman who has her Facebook account hijacked and enters the world of hackers and the Dark Web to try and find who did it and get revenge.

One for You – A comedy romance that follows a group of single people who sign up to a speed dating event to find their perfect partner. Some of the dates that result from the event lead to true love, but others provide hilarious results.

Only Hope – A morality tale about a man who pins all his future dreams in life on winning the lottery. Has he wasted his life waiting for something that will never happen, or will he win and be happy as he always hoped?

Everyone Follows Ella

Detective John Mathers must discover the identity of a social media influencer, Ella, who is driving vulnerable teenage girls to suicide, before his own daughter, Dawn, becomes their next victim. In a world where beauty is idolised, Ella offers the girls the chance to be as beautiful as she is; to preserve their youth and looks forever by becoming one of her ‘chosen angels’. Dawn is a shy, withdrawn girl who Mathers has sworn to protect since the death of her mother and who he does not want to see age a day. As he enters the girls’ online world, Mathers finds Dawn’s profile; a profile of a girl strikingly different to the impressionable innocent who hides in her room. He soon learns that to discover Ella’s real identity he must discover Dawn’s real identity. When the truth of Ella’s identity is finally revealed it will reveal with it a deeper truth of his own identity, and that of the daughter and life he thought he knew.

Ese: The Misadventures of Moving Forward

Ese has comfortably situated himself into the consistent ebbs and flows of his existence, seemingly schooling life and cracking the code to instant success. All of that changes when he moves schools, becoming a big fish in a vast and enveloping ocean. Dealing with questions of sexuality, identity, love, crushes and finding a concrete path on the lonely road. From talent shows to scheduling conflicts, debates and romance, Ese goes through revelatory experiences in a hilariously honest fashion. Ese, with the help and hindrance of an eclectic crew, embarks on the messy misadventures of moving forward.

Escape to Yackandandah

Two young ladies excitedly leave school just before Christmas to enter the work force. As teenagers, they do the usual things that teenage girls do. A summer rock concert in particular was a “must do”.

Then they disappear. No one knows how, when or where they have gone except the matronly police officer and two undercover agents.

The story unfolds with its twists and turns and things that we often experience in Australia. And, of course, some romance.

Engulfed

My story isn’t the beginning or the middle. It is the end of the end. It was over before it could ever really begin. A tale of nothing and everything. The world stopped in a heartbeat. We were given a mere forty-eight hours. If that. It seemed cruel. Suddenly next-day delivery meant nothing, but getting ourselves to our family the next day meant everything. Those who weren’t within driving distance of their family didn’t have a hope in hell of returning to them to be with them. Those who did manage to get to them would feel as though the time spent with them just wasn’t long enough. Nothing was enough now.
A personal and intimate account of a young couple facing an almighty tragedy. Luke and Maya are still in the honeymoon period of their life, renting a small apartment, with their little dog Cassie; they are working tirelessly to save every penny they have to one day move into their own beautiful home and start a family. They didn’t see this coming. No one did. When the announcement for the end of the world comes, it is hard to believe, but with the world slowly grinding to a halt, Luke and Maya know that they have some hard decisions to make and time is running out. With less than forty-eight hours till the solar flare engulfs the earth, they are faced with impossible questions to answer.
What would you do?
Where would you go?
What matters most?

Ebrangle

Growing up without knowing about her true identity, Julianna DeGel came to a sudden discovery of who she actually is and who raised her. The innocent, sporty and clever girl got pushed into an unknown world by an unfortunate scenario; however, Julianna is determined to search for herself and her true power. Quick on her feet and highly intelligent, Julianna picked up the skills she needed to survive in her new environment in just weeks.

Not only did she reunite with her long-lost childhood friend, but Julianna also met a group of individuals along the way to resolve a murder mystery. The higher she climbed up the ladder of truth, the more overwhelming and complicated the situation got. Who can she really trust out of all the new people she met? Problems after problems, will she be able to fight her way through with her new power? Will she resolve the murder mystery?

Dust on the Shelf

This tale of deceit on several levels is interspersed with historical and linguistic references.

As the second son of a wealthy family in Les Landes, a region of Western France, Bernard Gauthier is destined to enter Holy Orders according to an age-old tradition, now obsolete. His elder brother will inherit the rich property but Bernard has other ideas. He inherits some precious objects from his beloved grandmother. Does Bernard manage to free himself from the bond of poverty and celibacy required by the priesthood? What is the role of his formidable mother in all this? His interest in travel leads him to take a holiday in Australia where he is faced with an unexpected situation.

Dreams

Dreams is a modern fairy tale that tells the story about a friendship between three children – Jude, Jane and Jake. Over the decades, their relationship deepens, their friendship expands and they grow closer, much closer than most family ties are and soon it evolves into love. Their love goes much deeper into the soul – an unconditional love, so deep and primal that it expands from this life out and into the universe. 

The setting is a most beautiful one – the Pacific coast of California, where the sun shines almost every day and you’ll always find beautiful, laughing people, but – like life shows us again and again – nothing is as it seems: life is like the powerful Pacific Ocean – there is always an undercurrent. If you look behind the facade, you’ll find the counterpart: the brightest sun brings out the darkest shades, the most beautiful sunset brings out the darkest night but the darkness itself is dawn not yet born.

This fairy tale is a spiritual journey which tells the story of terrifying childhoods, children growing up to be haunted by traumas and memories only to evolve into human beings who learn to understand that the power of love – unconditional love – will heal them, make them whole again and see the beauty in life once more.    

That is the miracle of love.

Dr Nathaniel Goodrich - The Plight of Divorcement

Struggling to understand the challenges and exert positive change in his marriage, Dr Nathaniel Goodrich, a principal investigator of haematology, and the first in line to inherit a conglomerate of pharmaceutical-related companies, has something in mind. And then in the scrub room, he catches the radiating sparks in Dr Kristopher McCall’s mesmerising eyes. That is when Nathaniel recognises the appointed time is intimate. No longer determined to keep his inclination of intrigue to himself, Nathaniel faces a life-changing decision. What Nathaniel does not intend is to lose Annabeth, his beloved wife and disadvantage his four dear children. Nathaniel knows that if he were to pursue his secret self-interest, his parents would seek to disinherit him. But is it too late – a beautiful mess? Is Nathaniel conquered by the glow of the magic hour? If only Nathaniel can find out why Annabeth cannot be pleased before it’s too late. Only then can he solve his marriage predicament and hide his head during the appointed hour.

Don’t You Believe Me?

Will someone not wonder what you are about,

If the truth remains hidden and does not come out?

An opportunity to get your husband the £10,000 that he owed.

Does that not sound good? Is that not what Kelly would have thought, and gone along with, when presented with this once in a lifetime offer?

But those who presented her with this opportunity, were they really her friends? Were they thinking of her? Or, were they using her, and thought only of themselves?

And what of the malicious gossip going on in the background, accusations of which she was totally unaware.

If only she had told her husband the truth right from the start, then all the uncertainty and mistrust would not have ensued.

But she did not. She wanted everything to be a surprise. Thinking it was the right thing to do but she kept quiet. And the quieter she kept, the more guilty she appeared...

As Christmas drew near she decided to tell him the truth. But had she left it too late?

Her nonsensical story, her ridiculous version of events sounded so far-fetched and absurd.

After all of this time, after all of the secrecy, was she expecting too much to imagine that he would believe her?