Ripples of War

When the heavy stone of a world war drops into the tranquillity of peace, its ripples reach far and wide, disturbing the lives of all they touch. This is the story of two young people whose entire teen years coincide with a war that changes their lives profoundly.

In 1939, when World War Two begins, they live in opposite sides of the world, then as the Japanese enter the war and the conflict drags on, they both reach maturity and enter the services.

When the widening ripples finally allow them to meet in the fifth year of the war, then tear them apart, they are deeply in love and face almost insurmountable hurdles to live a life together.

All the war facts in Ripples of War are authentic, including the rescue at sea.

Rhinoceros or the Beast's Biographer

Rhinoceros or the Beast’s Biographer is an alternative history set during the 16th century. The African Kikuyo tribe train the rhinoceros as a beast of war and invade ‘Yurop’.

Ode, the son of the Chief Elder, is trained as a Griot, a traditional ‘Afrik’ storyteller. His role is to witness and celebrate the actions of the rhino mounted warriors led by his father.

As the teller of stories, Ode is attracted to the drama of war. But he begins to wonder if history is anything more than the transcription of murder? And does his celebration and re-telling of violent events encourage their bloody quest and even support the tacit suggestion that killing is a natural and inevitable human endeavour.

Running counter to the violence is the love story between Ode, and Anna, a white Southern Yuropan. Anna, highly intelligent, and confrontational has spent her life trying to be heard in a culture that belittles intelligent women. Through their shared knowledge of the Latin tongue, and their profound loneliness, Ode and Anna, become friends and lovers.

The Beast’s Biographer is a story of love, duty, fraternity and bloody conquest.

Return Into the Unknown

Join Ornella Moon on a life-changing journey in Return Into the Unknown. When her life is turned upside down, she follows her instincts and sets out to rediscover herself.

Venturing into unknown territory, Ornella encounters both beauty and danger. She bravely embarks on a path without plans or itinerary, discovering her strength and resilience as she meets love in all its different forms and undergoes a powerful process of soul and mind healing.

As Ornella navigates the unknown, she confronts her fears and faces her past, inspiring readers to question their own lives and consider the possibility of finding their lost selves.

With captivating prose and rich imagery, Return Into the Unknown is a tale of self-discovery, resilience, and the transformative power of love.

Rally ’Round the Flag

“A timely reminder of how the past colours the future”

Mary Cleeves

Rally ’Round the Flag is a thrilling historical novel set during the American Civil war.

The story begins in the mid-19th century in a large, Lancashire cotton mill,

which never stops production for 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Here a family with rich and privileged men controls the lives of the desperately poor men, women and children who are forced to work for them...or be turned out onto the street with no income nor roof over their heads.

In 1861 events move to the USA, where the first real battle of the Civil War started.

The history of the (first) Battle of Bull Run is told realistically until, close to its end, it takes on an alternative life as a result of just one military action, which historically changes the remaining years of war. Senior General in the Confederate Army Robert E. Lee at that moment speaks of how he now sees war in this new version of victory: “Once you get 'em on the run don’t stop. Never give up the pursuit.”

This fascinating account of the war, doomed to kill a quarter of the entire population
of the USA, leads the reader through many of the major locations and actions of the war. The grim reality of the five years from 1861 describes both the true historical characters, as well as the three imagined young Englishmen whose lives now lie in the USA. Here they are destined to see, and even to experience at first-hand, the appalling bloodshed, death and destruction of a war so often fought at very close quarters. Here a brother could find his father or his son aiming a rifle at him across a battlefield; a general could be responsible for the death even of his grandson.

The story roars faster and faster through the hell of shot and shell.

Cannons, and shells from these cannons, and also from mortars, were designed to slice through great swathes of human flesh, while at close quarters Bowie knives appeared to rip out the throats of an enemy fighting for his own life within an arm’s reach.

The bodies of the enemy lay scattered across innumerable battlefields

and became food for the crows. An observer of a huge battle recorded in his diary that he had seen: “Entire regiments disappeared in a few minutes. Legs, arms, knapsacks and rifles thrust high into the air and then scattered on the bloody grass.”

The reader may ask: “Can history be changed by the alteration of one small event?”

But is there more than a little similarity in the 19th century between slavery in the USA and the penury, desperate hardship and death from disease walking the streets of Oldham, as well as the lack of any security existing for all those working in the mills, factories and mines of Great Britain?

One part of the same American country wants to destroy the neighbour it has lived with peacefully for more than one hundred and fifty years.

An extraordinary read awaits you...if you rally ’round the flag, but which flag do you choose?

Puffin Jack

Puffin Jack is a United Nations peacekeeper in Cambodia in 1993. In a country ravaged by civil war and recovering from the horrific consequences of genocide and displacement at the hands of the Khmer Rouge, Puffin Jack finds an opportunity to prove to the world that he is a hero.

Puffin Jack is an Australian soldier, a peacekeeper on posting to Cambodia as part of the United Nations Transit Authority Cambodia. An idealistic dreamer living on the fringes of society, he embraces the barbed nickname given to him by his peers. He finds himself deployed to a remote one-man retransmission station deep in the rainforest of the Cardamom Mountains as part of the UN communications network.

Here he services and monitors a bank of VHF radios with the only other camp inhabitant for the company, a 17-year-old Khmer boy named Horrie by the previous UN resident. A lonely posting, Puffin Jack begins to entertain fantasies of a secret mission he believes has been tacitly authorised by his superiors to rid the region of Khmer Rouge influence.

In defiance of the United Nations Charter and contrary to any orders issued, Puffin Jack, with the hapless Horrie in tow, commences his quixotic and clandestine forays into the rainforest in search of the Khmer Rouge.

Princetown and the Conscientious Objectors of WW1

Over 16,000 men refused to fight in WW1 and became known as Conscientious Objectors.

Their initial incarceration in prison was deemed unsuitable for many and they were then sent to work centres to be engaged on work of national importance.

One such work centre was in the village of Princetown, Devon, home of the notorious Dartmoor Prison.

This book explores its change of purpose to that of work centre and the daily life, type of work and health of those COs held there. It also looks at the impact of their arrival on the local community and the attitudes of the village residents towards them.

Pirate's Lair

Epic adventure on the high seas!

A young British aristocrat abandons his life of wealth and privilege in exchange for vengeance!

Michael d’ Argentan’s world is turned upside down when he learns about the brutal death of his beloved parents at the hands of the infamous Barbary Pirates! With a burning and passionate desire to avenge them he sets off on a desperate quest to search them out.

Along the way he joins the Bandaliers who are at war with the Barbaries. Honor, life and even love are at stake in his daring journey. A master swordsman, from one fight to another, nothing will stop him from fulfilling his mission.

The Barbary Pirates...the world’s most feared pirates of all time...UNTIL NOW!

Pipistrello

Set in 1908 in a stately home in the lush English countryside, Pipistrello is a gothic tale of murder and mayhem.It follows the fortunes of the Chester family: the Italian countess Eleanora, her husband Sir Peregrine, their daughters Allegra and Elodie, and the loyal staff who serve them.At its heart is a set of tarot cards which divine the future. Full of dark omens, ghosts, lust and tragedy, the story travels to the glittering shores of the Italian Riviera and back as the lives of the inhabitants of Chichester Hall are transformed in unexpected and unimaginable ways.Pipistrello takes a glimpse into the intricacies of motherhood, the different seasons within a marriage and the desire for metamorphosis that lies within us all.

Outwitting the Enemy

Andrew was recruited into the British Secret Intelligence Service (SIS) in 1939 for his linguistic talents and other qualities suitable for working in the Service.

By early July 1940, he had already been sent on four missions including the sabotaging of a train carrying tank engines inside Germany, assisting in the evacuation of BEF soldiers from Dunkirk on one of the ‘small ships’ and surviving a number of life-threatening incidents when bringing King Haakon and the Norwegian cabinet from northern Norway to exile in London.

In November 1940, he is persuaded to help at Camp 020 with the interrogation of German spies captured in England; a few weeks later, he completed his naval officer training in Scotland and southern England.

With the Atlantic convoys being attacked by U-boats operating out of the German-occupied ports of Lorient and St Nazaire with heavy losses, he is sent at the end of March 1941 to spy on the building of the submarine pens for a possible raid by the RAF later in the year. He narrowly avoids being captured by the Wehrmacht and returns to London with vital information.

He undergoes parachute training in May 1941 before being dropped in NE France where he is escorted by a French Resistance group to Koblenz. His mission is to deal with a member of the SIS that had become a senior officer in the German intelligence service (the Abwehr). By some good fortune, he manages to escape by Lysander back to England.

The story is a most compelling, absorbing and attractive read with strong classical elements. It has a clean plot for the time period covered which develops and unfolds through a captivating storyline; the relatable cast of characters will keep the reader enraptured up to the very last page.

One Week in 1952

The story is set in June 1952 and describes one week of action between Tom, 8 years old, and his Aunt Siobhan, 18 years old, who looks after him while his parents are forced to leave home. An unexpected event enables them to holiday in Kent, where exciting adventures befall them both. Throughout the book there is a surprising comparison between the way of life in the 1950s, much of it based on historical fact, and that of the modern-day world.

Of Time and Tide

This is a story of how fate determines the life we lead, but with either kindness or cruelty.

Although deserts, forests and oceans separated Eddie Fraser, an Australian man, and Tina Morris, a Scottish girl, their lives were destined to entwine. Without the least knowledge of each other’s lives or even the wish to know, they were joined together in a marriage that, since Eddie’s work as a sailor on a merchant ship kept them apart for long periods of time, couldn’t possibly work. Or could it?

Against all odds posed by Tina’s poor health, she gave birth to three children, Maggie, Billy and Eve. And then the first world war, the great war devastated many lives, including Eddie and Tina’s. This is the retelling of how envy and greed for another’s life, love and wealth can dictate and corrupt a mind without conscience or pity.

James Coutts, a man of high standing in a community of mill workers, and his obnoxious daughter, Millicent, enter Tina’s life with devastating consequences. From that point onwards, this story becomes one of horror and treachery. The now grown-up Maggie enters into a battle of wits that only one can win.

Not for the Telling

A minor road accident led to a chance meeting of two new undergraduates, whose origins, study paths, and potential employment proved to be so contrasting. War was out of the question at the time, but when it arrived it enabled both women to devote their interests to a common objective. One found her metier in the air. Though discouraged by the exclusion of women from flying in the air force, nevertheless she seized a golden opportunity to fly in the service of her country. Her wartime record was distinguished and record breaking. Meanwhile, the other was recruited into an anti-espionage service designed to curb the activities of those citizens who were bent on crippling the national effort, if and when war actually came. The ensuing wartime enabled both women to excel in their respective duties, one in the physical sense, the other surreptitiously. On leaving university their ways had taken them apart, through unexpected adventures, trials, tribulations and various love matches, but a second sheer chance in their lives brought them together again, after losing each other and forgetting their former friendship.