Return to Hunterville and the Mānuka Honey Shop

Vulnerability, emotion, passion, lust, kindness, caring, tenderness, commitment, respect and the incredible power of a smile – this is William and Aoife’s love story. William is a quiet and reflective man from Hunterville in New Zealand, escaping rural loneliness. Aoife is a beautiful and trusting woman from Galway in Ireland, escaping an abusive partner.
They fortuitously cross paths for the first time at Nonna Russo’s cooking class in Naples, Italy. Their relationship starts very slowly, but in just 10 short days, total strangers quickly become inseparable lovers as they are intoxicated by ‘la bella vita’ of Naples. William and Aoife embrace the Napoli café culture, go to an opera for the first time, go horse riding on the slopes of Mount Vesuvius, experience aperitivo, visit jaw-dropping museums and churches, and swim down at the waterfront. They give kindness, respect and a friendly smile wherever they go. They are gifted the same by the people of Naples.
Absence makes the heart grow fonder. Seven weeks after a painful and emotionally charged farewell in Naples, Aoife is reunited with William on his farm in New Zealand. William proposes, Aoife is pregnant, there is a wedding and a funeral. As William walks from the Hunterville Cemetery, an old lady beckons him over. What she says has unimaginable consequences for William and Aoife’s journey ahead.

Revolving Door

Quietly reflective, the beautifully written poems in this slim volume offer a welcome respite from the noisy insistence of modern life. The language, now simple and direct, now rich in associations, double-meanings, and imagery, has its own natural rhythm and appeal regardless of subject and rhyme. Intriguing, absorbing, thought-provoking, the poems are innovative and fresh and the intensity of the verses in places will undoubtedly strike a chord with readers of all kinds - both established readers of poetry, those who read poetry now and again, and those turning to poetry for the first time. Largely relating one person's take on how it is to be in the world, the poems address such aspects of life as time, being, loss, culture, and contingency. The collection is divided into three sections - non-rhyming poems, rhyming poems, and a concluding section of lighter, more humorous verses, with each of two additional poems serving as foreword and afterword.

Senior Pleasures

Overnight Tom Hartley became a grieving widower after years of happy marriage and rebuilt his life by making new friends and taking up new interests. He moved house and set up a gardening club which also helped elderly residents and arranged walks and other social activities. After a number of close friendships with lonely ladies, he fell in love with neighbour Helen who had been working with him on the gardening club. Concerned about Tom’s over-friendly nature, Helen insisted on a one-year engagement and that they should continue to live in separate homes for Tom to prove that he could resist temptation. All went well until a glamorous widow moved in next door and began making advances.

An unexpected event brought about a change in plans and Tom and Helen had to sell their homes and move to a rundown property requiring months of hard work and expense to restore. Despite their problems the couple have fun together and their love blossoms. 

Shoot for the Face

Jason Rogers couldn’t remember the last time he had slept soundly. After surviving 20 years in the high-octane world of Russian investment banking, he knew that his time there as the high-flying international banker to the oligarchs was coming to an end.

The bank he’d built from scratch in the 90s, Falcon Capital, his pride and joy, was being assailed on all sides by shadowy forces in Russian society with impeccable government connections, the “siloviki”. To compound matters, his chief risk officer had approved a loan to an oligarch, Ari Kandinskiy, who was down on his luck and had all but gone broke. His efforts to recover desperately needed funds from the stricken oligarch would pit him against powerful interests in Moscow – including Ruslan Akhmatov, the mercurial emissary of Russia’s most troublesome regional governor.

Desperate times would call for desperate measures. Jason Rogers would have to call one final time on the services of Dmitry Ovchinnikov, the Siberian hitman who was a little rough around the edges and dressed like an American cowboy – but who had proved so terribly effective at neutralising his client’s enemies over the years and despatching them to cemeteries all over Russia.

Dmitry Ovchinnikov’s capacity for violence and appetite for dispensing his own, unique brand of “justice” would result in some of Moscow’s most bloody executions in recent memory. It would trigger an orgy of revenge killings which would see the body parts of prominent members of the Russian underworld scattered all over the white tablecloths of that city’s finest restaurants.

Would Jason Rogers come to regret the murderous gang war that he had unleashed on the streets of Moscow? Would he become one of its victims?

Only time would tell…

Simone’s Choice

Imagine you are in a bar celebrating your birthday and your freedom as a newly divorced man when your eyes meet those of a stunning blue eyed blonde. The connection is instant and electric. Finally, after such a long and desperately hard road, could true love be within your reach?

This is deeply personal and moving true story written by author David John Baird about Michael, a 51-year-old professional, and the torrid and steamy romance that nearly destroyed him and his belief in finding the “one”.

In this semi-biographical romance thriller, Michael meets Simone, a bubbly Italian on the eve of her return to Singapore. They exchange numbers and embark on a cyber romance of Skype dates and instant messaging. He is over the moon when she announces she has a job in Sydney and is moving to be by his side. Their romance is passionate and raw, honest, and deeply authentic. The story, in Michael’s words, is an insightful account of his thoughts during their flourishing romance.

However, the constant interruption by Simone’s ex-boyfriend Marco arouses his suspicions and what happens next, no one could anticipate.  

SOE Agent Code Name LILLY

Mary Dumont is a third officer in the Women’s Royal Naval Service working at the Admiralty Communications Centre in London in 1942 where she is recruited by the Special Operations Executive (SOE) to become a wireless operator-saboteur. Parachuted into France, Mary joins a small band of resistance fighters where she leads a double life, a schoolteacher by day, a wireless operator by night; all goes horribly wrong, Mary is captured and tortured by an SS major who is determined to obtain both her codes and the names of her companions. Mary makes a daring escape during an air raid, unknown to her, German Intelligence has infiltrated SOE, a double agent known to Mary has also been parachuted into France to capture a Dutch scientist who is escaping to England with plans for the German V1 flying bomb. Evading capture, Mary’s resistance cell must get the scientist to England before he can be handed over to the Gestapo, but first Mary must eliminate the German double agent. Just when she thinks it is safe on returning to England, Mary and her companions discover the identity of the traitor within SOE, they must try to eliminate him before he can return the scientist to the Germans.

Songs From The Mansion House Garden

Through the ages we have lived in a split society of the haves and have-nots. Songs From The Mansion House Garden is a poetic look into the lives people lead, some through wealth, others religion or through nature, and how we perceive each other. Each will have an opinion on wealth; whether it is a necessity or a creator of each life.

By the end the reader can make their own decision on the author’s thoughts.

Spy Within

Samantha and Emma’s late afternoon shopping trip was interrupted by a sudden attack to their town by an unknown enemy. The instinct to reconnect the broken family amid chaos and fear led them back home. Just when you think they are safe something else happens. The unexpected happens. We follow this family through much destruction and loss. We see the young people grow stronger, adults in the making. We see a broken marriage begin to heal in the brokenness. However, there’s a spy within and even the spy doesn’t realize who they are and what they are meant to do. Enjoy this tantalizing story as we go through the ups and downs, literally, when their world goes upside down. Or, dare I say, upside up?

Steeple City

Steeple City is set in Cork City, Ireland and is a humorous story of how selfishness and loneliness can consume a family whose mother dies giving birth. We get to see life through the eyes of the main character Fin, a funny, lying, stealing fourteen-year-old bastard who despises his older gay brother and womanising father. The only rock in his life is his granny “The Mad Mullah”. The more hardship Fin inflicts or is inflicted upon him the more relatable he becomes. His toxic humour helps him and the reader navigate a year in his life. Fin’s immediate and extended family experience a year of love, laughter and death where an array of characters enter Steeple City with their own unique self-destructive story.

Stumped

The brutal murder of a young married woman during an annual cricket match in the sleepy countryside village of Bundary near Bristol forms the backdrop to a novel of illicit affairs, an escort agency and the attempted break-up of an international drug smuggling ring based in the Balkans and operating in Britain and Eastern Europe.

Solving the murder involves cooperation between the Avon and Somerset Police and officers from the West Midlands who are working with The National Crime Agency to discover how drugs are being imported into Britain from The Balkans.

The visiting cricket team captain is a known drug dealer from the Wolverhampton area who is offered amnesty of a potential prison sentence if he will go undercover to try to break up the drug ring.

This brings him into contact with one of the suspects for the murder as he travels to Dubrovnik and Montenegro, where he meets up with the operators of the drug cartel who own a vineyard near Podgorica, the capital of Montenegro.

Subsequently Inevitable

They say our lives flash before our eyes when we die, but what if we preselect all the possibilities of our lives before we are born? Subsequently Inevitable is for anyone who ever wondered what might have been. What if you had stayed with the one that got away, had that baby…or what if you acted on those cold feet? Summer’s life will be everything she signed up for, as all the alternatives for her life paths play out. Find out what happens if Summer ends up alone or with the abusive Craig, loveable Luke, complicated Louanne, toxic Lexi, the man of her dreams, Tym, or her first but very twisted love, Stefan. The path Summer chooses is her decision to make, but the events that follow are subsequently inevitable.

Summer Poetry in Loch Ness

The glistening holy water of Loch Ness and the glorious surrounding hills of bloom and heather n' thistle glow into beautiful summer poetry from the mouths of cherubs, angels and the treasured imagination of Miss Bonnie Blue Sunflower. Breathe in the warmth as the shimmering sun rises and sun sets and the angelic never-ending sunshine in-between bringing all the joys of summer to Loch Ness. Feel the gentle, mellow breeze from the wings of ladybirds and fluttering butterflies and treat your sweet taste buds to the fruit and honey of poetry from heaven all about Loch Ness. One day, your soul will be led to Loch Ness by butterflies and birds of paradise because whatever your faith, all heavens are above the magical water of Loch Ness and the glorious dusk auroras sent by all of heavens' angels to delight your eyes and bring warmth to the enchanting heart of all those who truly believe in the glory and faith of poetry loved by all gods.