By now you know quite a bit about me and my animal family (The Furries!) - and also what
inspires me to write. Maybe now you would like to know a little about the actual books I've written.
All my stories seek to explore 'the unknown', and often draw on the many strange experiences and uncanny
coincidences that have flavoured my life. Maybe it is a way of making sense of them - who knows?
There are three novels available, and these are:
DARK STAR:
This was the first of my books to be published by Pendragon Press Ltd.
When I found outside my back door an eerie stone of the size, shape and colour of a skull, and complete with what
appeared to be eye and nose sockets - there had to be a story to it
Dark Star: (the first Darcy West Story)
Tells the story of reporter Darcy West, her estranged husband Brant Kennedy and her young nephew Alisdair,
who is orphaned when both his parents are killed in a car crash. Darcy is obliged to take him on and soon discovers that
Alisdair is no ordinary child; he is gifted, and also seems to possess the power to read people's minds and generally know
things he should not.
The mystery of Alisdair deepens and his seeming power fostered when she takes him to Westwalls to live: a remote property
in the wilds of Cumbria presided over by an elderly and eccentric hermit who makes Alisdair seem normal by comparison.
Brant follows her to Westwalls and violent quarrels ensue. Whilst exploring the fell, Alisdair finds what seems to be a meteor,
and a series of strange events take place with Mr. Ambrose at their centre. A sinister plot unfolds and to her distress, Darcy
suspects Brant of being involved, and eventually of plotting her death.
Darkness has fallen on Westwalls and its inhabitants….
This is my second novel and it is not one for reading alone or at night! (so my readers tell me).
I have to say the writing of it is still a vivid memory and one I shall never forget. Working at my laptop in the wee hours
at my remote Lakeland cottage, with the eerie shrieks of the barn owl filling the night, it felt as though I was living rather
than writing the book. This story literally haunted me.
A Grave Affair is the (very creepy) story of Jo Cavanagh and her sinister brush with the past.
Jo is a writer and she rents a remote cottage in Lakeland in order to work on her new book.
She is also fleeing an unhappy love affair; following the latest argument, her lover Blake Durante has accepted a post as
Resolution Officer in Bosnia at the height of the war. Jo sets off alone for the aptly named Twilight Cottage.
When she is almost there, a freak storm causes her to lose control and her car veers over the edge of a notorious Lakeland pass.
She hits her head and has a terrifying but also deeply emotional out of body experience. Jo brings back with her the memory
of medieval armour, a fierce and bitter love and a man with green eyes that seem to penetrate flesh and bone to the essence beyond.
Both image and emotions remain with her to haunt her day and night.
On her release from hospital Jo moves into Twilight Cottage and is terrified by inexplicable happenings.
Vile odours, slime on walls and unspeakable things on the floor is to name but a few of them. A deadly hawk - dark
with menace - unnerves her with its presence: silently swooping down from the fell, or as a silent sentinel on watch from
its perch on a churchyard yew, awaiting the chance to swoop into her life and threaten her very existence.
The past haunts her, and Death pays a violent call to the remote Lakeland community. Gradually Jo realises that the terror
cannot end until long-buried wrongs are righted and ancient passions fulfilled.
Jo, her new friends Col and Finola, along with her agent and Blake are trapped within Twilight Cottage for the Final Confrontation……
This is the third and most recent of my novels, and perhaps my most ambitious.
As many readers have asked me how Brant and Darcy met, this book goes back to the beginnings of their relationship.
The story itself was inspired by a real life event: the discovery of the preserved body of a medieval knight
at St. Bees on the remote West Cumbrian coast. Whilst researching another project in Whitehaven museum, I came across a
display showing the shroud in which he had been wrapped and other fascinating details of the burial. Such as the strands of
dark curly hair placed around his neck and chest, and the female skeleton found alongside his lead-lined coffin.
Then the detail that really hooked me: despite being dead for some seven hundred years, his eye colour was still discernible!
That was it; from then on I became obsessed with the unknown knight and his possible identity. I contacted the leader of the
archaeological dig responsible for the find at Leicester University and received valuable help and information. I also attended
a video showing of the post mortem examination performed on the knight. Once the basic research had been done, I began thinking
about this knight as a man, with a life and perhaps, a mission. My sleep began to be haunted by dreams of him,
and strange symbols such as a large red cross with splayed arms on a metal shield, and then terrifyingly, of huge pits filled
with flames. The dreams turned to nightmares filled with blackened flesh and desperate screams.
There came a time when it was all too much and I turned my back on the novel.
A few years later I took it up again, compelled by a series of 'coincidences': numerous references in the media to the order
of holy warriors of which 'my' knight was a member; a white van parked at the end of our rutted and little used lane actually
bearing the Order's very specific and rarely-seen name blazoned in red on its side (I am trying not to give too much away
here so shall resist temptation to be more explicit!), and found myself constantly coming across references to my knight's
equally unusual first name, and even received a couple of telephone calls from men actually bearing it.
I took these, and the dreams which by this time had recommenced, to be 'creative nudges' and designed not only to make me
pick up the book again, but have the courage to drastically rework aspects of the plot where I had 'played safe' in the earlier draft.
Time out
I do not believe this! Alone in the house, I was typing the above paragraph when an almighty
crash stopped me in my tracks. I have just searched the house, fearful of what I might find, and at first found nothing
to explain the noise. But then the answer became clear: I have a picture of a medieval knight's horse set in a wrought iron
frame hanging in my kitchen. The noise I had heard was this picture crashing onto the stone floor below.
It has hung there for years and never fallen from its hook before! I trust this doesn't constitute a 'nudge of disapproval'
about what I am divulging here! However, to continue….
I reluctantly began to rework the novel and as the identity of the knight found at St. Bees is still a mystery, felt free to
indulge follow my hunches. So using 'St. Bees Man' as a spring board, the new version got under way and eventually was
finished in time for the launch in June 2003. All in all the writing of this book spanned a decade!
The story begins with reporter Darcy West receiving a telephone call from her friend Caroline Stevens who is a
lecturer in archaeology at their old University. Caro tips Darcy off about the discovery of a body believed to be that of a
medieval knight and arranges to meet her later that day at the post mortem. Darcy sets off for Cumbria to stay at remote Mistletoe
Cottage, a rural retreat given to her by her parents. A strange event that can only be described as 'mystical'
occurs during the post mortem, and Darcy's life is irrevocably changed.
In Cumbria she meets astronomer Brant Kennedy and whilst being attracted by him, starts to suspect both his agenda and integrity.
A visit to his hidden observatory on the cliff top at St Gildas Bay, close to where the body was found, reveals an
intriguing blend of a Bond-style space-age technology spiced with ancient mysticism.
Brant is secretive about his work and on the defence when it comes to the opposite sex.
Alchemy, secret religious sects and chilling deaths drag Darcy deeper into a web of mystery and intrigue.
As danger threatens, so her distrust of Brant deepens. As the dramatic climax approaches,
Darcy is on the run and fearful for her life. Is Brant to be her rescuer - or assassin?
Many of my readers have commented that they love the 'twist' at the end of this story, so sorry, folks - I ain't about to reveal more!
If you would like to buy your copy of Immortal Dust - or Dark Star and/or A Grave Affair, click on the button
below to go straight to the Pendragon Press Ltd web site.
Dark Star: (the first Darcy West Story)
A GRAVE AFFAIR:
IMMORTAL DUST:
A few years later I took it up again, compelled by a series of 'coincidences': numerous references in the media to the order
of holy warriors of which 'my' knight was a member; a white van parked at the end of our rutted and little used lane actually
bearing the Order's very specific and rarely-seen name blazoned in red on its side (I am trying not to give too much away
here so shall resist temptation to be more explicit!), and found myself constantly coming across references to my knight's
equally unusual first name, and even received a couple of telephone calls from men actually bearing it.
I took these, and the dreams which by this time had recommenced, to be 'creative nudges' and designed not only to make me
pick up the book again, but have the courage to drastically rework aspects of the plot where I had 'played safe' in the earlier draft.