Survivors of Origin

In the new novel from Paul Swaffield, Survivors of Origin, we meet Fred and Mary Quicklock. Times for Fred and Mary are, alongside many of their contemporaries, suffering from hard times in 17th century England.

However, their dire situation shows some signs of improvement when the son of Edward Buckingham, a wealthy ship owner, is brought into their lives.

Meanwhile the evil slave trade is making the participants of that dreadful enterprise very wealthy indeed. And others are eager to muscle their way into this vile but lucrative industry.

For some reason their son Ezra is drawn to a life on the seas. 

Due to a bad decision he swiftly finds himself in a world of greed, danger and violence. However, he also found companionship and love.

Captain Isaac Dunsmoore is in command of a brand new and sleek ship called the Rebecca-Ann. It's first voyage was a trans-Atlantic voyage from England to Belem, a port in Brazil, on the Amazon Delta mouth.

Rothwell Spurt is a ruthless pirate who is fleeing from the British Admiralty. He wants the Rebecca-Ann, as does the corrupt rulers of Belem, Garcia Paz. It looks possible that the maiden voyage of the Rebecca-Ann could be its last.

But Captain Dunsmoore has a new recruit to his crew, Ezra Quicklock and he and the first mate Horace Clunk, Taylor Potts seek out the help of the indigenous peoples of the area, the Tupi tribe and the enslaved Africans. 

Can the crew and their allies defeat Spurt and Paz and save the Rebecca-Ann from the clutches of Spurt and Paz? 

And can they restore peace, harmony and order in the port of Belem?

This is a swashbuckling novel which deserves a place on the bookshelf of every fan of this type of salty seagoing novel.

It's published by The  Bookguild at £8.99.

Burning Secret

Burning Secret is an exciting novel by R J Lloyd that is based on the extraordinary true life story of one of his ancestors.

R J Lloyd was working hard to trace his family tree. he had managed to trace it back to the 16th century. But he was unable to find any trace of his great-great-grandfather Enoch Thomas Price. It seemed that he had vanished without trace.

So, what had happed to him? After many years of false starts and dead ends a cousin called him with some exciting news. His cousin had found evidence of what had happened to Enoch Thomas Price all those years ago. 

A Californian called Susan Sperry had recently taken her retirement and finally had the time to search through a box of documents that her mother had given her three decades previously.

Susan Sperry found references to her great grandfather, Harry Mason, a wealthy hotelier from Florida who had died in 1919. What possible link could there be between poverty-stricken Enoch Thomas Price and wealthy hotelier Harry Mason? It transpired that they were the same person!

The story that writer R J Lloyd uncovered was one of poverty, violence, betrayal and triumph. And he has used his skills as an author to fill in the blanks.

It's 1844 and Enoch Price was born into grinding poverty. However, Price was an ambitious young man and he travelled to London to seek his fortune as a bareknuckle fighter. However, bareknuckle fighting was a murky world operating at the edges and often beyond of lawful society and soon Price finds himself in the clutches of an unscrupulous illegal moneylender well-known for his use of violence. 

He is, by now, a married man with three daughters and he is facing ruin and imprisonment. He decides to flee England for Jacksonville, Florida. The decision to abandon his wife and three little girls reportedly haunted him for the rest of his life.

By the time he arrived in Florida, Enoch Price is no more, replaced by Harry Mason.

By a series of adventurers in his new country, Harry Mason plays a vital role in the development of the growing city of Jacksonville, all through a variety of schemes and risk-filled enterprises. 

However, he is wracked with guilt over the callous way he abandoned his wife and three daughters and he makes contact with his wife, pleading with her to join him in Florida. However, she feels she cannot trust him and declines his offer.

Mason weds again, though bigamously, and he fights to keep his true identity a secret. However, his public life is one of significance and success and he achieves political prominence, becoming a member of the Florida State House of Representatives in 1903.

His business enterprises he boosts via a range of practices, not all of them honest and there is talk of him becoming the Governor of Florida. However, what good is it if a man gains success in his business life if his personal life is filled with bitter self-recrimination? 

He planned to return home to England and face the music but the intervention of the Great War and the subsequent virulent Spanish Flu put paid to his plans.

It's a well-written, poignant story of how one decision can change the outcomes of the lives of many.

It's published by Troubador at £10.99.

From Wolf to Supermutt

From Wolf to Supermutt and everything in Between is a book by canine behaviourist Erika K Goshi.

Erika adopted a dog called Mila and, perhaps naively, believed that because Mila was a mature dog and not a puppy that she wouldn't really have to do very much with regards to training Milla. Oh, how wrong she was!

She quickly learned that Mila had a passion for chewing expensive Persian rugs. And decided to annex the living room for use as her personal canine toilet area.

When someone asked her to do anything, sit, come, stay, etc, Mila wouldn't comply. Instead she would greet each command by hurling herself onto her back in a submissive pose and decline all requests to even consider moving.

Loud noises, such as thunderstorms and firework displays would send her into a total panic and she would run around manically. 

And even the merest sight of another dog caused a very extreme reaction.

Erika had to learn about canine behaviour in order to try to work out how she could help her rescue dog. In fact she got s deeply interested in the field of canine behaviour that she eventually qualified as a canine behaviourist herself.

In her comprehensive and information packed book readers will learn about how to deal with pee and poo, how to deal with smelly dogs, the chewing of carpets, house soiling, how to cope with demodex mites and your canine companion.

There's canine obedience, training and the like. Play and even the unwillingness to play, how to choose the right breed for you, the right types of food to buy, special diets that might be required, healthcare for canines and so much more are crammed into this 482 page book.

It's an excellent book and is well worth buying, especially if you or someone you know has a rescue dog. It is published by Matador at £13.99.

However, a puzzling omission is that there are no illustrations at all, no line drawings or photographs. 

Jubilee Book Sale

Books are for sale from 70p in a special Jubilee Sale.

To celebrate the Queen’s Jubilee, online book retailer www.Books2Door.com is having a ‘regally brilliant’ sale with books from as little as 70p.

With books for all ages, this specially hand-picked collection features non-fiction and fictional books including titles about Her Majesty.

Book customers can also get your hands on some bargain books from only 70p across a wide range of interests and topics.

The Jubilee Bank Holiday Sale runs online at www.books2door.com from Monday 2nd June at 6.00am through to Sunday 5th June at 11.59pm.

The Calloway Sisters

The Calloway Sisters is a vibrant new work from published novelist and history buff K. A. Lalani.

Set during the affluent post-Edwardian period in the Australian city of Melbourne, the Calloway sisters are enjoying everything that life can offer them.

However, all is not as it seems an the past secrets, errors and indiscretions of the family member of their parents' generation have a harmful impact on their otherwise blissful lives.

But the world they know is soon to be damaged by the advent of a devastating war in Europe that soon sucks in countries of the far-flung British Empire as Britain itself becomes drawn into a conflict between nations on Continental Europe and further afield.

Agnes and Sarah become volunteer nurses and find themselves facing challenges that they and other medical staff were totally unprepared for.

Back at home in Melbourne those who remained find themselves compelled to face up to problems and sins of their own.

The story begins in 1913, the year before the Great War commenced and it grabs the reader by the hand and drags them quickly into a story of gossip, of blighted love and of deliberate, calculated humiliation.

But then the Great War came and with it destruction and death.

K. A. Lalani brings to life the period of the post-Edwardian era and the dreadful conflict that saw much sacrifice and bravery from many who were involved, but especially the Anzac troops and the nurses who accompanied them, the Anzac Girls.  

It's published by The Book Guild at £9.99. 

The Little Pen

In her latest book published author Wendy Williams brings her readers a new hero. In The Little Pen Wendy introduces us to a little pen.

He has had enough of residing at the bottom of a handbag. He wants to get out of the handbag and to see something of the world. 

But he is more than a little bit nervous. A bit too afraid to go on an adventure. But eventually the opportunity to escape his humdrum life arrives. And he bravely grasps hold of it.

What will happen next for the little pen? Will this be the beginning of a new, exciting life for him? 

What happens to him? Will he see the world? What will he write?

The story is very well written and sharply and colourfully illustrated by Elena Kochetova.

As a writer myself I guessed that Wendy's book might be based on a pen of her own and Wendy confirms that this is the case, it's based on her favourite pen which has travelled the world with her.

It's aimed at children between the ages of three to five and their parents and grandparents, too.

It's published by Matador at £6.99.

Still Standing, the Flip Side of Denial, Depressional and forgiveness

Still Standing the Flip Side of Denial, Depressional and forgiveness is an autobiographical book by Mwangala Lethbridge. Zambian Mwangala had it all. She was an architect, a mother and had political aspirations.  

But a cruel and severe motorcycle accident put paid to all that in a blink of an eye. Family members gathered around her hospital bed in Lusaka and prayed to God to deliver her and sent out heartfelt pleas on social media channels being friends and other people she knew to donate blood in a desperate appeal to help her survive the night.

However, within five years Mwangala had earned an MBA from Manchester University, successfully completed the Virgin Money London Marathon and had instituted a programme to offer educational empowerment of girls in her home area of Zambia, through the auspices of the Mwangala Mwenda Foundation.

In her book Mwangala tells her story which commences with a tragic accident but then reaches a heart-warming conclusion which shows how, with the help and assistance of family members, friends and on some occasions, total strangers and medical professionals, specialists and the Lord, that a person can succeed against all odds.

It's an extremely well-written and very powerful book that will uplift and inspire the reader. Mwangala takes her reader from the depths of despair to the heights of accomplishment and self-realisation. 

It's published by Troubador in hardback at £12.99.