Jim Hawkins vowed he would never return to Treasure Island. And he never did.

Instead of the treasure and adventure that Jim had dreamt of, he witnessed murder and betrayal, and learnt the hard way that sometimes good men must deal with the devil. He also returned with one small lie on his conscience that has shaped his life ever since.

Four years later, determined to put his wealth to good use and old enough to make his own way in the world, Jim wants to travel to London and study medicine, following in the footsteps of his mentor Dr Livesey.

But fate and the press gang have other ideas. His reputation goes before him, thanks to the bragging memoir he wrote of the Treasure Island expedition. Jim’s past catches up with him, along with friends and enemies that he never knew he had, on board the most mysterious and terrible of all His Majesty’s ships of war: H.M.S. Barabbas.

The First Ted Gorse Adventure

“And then those unsympathetic eyes settled on Ted. The mouth quirked slightly in what might have been a small smile and she started to walk towards him. She walked right through a small family of dad, mum and small kid in pushchair, and neither she nor they seemed to notice.”

On Ted’s first day at work he sees an apparition in Salisbury’s Old George Mall. This is not a good start. The job is meant to keep him out of trouble …

His parents have left him in charge of home and the cat for a week. His brother has been catatonic in the hospice for the last four years and he has a final warning from the police hanging over his head. Ted just wants to keep his head down, get a girlfriend, be a good human being, and become a software millionaire, not necessarily in that order.

The Thief and the Witch, who wield forces that have shaped his life since before he was born, have other ideas. For them, Ted is the key to destroying the world, or to saving it.

Set in Salisbury, the Ted Gorse Adventures are for fans of contemporary fantasy from young adult onwards. The series continues with The Comeback of the King.

The Second Ted Gorse Adventure

“The King wants Ted Gorse.”

It is the week before Christmas, and Ted’s life is back on course after the events of the summer. Personal loss, the brief ability to command world-destroying magical powers, and a showdown with the mad magician who had shaped his life are behind him. And then the King appears in Salisbury.

Who is the King? No one seems to know, but he rules the city, and the city is happy to be ruled. Even Ted’s nearest and dearest are under his spell. It seems the only person able to disobey him is Ted himself.

The King wants Ted, and he doesn’t wish him well.

Set in Salisbury, the Ted Gorse Adventures are for fans of contemporary fantasy from young adult onwards. The series began with The Teen, The Witch & The Thief.

Extra feature: The Comeback of the King includes a free short story showing Ted’s first appearance in print.

Michael Gilmore, Captain of the HMSS Ark Royal is part of Earth’s first interstellar delegation to visit an alien planet. His passengers are an ill-tempered prince and an inscrutable quadruped alien. His First Officer is on the brink of mutiny, the ship’s A.I. seems to have turned renegade, and the neighbouring vessel harbours a genocidal maniac.

What should be a prestigious honour is turning into a treacherous journey whose true purpose has yet to be revealed by their mysterious alien hosts…

Lieutenant Joel Gilmore is part of a multi-species observation team on a hidden base in a distant solar system, when they find themselves under attack by the very aliens they were meant to be watching. Joel and his allies, the enigmatic Rusties, must explore the parameters of trust in a lethal confrontation with a deeply alien third species: one with a proven predilection for xenocide on a planetary scale. Meanwhile the humans and the Rusties rush to their rescue – but as it turns out, are they any better?

This book is for any author thinking of hiring a ghostwriter, and for any writer thinking of being hired as one. Ghostwriters, and the ghostwritten.

You don’t have to have fame or fortune to have an idea for a novel. You do need to know what to do next, and that is where most ideas sputter and die.

However, there is an army of writers out there who can help you turn that idea into reality. They are ghostwriters, and they underpin the publishing industry. There is absolutely no reason why you shouldn’t hire one yourself.

Authors will learn how novels are put together, and what they can or should expect of their writer. Writers will learn how to adjust their tried and tested skills to writing from inside the head of another person. From both points of view, this book goes through all the steps needed to ghostwrite a novel:

* Developing that initial idea into a plot that will make a gripping story.

* The common mistakes to avoid.

* The legal, financial and practical aspects to take care of.

Above all, this book shows how ghostwriter and ghostwritten can work together in a rewarding partnership to turn that initial idea into the dreamed-of reality – a novel.