A bit about my book, Smugglers at Whistling Sands

I said in my last blog I'd give people a bit more of an insight into my children's adventure novel, Smugglers at Whistling Sands, based at Abersoch, North Wales.

Actually, looking back through my earlier blogs, I did talk about it a bit in my entry on August 20th, that said, it's probably well worth offering a reminder, especially for those of you who have only recently discovered my blog.

As I mentioned just over a month ago, Abersoch and the surrounding area is in my blood - I love the place and have been going there on holiday all my life - ie. for 44 years! So when I decided to write a children's adventure novel, the part of the world which has such fond memories for me seemed the obvious location.

The title makes no reference to Abersoch, but refers to Whistling Sands as in "Smugglers At Whistling Sands". As you'll gather from that, this beach does feature prominently in the book, and the sand on that beach does whistle by the way. Well, not whistle exactly, it's more of a squeak - but in all the beaches I've ever walked on, I've known any other sand to make that noise as you walk across it.

The youngsters who feature in this book are on holiday at Abersoch but they do not just stay put there. Their adventure takes them to a number of places including Whistling Sands obviously but also the St Tudwal's Islands, Aberdaron and Porth Ysgo - a remote beach nearby, and the hillside above - and the disused manganese mine to be found there.

The owners of the Vaynol Arms public house in Abersoch might be pleased (I hope) to discover that their premises features in the novel. Oh and the grotty hotel where one of the smugglers stays is, I hasten to add, a figment of my imagination!

The action centres around the Johnson children, Jack, David and Emily (aged 12, 11 and 10 respectively) and a headstrong girl called Lou whom they meet on the beach. It is she who is the catalyst for these rather dull Johnson siblings to spread their wings a bit. And what better time to do that than when they should happen across the activities of smugglers!

As I said in August, there is quite a lot of realism in this story, for all the fact that it is a rather post-modern children's adventure owing some of its inspiration to Enid Blyton's novels which I enjoyed a great deal as a child.The activities of the smugglers are based on real life occurences and if you do a search on Google at the point when the children do their Google search, you might well come across references to real-life smuggling which was in part the raw material for the book.

I could say more, but Downton Abbey is about to start. (Martin in Canada, you may not know what I mean by that but all UK residents will!)

PS: Sales update: four sales over the weekend takes tally to 43 - will I make the big 50 by next Sunday? If I do, as I said before, I guarantee to write a sequel.