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 DRACA: IN SUPPORT OF COMBAT STRESS



 CHALFONT ST GILES AND JORDANS LITERARY FESTIVAL



 SATURDAY 15TH MAY, 5PM, ONLINE


As you know, Draca was due to launch last year at the Chalfont St Giles &amp; Jordans Literary Festival until covid forced its cancellation. This year the organisers have invited me back to talk about Draca, the story behind the book, and my partnership with the veterans’ mental health charity Combat Stress. 

With social distancing rules still in force, all the festival’s presentations this year will be online. The upside is that my talk will no longer be constrained by the capacity of the lovely 17th century Friends’ Meeting House in Jordans. The downside is that I will not be able to offer you hospitality afterwards. I would love to have been able to celebrate Draca’s success with the supporters who helped her to launch. 

The talk will last for about 40 minutes plus Q&amp;A, and is ticketed. If you would like to join me online please click <a href="https://www.chalfontstgilesliteraryfestival.org.uk/pages/2021-speakers-tickets">here </a>to buy a ticket (£5) or see the festival’s full programme. All my speaker fees go directly to Combat Stress. 


 HOW ARE WE DOING?


Many supporters have asked me how Draca is faring, and the short answer is that until I receive a royalty statement, I don’t know. November’s royalties, of which a little over £600 went to Combat Stress, only covered receipts preceding the launch. The lack of bookshops, libraries, and speaking engagements since then won’t have helped sales, but I can say is that Draca is collecting a gratifying number of brilliant reviews. In July and August last year Draca was also selected for the online book club The Pigeonhole, and I had the pleasure of seeing the overwhelmingly enthusiastic reactions of nearly 200 readers around the globe as they read and discussed each daily instalment. The Pigeonhole themselves commented ‘we love discovering gems like this’, and I honestly don’t know the club reader who said it was ‘the best book I’ve ever read’.


 NEW DIRECTIONS


Nearly a year on from launch, this may be my last update via Unbound. A similar note about the talk will go out to my mailing list in a couple of days. In that I'll also include a glimpse of a new and exciting direction for my writing. If you’re not already on my mailing list, and would like to hear about work in progress and future releases, do please sign up via my web site <a href="https://geoffreygudgion.com">here</a>. Scroll down and click 'subscribe'. There's a free collection of short stories to download by way of a welcome.

Once again many thanks for your support, and for helping me to bring Draca into being. I hope to ‘see’ you online on 15th May.

Geoff

A DATE FOR YOUR DIARIES

Dear Supporters,

Exciting news; I have been invited to speak about Draca at a literary festival in late May next year. The organisers tell me I shall be sharing the billing with a “household TV name”.

I'd like to factor this great opportunity into the launch plans for Draca, but the timescale is very tight for Unbound to have completed the editing, design, and pre-publication process in time. Unbound tell me that I must reach 100% in the next two weeks to be sure of having pre-release copies printed and ready for the literary festival. Draca would go on general release in June.

Your enthusiasm has already taken Draca to 89% of Unbound’s threshold for publication, so while we’re well on track I’m still about 60 books short with an unexpected but very welcome deadline, and I have a request. Can you recommend Draca to a friend? Perhaps buy an additional copy as a gift? Best of all, adopt Draca for a book club! With your help, and several other initiatives I am running in early September, this is achievable. It’s too good a chance to miss.

As a small ‘thank you’, I’ve prepared an ebook of five short stories. One of them is ‘Muse’, which many of you told me you loved when I released it to mark Draca reaching 50%. The rest will be new to you. All have a brief introduction to explain the creative thinking behind the story. Just email me at geoffreygudgion@icloud.com and let me know whether you would like the short stories in .mobi (Kindle) or .epub (Apple) or pdf format. Please also let me know if you’ve introduced a friend; I won’t necessarily make the connection as new names appear on the list of sponsors.

Thank you. I look forward to broadcasting the news of Draca passing 100% very soon!

Geoff

BIG NEWS, A SMALL REQUEST, AND MORE SHORT STORIES

Draca is becoming real. Each of you has helped to make this happen, so let me share a preview of the cover. I think it captures the mood of the book perfectly. Soon I'll be banging the drum in the usual author 'cover reveal' of pre-launch publicity, but you, my wonderful supporters, saw it first. Thank you.

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Draca Cover Preview

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Dear friends,

In a world where people are rightly concerned about their loved ones' health and about crashing economies, a mere book launch seems like a trivial issue. However you've helped me bring Draca this far so let me update you on unfolding plans.

There were to have been two 'launch' events; the Chalfont St Giles Literary Festival, and a celebratory gathering at Daunt Books' City bookshop on Cheapside. In the light of new government guidelines the Literary Festival has now been cancelled. I had already pulled out of the Daunt Books evening; even before the current restrictions, calling a City launch event during the probable peak of the pandemic felt a little like throwing a beach party after a tsunami alert.

Unbound have confirmed that the Draca's release will go ahead as planned on 14th May. You should have your copies a little before that. 

Timing, as they say, is everything, but the Pangolins' Revenge was something I couldn't plan for. Draca's launch will now be a 'virtual' affair, dependent on press releases, a blog tour, and those all-important early reviews. You each could play a part in that, and closer to the date I'll tell you how.

Let me finish with some good news. I sent early copies of Draca to some 'names' in the literary, military, and sailing worlds, and I'm glad to share some stunning feedback with you that will soon grace the book's cover:

From General Sir Nick Parker, Commander British Forces Afghanistan 2010: ‘A terrific and compelling story which highlights mental and physical challenges that many who have served will recognise.’

From Suzie Wilde, Author of the Book of Bera trilogy: ‘Tension release, tension release, fear, laughter, fear, lust, so you don’t notice the tightening of the noose … the story sucks you in and won’t let go.’

From Ewen Southby-Tailyour OBE, former Yachtsman of the Year: ‘A cracking, believable yarn made even more authentic by the wonderfully descriptive sailing scenes – and by falling in love with the true heroine, the Bristol Channel pilot cutter Draca.’

I'm hugely grateful to Ewen, Suzie, and Sir Nick for taking the time to read the book and comment so favourably, and particularly to one friend who made crucial introductions. Support like this will give Draca a very fair wind.

When the world is a safer, more predictable place I hope to organise an event for supporters. It won't have the immediacy of a 'launch' but it would be wonderful to raise a celebratory glass with those who have made Draca reality.

In the mean time, say well.

Geoff

Draca will now have a 'virtual' launch

<img alt class="doksoft_image_img" src="https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0728/3615/3620/files/DSC01579__281_29.jpg?v=1690913293" width="375" height="500">There's a dragon in Draca; a restored figurehead with a dark history. The Vikings who carved and venerated that fearsome eye would have celebrated not Christmas but Yule, the midwinter solstice and the birth of the new year, so Happy Yule, God Jul. Or, as it may have been in Old Norse, Gleðileg jól.

It's a long wait, isn't it?

3 months since Draca reached 100% funding, with your help.

Over a month since I finished the 'structural edit'. That's normally the hard one, when an experienced, professional editor critiques everything from plot to characterisation to language and 'voice'. I'm delighted to say that Draca sailed through with only minor tweaks.

Three weeks since the copy edit was done. That's the detail, right down to punctuation.

The next stage is when I'm sent suggestions for cover design. The boat in the storm that I worked up on my laptop for fundraising is definitely capable of improvement. There'll also be some contractual stuff to go through for the rights to use the 'In Support of Combat Stress' motif within the front matter.

Then comes typesetting. After that Draca will be in the queue for launch resources. The current forecast is that you will have the book in your hands in mid May, although general release will probably be July. I'd love to accelerate that so we don't launch just as everyone is going on holiday. There will be a programme of promotional activities building up to the launch, and beyond, starting with a speaking slot at the Chalfont St Giles Literary Festival on 21st May. Details to follow, but I've managed to negotiate a small number of free seats for supporters.

So thanks for your patience. I'm so keen for Draca to be out there in the world, and I look forward to signing as many of your copies as possible at launch events. The next update will probably when I can share a preview of the cover.

In the mean time, thank you once again for your support. Between us, we're making this happen.

God Jul, Gleðileg jól, Happy Christmas.

Geoff

God Jul from the dragon

Draca is almost ready to go to print. This weekend will see the final approvals of front &amp; back covers. I've shared three 'cover quotes' with you already - General Sir Nick Parker, Suzie Wilde, and Ewen Southby-Tailyour - and I'm delighted to say that just in time to make the cover I had this from Sir Peter Wall, the President of Combat Stress:


 'A really cracking read about a soldier who attacks his battlefield demons through his passion for sailing - and sadly still needs help.’ 


Combat Stress will receive half the royalties from the book.

I have already seen the vinal version of the 'internals' including supporters' names Reading through those, I recognise many of you who have so generously made Draca reality, but there is a substantial number I don't know. I feel sad that I haven't been able to thank those supporters individually and personally. For excellent GDPR reasons Unbound is unable to share your details, but I'd like to invite you to join my mailing list so we can keep in touch.

If I have your email, I've sent you a link to download Corn Goddess, a volume of short stories that's free to supporters. If you haven't had the email, please subscribe via my web site at <a href="https://geoffreygudgion.com">https://geoffreygudgion.com</a> to receive your copy.

<img alt class="doksoft_image_img" src="https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0728/3615/3620/files/Corn_Goddess_cover.jpg?v=1690913297" width="375" height="500"> Think of it as an appetiser to whet your palate until Draca is released. Hopefully, in these times of lockdown, you'll find the stories diverting.

Stay well.


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Good news as Draca goes to print

Firstly, huge thanks to everyone who has helped DRACA start so well. Unbound say that projects that hit 30% in the first month tend to succeed; with your wonderful support DRACA is at 38% after two weeks. Please share, tweet, tell your friends, and let's keep the momentum going.

By way of thanks, let me offer you a preview. I've already posted an extract that introduces you to Jack, the flawed hero who is haunted by his past, or perhaps just haunted. But well over 1/3 of the book is written from the perspective of Georgina ("George") Fenton, a pint-sized, feisty, orphan-with-attitude who's made her own way from foster homes to be manager of the local boatyard.

Here she is at the funeral of Eddie Ahquist, Jack's sea-dog grandfather:

-----

George could learn a lot from watching people. At first, everyone looks the same. All in black, all with that funeral look as if they wore a passport photograph where their faces should be. She could make out the Ahlquist crowd, all hugs and kisses except Jack, and then there was an older man and two women who stood a bit apart, both more smartly dressed than the rest, and the only women in hats. A husband, wife and daughter, at a guess. The man was a short, lean, military type who stood very square. When people came up to the older woman, she offered her hand palm-down, fingers drooping, as if she expected them to go down on one knee and kiss it. No one stayed with them, and the three kept to themselves as if they knew it was pointless to try to talk. 

Jack moved between them and the rest, half-belonging to both groups, neither oil nor water, looking stressed. Like all the men he was sweating in his dark suit, with spots of damp staining his shirt across his chest. The younger woman must be his wife, so the military man and the Duchess were the in-laws, and the families didn't get on. 

Jack waved when he saw George. Nothing too enthusiastic, but enough for her to wander over and say hello. She was ready for the mother-in-law's fingers. If you slide your hand under that kind of regal greeting, then grip and twist, you can turn it into a proper handshake. The Duchess didn't like that. She didn't like George's looks, neither. The Duchess was tall enough for her eyes to be at the level of George's hair, and George saw her wince. So what? George liked orange. It's a strong colour, and it was only a streak. While Jack fumbled the introductions the woman's eyes dropped so she was looking down her nose at George's skirt, and her mouth pursed into a tight, wrinkly, cat's arse circle of disapproval. Maybe yellow was a bit bright for a funeral, but there wasn't much call for dark, smart stuff in a boatyard. At least George had put a decent jacket over it, and she bet the Duchess couldn't tell that the jacket came from a charity shop.

Jack's wife introduced herself as Charlotte. Very upmarket, with the sort of accent you hear in posh shops. Her handshake was straight, if a bit cool. She was tall, like her mother, and slender and attractive, unlike her mother. Her black, straw hat was broad-brimmed so she had to tilt her head on one side to whisper in George's ear.

"Thank God for some colour. I think old Eddie would have loved it."

George decided she was going to like Charlotte. She stayed near her as they were ushered inside.

 

Twenty minutes later George was, like, 'was that it?' A whole life, nearly eighty years, reduced to one reading, two hymns, a three minute drone from Rent-a-Priest, and a poem? 

Jack's father gave the reading, bellowing it out like a fire-and-brimstone preacher. Isaiah 61, the order of service said.  

'The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me, because the Lord has anointed me to bring good tidings to the poor;' he stared at a young woman in the front row, with two young children beside her. Another Ahlquist by the look of her, and the kind of blonde who's gone way too plump with motherhood. 'He has sent me to bind up the broken hearted...'  She didn't look very broken hearted. She had big, dark eyes, a snub nose, and puffy cheeks, like a seal pup with tits. Jack's father didn't strike George as no preacher, neither, but he turned that stare towards Jack as he finished, and thundered 'To proclaim the year of the Lord's favour, and the day of vengeance of our God; to comfort all who mourn.'

Meet George!

It's that time of year when we're all pestered by emails trying to sell us something.

Relax. 

This one just says 'Merry Christmas' and tells you that you've done something rather special. In helping me to launch Draca you've helped veterans whose wounds are more than physical. The first royalty payment, for a shade over £600, has gone to Combat Stress and, depending on sales, more will follow. Follow the link and you'll get a glimpse of the heroes we're supporting.

It has been a strange launch, without bookshops, or libraries, or events, so I've concentrated Draca's promotion on PR and online advertising rather than retail outlets. That has produced some good results and more than a few frustrations. For example Draca had a highly supportive review in Soldier Magazine, the premier periodical for the British Army and its veterans, which drove Amazon out of stock four times in October. Amazon, it appears, hold lean stocks and rely on publisher logistics to resupply 'just in time', which probably works well when the supply chain isn't crippled by covid.

The good news, with no 'buts', is that readers' responses have been great. As I write Draca's average score on Amazon is an unusually positive 4.5 / 5. No fewer than 74 of the 110 readers who left a rating gave it 5*. There are some lovely reviews <a href="https://www.amazon.co.uk/Draca-Geoffrey-Gudgion-ebook/product-reviews/B087CCVKLV/ref=cm_cr_dp_d_show_all_btm?ie=UTF8&amp;reviewerType=all_reviews">there</a>, if you want to look. Covid may have trimmed her sales (sails?) but in literary terms Draca is a success. If you haven't yet left a score, please do. It really helps build momentum.

So Merry Christmas. I hope you manage hugs with those you love, and stay safe until you reach the end of the queue for the jab.

And thank you.

Geoff

Merry Christmas - and thank you.

Happy New Year, everyone. Draca is about to move into the production phase, with a publication date of 14th May. I've just been sent the first draft cover, (great, but not yet ready to be shared,) so the pace is heating up.

My immediate challenge is to find a celebrity who'll read an advance copy of the book and provide a suitable endorsement to go on the cover. "Brilliant page-turner, great cause...thoroughly recommended..."  - that sort of thing. A celebrity, perhaps, who is supportive of veterans struggling with the aftermath of combat. So if anyone has a friend or contact who's a 'name', literary or otherwise, do please introduce us! Remember half the royalties go to Combat Stress.

You'll have seen an email from Unbound asking you to verify your names for the sponsors list, which closes at midnight on 27th January; this week is the last chance for any of our friends to put their names inside the book.

Finally, a date for your diaries. The first launch event will be in the lovely, 17th century Friends' Meeting House at Jordans, Buckinghamshire, as part of the Chalfont St Giles Literary Festival. I'll be talking at 4pm on 21st May, and have negotiated a limited number of free seats for supporters. Space will be limited, so I'll also be holding a launch event in central London in late May/early June. Details of both events to follow but I hope to be able to thank as many people as possible in person at one of those.

Exciting times!

Geoff

Psst! Know any good celebrities?

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You should have your copies of Draca by now. You've helped to bring her into being, and I hope you are pleased with the result. Even more, I hope you enjoy the story. There have been quite a few challenges in corona-stressed logistics, but in the few days since release book bloggers have posted some great reviews. Here's extracts from the first five:

...'I really struggled to put this down… a really great and interesting read' 
...'This book was amazing and I practically devoured it in a day.' 
...'A complex and pacy thriller that will keep you on the edge of your seat' 
...'I could talk about this book for ages. It is so nuanced and poignant – an excellent read.' 
...'Beautifully descriptive, full of tension but with an emotional heart. A stunning read.'


 But about those challenges...


To be honest there have been better book launches. No bookshops. No libraries. No launch parties. And, most significantly, no stock at Amazon.

What??

That's right. There is stock, lots, and it is a joy to see Draca in print. Unbound have done a fantastic production job. But Amazon are working to priorities more arcane than their algorithms and will not take the print copies into their system until early June.


 Time for some lateral thinking


Unbound has decided that Draca shouldn't be crippled by covid chaos in distribution. They are now selling Draca directly, and have slashed the price to just £7.99 including UK P&amp;P. That's quite an offer. Unstainable, in fact, so if you'd like another copy as a gift, I'd grab one while you can, <a href="https://unbound.com/books/draca/">here</a>.

I do hope you enjoy the book. If so, please leave a review or a star rating on Amazon, <a href="https://www.amazon.co.uk/Draca-Geoffrey-Gudgion-ebook/dp/B087CCVKLV/ref=cm_cr_arp_d_product_top?ie=UTF8">here</a>. It will really help when they have stock. Word of mouth will also be crucial if Draca is to be a success; think about book your clubs. I'm happy to have a Zoom chat, or even a 'live' gathering when we're allowed, if you are not too far away.

Meanwhile stay safe. And once again thank you for helping me to make Draca real.

She's sailing!

Like all writers, I’m often asked where I find the ideas for my books.

“Sainsbury’s,” I usually reply.

Others have a less flippant answer. I once heard an author quote Michelangelo; ‘I saw the angel in the marble and I carved until I set him free’. I snorted at his pretension, even though I had a sneaking admiration for anyone who can claim to see the finished work at the outset. I’d love to have an Epiphany where a complete novel bursts into my head. My stories have small beginnings. I pick at one idea, and in time may encounter another that multiplies the first; a kind of writerly serendipity. Sometimes I can’t even remember the sequence.

Unusually, I can remember the exact moment when Draca was born. A friend had asked me to crew for him in his sailing boat, and one evening we’d anchored in one of the great natural harbours that open into the English Channel. It was a wild, ethereal place, filled with the sunset screaming of gulls, and we sat in his cockpit, sipping whisky and telling stories with the comfortable ease of long friendship. The only sign of life was the squat tower of a Saxon church, far away over the water.

Around us the long summer evening faded from pink to peach to grey, and the ebbing tide exposed the bones of dead ships, poking through the mud. It was a twilight so atmospheric that it had to become the setting for a story, and the story would have to feature boats and people who lived at the sea’s edge.

I’ve learned that boats have characters. That may sound fanciful, but several more experienced sailors have told me that at first, a boat simply has characteristics, such as her best points of sailing, or the way she lifts and slews to a wave. In time, this basic understanding grows until you recognise her moods; the boat becomes a friend who talks to you, and her language is the feel of the tiller in your hand and the singing of the wind through her rigging. When the ship is sailing well, she feels happy, and when she’s shoulder-charging the waves into a storm, she can be belligerent. Treat her badly, and she can be as angry as a wronged lover. I sense that the older the boat, the more her idiosyncrasies, so why not have a boat as a character?

2 x 2 = 5. Multiplied ideas acquire a momentum. The next time we anchored, in an equally desolate place, I stared at the ribs of another rotted ship and wondered what human stories they could tell; heroism at Dunkirk or the Normandy beaches? Exotic trading voyages in the days of Empire? Those bones might lay on other bones, in ever deeper layers of history, back to a time even before that Saxon church was built. After all, Vikings raided this coast in the 9th Century, exploiting their sea power in their war against Alfred.

That took me off at a tangent. So much of plotting a novel is asking endless ‘what if’ questions. What if an artefact exposed by the mud could be evil? An object that has been central to atrocity, perhaps? People are rarely wholly good or wholly bad; most heroes are flawed, many villains have some redeeming aspect. Humanity implies imperfection. But an object? Britain's equivalent of a blood-soaked Aztec god?

I began to see my angel in the marble. Except that it was a gargoyle. Or a dragon. Very ugly. With a story to tell.

Draca.

The Angel in the Marble

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There’s a classic sailing boat at the heart of the plot of Draca. Those who know me well have asked how a landlubber like me could write the maritime passages. After all, ten years ago the only thing I could remember about sailing was a bushy-bearded instructor bellowing at me. I think he was saying “when you see the seagulls walking, it’s time to go about.”

Confession time. In a previous update I described how the idea for the book was born, anchored in a natural harbour on England’s South coast. The next time I sailed, with the same friend, the concepts for the book had formed to the point where we’d divert our course, on entering a harbour, to take a closer look at any classic sailing boats nearby. Old boats seem to have more personality, and I needed to find a type that was probably pre-war, and of a size that could just about be sailed single-handed if the skipper was fit and knew his stuff. Yet it was online research led me to Bristol Channel Pilot Cutters, the model for Draca. 


 Pilot Cutters – hard working, classic sailing boats


Pilot cutters were built to wait for ships to arrive off a port; pilots earned good money guiding vessels into harbour. With the pilot there’d be a mate, a seaman, and perhaps a boy. Cutters were robust enough to wait offshore in all weathers, perhaps for weeks. They had neither the belly of a fisherman nor the sleek lines of a racing yacht, but they needed speed. The first cutter to hail and offer their services would get the job. The cutter would follow the ship into harbour, recover their pilot, and go back to sea until the next ship. Sailing cutters fell out of use after telegraphy meant a ship could signal ahead. By then a steam powered launch could rendezvous faster, and against the wind.


 A Yachtsman’s Log


Then I discovered ‘A Yachtsman’s Log’, written by Frank Carr for a readership with salt water in their veins. It’s a fascinating insight into sailing his cutter, the Cariad, in a technologically simpler time. No radar, no echo sounders, not even simple mechanical tools like winches to hoist sails. It was a time when fog at sea meant true blindness, navigating by dead reckoning among the tides and rocks, with the unseen bells of buoys to guide you if you were lucky. There are passages that are quaint by today’s standards; picture four men, after a sailing trip, taking the cutter’s dinghy up the Thames to work in the City, all shielding their starched collars from the wilting spray with their bowler hats.

But one of those men also wrote about life-threatening crises at sea with self-deprecating charm. Frank Carr was very much a certain type of Englishman from that age of sea power and Empire.

So if anyone questions how a pilot cutter handles in a storm, I have it, chapter and verse. And if anyone says it’s impossible for a boat to even survive a particular situation, then I beg to differ. A plucky chap called Frank Carr left me his log. And he’s certainly not one to boast.


 Further reading


I cherish my well-thumbed copy of A Yachtsman’s Log by Frank G G Carr, published by Lovat Dickins and Thompson in 1935. The image above is of his boat the Cariad and is on the cover. The book is long out of print, but you can see the Cariad, now restored, at http://www.cariad.org

The original DRACA

<img alt class="doksoft_image_img" src="https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0728/3615/3620/files/WLAW.jpg?v=1690913309" width="500" height="498">WE’D LIKE A WORD is a podcast, not a socially-distanced tap on the shoulder as you break lockdown restrictions. A very good and very influential podcast at that; previous guests have included Anthony Horowitz and Graham Norton. Now the wonderful guys who run it have invited me to come on their show on Wed 17th June to talk about Draca. My fellow guest will be General Sir Peter Wall, a former Chief of the General Staff and now President of the veterans’ mental health charity Combat Stress. Combat Stress, you’ll remember, will receive half of Draca’s royalties.

Those who’ve already listened to WE’D LIKE A WORD know that its producers Paul Waters and Stevyn Colgan have a light, easy manner that makes for great listening. ‘Good craic’ as Paul’s fellow Irishmen would say. There’s no way of knowing which way Paul and Stevyn will steer the conversation but I’m sure it is going to be fun, and probably enlightening.

WE’D LIKE A WORD is available on iTunes, Spotify, Google Pods, Apple Music, and wherever good podcasts are hosted. They’re also to be found at Podcast Radio and on their website here: https://wedlikeaword.com


 A SMALL REQUEST


Draca has been sailing for four weeks now, and the early feedback is great. At the time of writing Draca is scoring 4.8 ex 5 on Amazon with reviews ranging from scholarly enthusiasm to the wild exuberance of one blogger who finished ‘You need to pick this one up. Draca will blow your mind. 5☆.’

Several of those reviews have come from supporters like you who pledged support and made this book happen. These early reviews are crucially important to building momentum. So if you’ve finished the book, and you haven’t yet left a review, do please leave a rating at Draca’s Amazon page <a href="https://www.amazon.co.uk/Draca-Geoffrey-Gudgion-ebook/product-reviews/B087CCVKLV/ref=cm_cr_dp_d_show_all_btm?ie=UTF8&amp;reviewerType=all_reviews">here</a>. Just click on 'Leave A Review' and scatter stardust. It doesn't have to be long.

Thank you!

I think a launch party is still way beyond the horizon but as lockdown starts to ease I hope you are emerging safe and well.

Geoff

"WE’D LIKE A WORD..."

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As anyone who has read Saxon’s Bane knows, I like to write stories where worlds collide. Not, I hasten to add, in the astronomical sense; I don’t write Science Fiction, but I do like the past to echo in the present. Even better, to play on it in a way that has the reader wondering if there is more in today’s world than can be explained by science.


 Weaving the past into the present


In a previous post I described how the initial idea for Draca came at anchor in a friend’s boat, watching the ebbing tide reveal the bones of dead ships. What else did the silt’s ancient layers conceal? After all, Guthrum’s Viking army wreaked bloody havoc in that very harbour during their war with Alfred. There’s a contemporary, 9th Century poem by Torbjøn Hornklov which evokes the moment when the dragon ships surged out of the mist:


 Ships came from east-way, 



 All eager for battle,



 With grim gaping heads



 And rich carved prows.



 They carried a host of warriors,



 With white shields



 And spears from the Westlands



 And Celt-wrought swords.



 The berserks were roaring



 (For this was their battle),



 The wolf-coated warriors howling,



 And the irons clattering.


But how might such a moment impact the present? Weaving history into a contemporary novel is tricky. In Saxon’s Bane I set whole chapters in the Saxon era. In Draca I took a more subtle approach, revealing the past through the contents of an old man’s bookshelf; his diaries, his obsessive research into his own Danish heritage, and his copies of the ancient sagas. If the tidal scour revealed a Viking artefact, he’d probably keep it. His diaries could reveal his mental disintegration, until he dies raving that he ‘tried to give it back’.


 The joys of research


Researching a book can be wonderfully diverting. It sucks time as you wade through bogs of facts. Whole days sink without trace. That old man dies in the first chapter and it’s his legacy that triggers events. Still, just populating his bookshelf mired me very happily in perhaps a month of reading ancient history. I could use almost none of it. All for a book set in the present day.

There are a few exceptions. A dictionary of Old Norse taught me obscure words that became chapter titles; (Chapter 1: Arfræningr, one stripped of his inheritance). Snorri Sturluson’s 13th Century Heimskringla taught me the lilt and vocabulary of Old Norse, even in translation. It taught me enough to ‘book-end’ chapters with short extracts from a Viking saga.

So readers of Draca will find slices of history framing a modern tale; slices that tighten the tension as the ancient and brutal past starts to resonate ever more loudly in the present. Next year, after publication, you’ll be able to tell me if it worked. For now, here’s how that back story begins.

Enjoy!


 
 From the saga of King Guthrum, c.875AD
 



 That winter King Guthrum laid down a mighty dragonhead ship for his son Jarl Harald, whom he loved and honoured most of all. Of oak did he build it, cut finely that it might bend with the sea, with benches of pine for twenty oars on the one hand and twenty on the other. The fittings were splendid, as befits a great jarl, and a richly carved strake rose to a wondrous dragonhead at the prow. As was the custom, this could be taken down, like the helm of a warrior, lest it offend the landvættir, the land spirits.



 Then Guthrum and Harald made sacrifice in this wise: Harald took a stallion that he loved, and calmed the beast, covering its eyes that it might not see whence the blow would come. Then they took their axes and struck; Harald between the stallion’s eyes, and Guthrum at its neck such that the sound of the blows was one, and none could tell who made the killing wound. So mightily did Guthrum wield his axe that the stallion’s head was wholly struck off, and the wise ones said that the fall of the blood was good, for the dragonhead tasted blood before ever a bowl was brought to its mouth.



 Then Harald knew that the gods would sail with them, and would find them even in the furthest reaches of the sea, for the dragonhead was truly consecrated to the Æsir.

When worlds collide

'A terrific and compelling story which highlights mental and physical challenges that many who have served will recognise.' General Sir Nick Parker, Commander British Forces Afghanistan 2010

'A cracking, believable yarn made even more authentic by the wonderfully descriptive sailing scenes – and by falling in love with the true heroine, the Bristol Channel pilot cutter Draca.' Ewen Southby-Tailyour OBE, Yachtsman of the Year 1982

‘Tension release, tension release, fear, laughter, fear, lust, so you don’t notice the tightening of the noose … the story sucks you in and won’t let go' Suzie Wilde, Author of Sea Paths and Obsidian

'A really cracking read about a soldier who attacks his battlefield demons through his passion for sailing - and sadly still needs help' Sir Peter Wall, President of Combat Stress

Jack’s father didn’t recognise him. Not at first.
Jack saw him coming, and waited at the hospice’s entrance. Harry Ahlquist strode tight-jawed through the car park, rolling his shoulders as he came as if bracing himself for a fight. The sun could have been in his eyes. It was warm on Jack's neck, warm enough for the sweat to stick his shirt to his back and to taint the porch with smells of tar and hot metal. And as Harry came closer he glared at his son in the what-are-you-looking-at way that he might out-stare a stranger.
He finally did a double-take and stopped.
"Good grief, what brings you here?" Harry's eyebrows folded until vertical, parallel creases appeared in his forehead above the bridge of his nose. The eyebrows were thicker than Jack remembered, still sandy despite the silver over the temples, and they bristled in the old danger signal.
Jack swallowed, dry-mouthed, ridiculously nervous like a boy caught playing truant. "Hello, Dad. Same as you, I expect."
They stared at each other. Neither tried to shake hands.
"How's Mum?"
"Well enough. She misses you. How long have you been back?"
"A while." As he knew. That was Harry's way of reminding Jack of his failings. Jack turned away and walked into the building, scanning the day room beyond the reception for his grandfather.
"You're limping."
"Fell out of a truck and broke my leg. It's mending." Jack kept it simple. At least he didn't need a stick anymore. They stood at the door to a room large enough to hold perhaps twenty ill-matched armchairs, some pushed back against the walls, others clustered around a blaring television. About half were occupied by sick, elderly people who looked as if they'd been waiting for something for so long that they'd forgotten what they were waiting for. French windows stood open to the garden, admitting hard sunlight and soft summer smells of cut grass and roses, a sweet layer over the undercurrents of floor polish and stale urine. A uniformed nurse near the door was putting a cup of tea beside a chair, her smile as shiny as the institutional china in her hand. Resilient. Caring but functional.
"Hi, Sandra."
Sandra looked up and her smile broadened, probably because she'd recognised someone she didn't have to watch die. Jack wondered how anyone had the emotional strength to do Sandra's job; palliative care, with success measured by the gentleness of inevitable death.
"Hey, Jack." She frowned past Jack at Harry, clearly wondering who he was.
"How's Grandpa, Sandra?"
She winced, and spoke softly. "Soon, now. Today's a good day, so far. We wheeled him into the garden." She lifted her chin towards the French windows. "He's talking ok."
Jack nodded, relieved. In the early days, there had been regular spaces in between doses of medication when they could talk, the calm between stupor and agony. Now his grandfather was on ad lib morphine, you had to be lucky. Even when he was lucid, he could be confused. Jack stepped out into the garden, leaving his father to fire questions at Sandra in brisk, Sergeant-Major tones.
Grandpa Eddie sat in a wheelchair on the lawn, face lifted to the sun, eyes shut, with an oxygen bottle for company. Lines trailed from his arm to a drip on a stand beside him. He'd lost so much weight that he'd shrunk within his clothes, and his neck stretched like a tortoise's through the gaping collar of his shirt. He had almost no hair left, just a few thin wisps of silver fluff, and no eyebrows, either. Once he'd had great bushy things, thicker even than Harry's, as if a pair of rodents had crawled onto his face and nested, but like the hair, they hadn't come back after the chemo. Jack pulled a chair over to sit beside him, on the side away from the sun, and squeezed his arm.
"Jack, my boy!" Eddie's voice was surprisingly strong. Not quite at the level where he used to bellow into a storm at sea, but still robust enough to belie the yellow skin. His eyes seemed to sparkle from deeper within their sockets, as if the man was shrinking inside himself. Broken veins on his face gave a bizarre parody of health, like an apple-cheeked skull.
"How are you, Grandpa?" Stupid bloody question. He was dying.
"There are good days, and there are bad days. The good days are when you come."
Good. He was making sense. Sometimes he and Jack could have a decent chat; sometimes Eddie would rave as if another person was locked in the same body, someone altogether nastier.
"Are you comfortable?" How the hell do you ask an old man if he can handle the pain? That's what the doctors had promised. 'We'll keep him comfortable for as long as we can.' 
Eddie didn't answer. For the first time Jack saw fear in his eyes.
"He's in the garden, now. He's coming for me, Jack."
"Who's in the garden, Grandpa?" Sometimes Jack had to humour him. The hospice lawn held nothing more threatening than figures slumped on benches.
"No. My garden." Eddie shook his head hard enough to shake the dangling tubes. "Harald's waiting at the cottage." Eddie pronounced the name in two, emphasised syllables in the Nordic way. Har-Rald. He groped at Jack's arm, staring at him again as if willing him to believe. Jack smiled in a way that he hoped was reassuring, and nodded past Eddie's shoulder to where his father was crossing the lawn. Sandra watched from the doorway.
"No, Grandpa, Harry's here." Eddie had always referred to his son as 'Harry' rather than 'your father', so Jack used the old man's language. "He's come to see you."
Disbelief, then horror, tightened his grandfather's face into a rictus of fear as Harry's shadow fell across them.
"How did he find me?" Eddie kept his eyes locked on Jack, but shook his head from side to side, denying Jack's words. "He's dead. Harald's dead." The grip on Jack's arm tightened as if Jack was a fixed point of safety in the middle of a nightmare, and beside them, Harry flinched as if he'd been struck on the face. Jack lifted Grandpa Eddie's hand and nodded towards his father.
"No, Grandpa. Look."
Eddie turned, lifting one hand to shield his eyes as he squinted into the sun. Tubes snagged against the oxygen bottle.
"Not here." Louder, now, almost shouting. "He's following me." Eddie tried to get up, lurching away from Harry so the drip almost fell and Jack had to catch him. Sandra began to walk towards them, frowning.
"Harald died on the beach. He's DEAD."
The shout turned heads all around the garden, and Sandra started to run. Harry squatted, dropping out of the sun's glare, and reached out a hand to touch the old man on the arm. "Pa, please." Eddie squirmed into Jack, whimpering, as Harry tried to turn him, and in a moment of sick pity Jack saw liquid dripping from his grandfather's seat. The tang of urine cut the scent of flowers.
"Pa, it's your son, Harry."
"Shot down like a dog." The shout became a scream. By the time Sandra eased Harry away, Eddie was gripping Jack's shoulder hard enough to hurt. It was incredible that someone so sick could have such strength.
"Don't let him take me, Jack." The scream disintegrated into a sob.
Sandra jerked her head towards the building. Time to go. Jack rose and slid his hand along his father's shoulders to turn him away. It was the nearest he'd ever come to giving him a hug.
"We'll try again tomorrow, Dad."
Harry shrugged the arm away, his face working.
Jack rang Charlotte afterwards to say he'd stay in Grandpa Eddie's cottage for the night. It was two and a half hours' drive home, and the end was close. His wife didn't sound too fussed. She might even have been relieved. She had a girlie night out planned, it seemed. Pals from the gym. Harry didn't offer a bed, and it didn't occur to Jack to ask, so he bought a cheap takeaway and a bottle of wine, and wandered through Eddie's cottage, wishing that his grandfather could drift away peacefully on a cloud of morphine. There was such fear in the old man's eyes, these days. It didn't seem to be fear of death itself, but as the cancer ate into his brain he'd started raving as if the Grim Reaper lurked in the shadows. Today, it had been Harry, his own son. Two days earlier, it was 'a Viking warrior in the trees'.
But then, Grandpa had always been obsessed with his Viking heritage. He was the kind of guy who taught himself Old Norse so that he could read the old sagas in their original form. The bookshelves in the cottage's front room were packed with volumes of Viking history. Some of them were antiques, printed in Old Norse with Danish translations. Some had paper bookmarks sticking upwards, each with some cryptic reference written in Grandpa's arthritic script.
Jack ran his finger along the books' spines, reading his grandfather's life in the shelves above the desk. A small photograph of his parents was wedged on a high shelf between almanacs and magazines, pushed almost end-on so the picture was partly obscured. A middle shelf held framed happy-snaps of Jack’s sister Tilly and her children. There was a larger one of Jack at his passing-out parade, his face tight with pride beneath the coveted Commando green beret and the globe-and-laurel badge of the Royal Marines. Dominating the bottom shelf, in between Sagas of the Norse Kings and the mighty Old Norse Dictionary and Grammar, was a big, framed photograph of Eddie's beloved sailing boat heeling under a press of sail, with a younger Grandpa at the tiller. The sails were traditional, red ochre canvas; Grandpa refused to ‘sully’ a hundred-year-old boat with modern polyester. There was no other crew in sight, although Draca wasn't a boat to sail single-handed. They were probably hidden behind the sails, but the photo made it look as if Grandpa was on his own, grinning, one leg braced against the lee side of the cockpit, in his element.
A brassbound clock, a barometer, and a compass ranged along the mantelpiece, beneath a framed Admiralty chart of local waters. In the recess on the other side of the fire, Eddie's magnificent, wooden model of a Viking longship sat on white-painted cupboards beneath more shelves of books. Grandpa had made that. He'd been quite a craftsman before his hands gave out. The smell of French cigarettes still lingered, a year after he'd finally kicked the habit.
Jack couldn't stay in the room, not that evening, not on his own. He felt too much of an intruder. He took his wine into the garden, where Grandpa had made a seat by burying an old, wooden dinghy stern-first in the ground so that the bows made a protective arch. It stood at the highest point of the garden, near the cottage, where there was a view through the tree tops to the water, and the bench he'd fixed to the thwart had been a perfect size, when Jack was younger, for an old man and a boy to sit side by side and tell stories. Since the previous winter, the boat seat had also been home to Draca's figurehead, a piece of ancient, carved timber that Grandpa had found poking through the mud below the cottage one morning, on a day when extreme low tide and a Northerly storm had combined to push the sea away from the land. Eddie had cut a slot for it at the end of the bench so it would sit upright and stare at the sea beside him.
Ugly great beast. 'My pet dragon', Grandpa called it. 'A piece of Draca to keep me company'. It was about four feet long, carved with a lattice of scales, and curved like a question mark or a bishop's crozier, except that the hook bending down over the shaft formed a snarling mouth that could have been any animal with a long neck and jaws. Once it had probably been much longer, but the neck ended in a scorched stump that he'd trimmed and squared so it could be fitted to Draca.
It had its own smell, that dragon. In still air it was strong enough to overlay the garden's pine resin and salt with something older; a charcoal and leather, old wood and male sweat kind of smell. Eddie had soaked it for months in the same stuff that they used to restore that Tudor ship, the Mary Rose; a polymer that drives out the salt water and hardens the timber. Somehow the carving still leaked scents trapped deep in its core. Jack had told Eddie it was probably a historical artefact, and that he should take it to a museum, but Eddie just laughed and said they were meant to be together; a Viking figurehead found by the descendant of Vikings.
Jack forced himself to remember the good times in this spot, not the ravings in the hospice; the stories, the shared confidences. He and Grandpa had come out here even in winter, lit a fire in a cast iron stove by the seat, and talked, staring at the flames. This place, this panorama across Freshwater Bay to Witt Point, then over the harbour to the hills rising beyond Furzey, had been part of Jack's childhood and youth. Him and Grandpa. Always, in the good memories, just him and Grandpa. Jack wedged himself into the corner by the carving, put his phone within reach, cradled his wine, and watched the long summer evening fade over the water. He and Grandpa's dragon would keep vigil together.
Jack woke with the kind of jolt that he'd have had if he'd let himself doze on patrol, resting up within an ambush position, and one of the sentries had woken him with a gentle touch and a wordless signal. Contact! For a moment he felt the adrenalin rush that comes before action, that familiar dry mouth in chill night air, but as his eyes probed the near-darkness he saw only the first stars over the harbour, and the outline of Witt Point like a dark mass low against the water. His tension faded into mild loneliness, remembering the names of the men he had thought were around him. Abbott, Wolfe, Collins...
But something had woken him, and he searched his memory for the sign. There'd been a noise, perhaps just the creak of the boat seat settling as the temperature dropped, and he stood, senses still tuned. Behind him, to the West, the sky was pale enough to outline the hills rising beyond the cottage. In front of him, the water shone faintly, showing the nearest islands dotting the harbour, patterns of darkness that merged into a black mass, like low cloud. A light mist forming over the water dissolved the shorelines in irregular patches. A stand of Scots Pines covered the slope from the garden down to the water, and if he held his line of sight high in the trees he could let his peripheral vision scan the space beneath them.
He knew those trees. There was no reason why they should suddenly seem threatening. Their trunks stood clear against the mist that weaved its greyness beyond, their outlines and spacing irregular, the way body of men might stand, watching, waiting. He began to understand why a deluded old man could think there was someone among them. A whole troop stood there, and any one of them could be a ghostly warrior. Two branches, lifting almost horizontally from a trunk, had been perfect for a childhood rope swing that took him far out and high where the land fell away. Look at me, Grandpa! Now they looked like two arms stretched in crucifixion.
But tonight there was movement between the trunks, a shadow among shadows. And again, between different trees. The shape was indistinct, and always at the edge of his sight, disappearing into the background dark when he looked directly at it. If he'd have been on patrol, Jack would have snapped on his night vision goggles and crouched into cover, weapon ready. As it was, he grabbed Grandpa's torch from kitchen and threw a searchlight beam down the slope.
Nothing. The glare panned through the trees, making shadows dance, until the beam was lost in a circle of opaque greyness above the beach. No people, no animals darting away, no eyes shining in the beam. Jack wondered whether to go down there. The torch was big enough to double as a club, if necessary, but he wasn't fully fit. Not yet. If he fell over a tree root he could set himself back weeks. He snapped off the torch and waited, listening to the whisper of branches in the wind. The tide must have been out. He could smell seaweed from the mudflats rather than the sharper salt of open water. He waited until his eyes readjusted to the dark, and when he still saw nothing, he turned to go inside. The day had been hot, but this early in the season the night was chill, and he was only wearing a light fleece and jeans. He'd sleep in his old bed, in the little room at the back of the cottage.
Getting to sleep was usually easy, with a little liquid help. It was staying asleep that was the problem.
One summer when Jack was a kid, the family stayed on a farm for their summer holidays, and the farmer set out a magpie trap in his yard. In the centre, in a little cage within a cage, was a live magpie. The 'call bird', the farmer said. He'd left it a dish of water and even a bit of dead pigeon to eat, but the thing flapped around making a lot of noise in that harsh, rattling way of magpies. As Jack and the farmer watched from inside his barn, three more magpies arrived and hopped down through the wire door to see what all the fuss was about. They went frantic when the farmer walked over and they couldn't get out, and he shot them, one by one, with a .22 rifle he kept for vermin.
The Islamists hadn't killed Jack outright because he was their call bird, but they'd used Corporal Collins for target practice. It was usually Collins that woke Jack in the black hour before dawn, and always with the same pleading look, that way he'd stared at Jack as if he could do something. Collins had come running back for him through the firefight in a mad, heroic, suicidal dash, and he was still coming back for him, pulling him out of the fug of sleep when the alcohol drained from Jack's system and all that was left was the sour taste of guilt. Sometimes, in those first moments of wakefulness, Jack could smell roasting meat. Then he'd have to walk outside and breathe clean air, whatever the hour, whatever the weather. He'd have run, if he could. Even in summer, the air just before dawn can be pure as snow.

Draca

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