Joy Eramian

The Agha’s Children
(Nicosia)

The Agha’s Children traces the adventurous history of the Eramian dynasty in Cyprus over the last two hundred and fifty years.

Around the middle of the eighteenth century in the face of the Ottoman oppression of the Armenians, Stepan Eramian Agha bought land in Cyprus for his second son, Borghos-Berge, and sent him away from the family’s ancestral estate in Turkey. Although life was safer on the island, this, too, was a troubled land. The stories of the Agha’s descendants are tales of love and hatred, cruelty and compassion, murder, piracy, slavery, tragedies and triumphs. Through it all the family survived and prospered and the Agha’s decision to move his family to Cyprus secured the future of his line when so many perished in the genocide of the Armenians.

The accounts in this book of the lives of the Eramian family members are based on the memories and traditions of their descendants, many of whom live in Cyprus to this day.

Jackie Todd

Spanish Pointers
(Trafford Publishing) Now republished as Dog Days in Andalucia

When Jackie Todd and husband Stephen went to live in Spain they planned on having one Spanish Pointer and two tabbies. So how did it happen that they wound up with eight dogs, none of them Spanish Pointers?

All royalties from this book donated to The Costa Animal Society.

‘“Spanish Pointers” . . . the best book I have ever read.’ - Jackie’s Mum

Mary Earnshaw

A Wake of Vultures

Fossil-hunters, murder & mystery – a cracking combination

Set in a vast river valley in deepest Africa, this tale of rivalry, greed and death blends the classic, Agatha Christie-style brain teaser with the fun of an Indiana Jones movie.

It all begins with an innocent little walk in the park and now…

Professor Lizzie Lamb’s in big trouble. Last year she dug up the jawbone of a rare, ancient human in a remote African valley– now the vultures of the fossil-hunting world are flying in, desperate to find more. One of the first to arrive is murdered. Was the ancient jawbone behind the death? Was it a case of mistaken identity? Or was the dead man mixed up in something altogether more disturbing – and dangerous?

The murder is just the beginning. As a wave of crime threatens to engulf the isolated valley, Lizzie is determined to stop it in its tracks. 

Set against a vividly painted African landscape, with walk on parts for the wildlife, this is more than just a murder mystery, it’s an armchair safari.

Paperback: www.cosiandveyn.co.uk

E-book: www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B00770P5PG

This book is inspired by Mary’s experiences (excluding murder!) in Zambia with her husband, archaeologist Professor Larry Barham of Liverpool University. Quarter of the profits from this book will go to Liverpool University’s Africa Endowment Fund www.liv.ac.uk/giving/africa/  

Robert Turner

Kishkinda – Adventures in The East
(Reverb)

In June 1991 Robert Turner arrived at the ruined South Indian city of Vijayanagar, which lies in a bend of the Pampa river known as Kishkinda, the mythical Kingdom of the Monkeys and Bears from the epic love story of the Ramayana. His visa had expired, he had very little money and good reason not return to the UK. He ended up staying for four years.

Robert has superbly documented the landscape, history, myths and people he encountered there, from the local Raja and a mad sadhu to a vengeful hunchback and a capable country harlot. Interspersed with the tales of Kishkinda is the astonishing story of how Bob came to be in India in the first place after a colonial childhood that led to a youth detention centre, a three-year sentence in a Lebanese jail and many other adventures besides, across Britain, Pakistan, China and elsewhere.

Intriguing, compelling, surprising – you will not read another travel autobiography like it. In Robert’s own words: To err is human – and to get away with it is fun!

Victoria Kingston & Hilary Johnson

Hounds At Home

This book describes what it’s like to live with greyhounds at home. When a greyhound leaves the caring, even magical kennels at Hersham, they embark on an adventure that is exciting, loving – and sometimes terrifying. But it’s also an adventure for the humans.

Between them, the authors have adopted about a dozen greyhounds and cared for many more. In this diverse collection of stories, they depict the highs and lows, ups and downs, joys and sorrows – of adopting a hound needing a home, a creature with an unlimited capacity to express love, to live in the present and forgive the past. 

Perhaps this volume will inspire readers to adopt a greyhound – or remember exactly why they did.

A.W. Stewart

Rooktime

(Author House)

It is an ordinary summer's day when Mark and Laura Murray set off for a picnic. To their astonishment, as they ride round a familiar corner theyfind their way blocked by a high hedge. Abandoning their bikes, they push through the tangle of spiky twigs and find themselves sanding at the edge of a vast lake.

Although they do not know it, they are in Rookland, kingdom of the Silver Crest, Lord of the Birdmen: creatures with the bodies of men and the heads and talons of giant birds. Two of Silver Crest's servants are at this mpment rowing across the lake to capture the brother and sister to add them to the team of children already working as slaves in the pine forests of Rookland.

Will Mark and Laura be condemned to live for eve as prisoners of these vicious birdmen, with their terrifying eyes on the backs of their hands, and their malicious pets, the rook-spies? Rooktime tells of the many dangers they and their fellow slaves have to face, dangers that unite them all and reveal reserves of courage they never knew they possessed.

Wendy Hue

Tope Arrives

(AuthorHouse)

Topé is suddently orphaned and against his will he has to leave Nigeria. Worried about starting a new life in England, he feels he is an outsider in his new school. It is a time of tears and tussles. Will his nimble football skills and precious wooden boat some how help him to carve out a new beginning? Will he ever again be able to believe in himself and drum in with the dundun drums his renewed sense of fun and pride.

Longlisted for the Times/Chicken House Fiction Competition

James Morley

Olympic Nemesis

(Benham's Sea Mysteries)

Emily Simpson's Olympic dream is threatened by an internet gambling syndicate.

Emily and crewmates Chloe and Erin are selected to sail for Britain in games held in the mysterious South American country of Olifa. Emily's father, Steve, is sailing in the Patalympics. Speculation about a father/daughter double puts both under threat.

Emily's Danish mother, Kirsten, lives in the shadow of her family's wartime disgrace. Rumours circulating aboutEmily's ancestry bring her and her partner, Tom, in danger from a deluded stalker.

Also by Jim Morley: The Nemesis File, Rocastle's Vengeance, Magdalena's Redemption, Emily's Hour - to come: Flanagan's Legacy

Lisa Jane Weller

Amazing Gracie

            (Troll Boy Books)

LISA JANE WELLER 

Lisa Jane Weller was born in 1980 in Woolwich, London, but spent most of her childhood in Bexley, Kent. There she studied at Townley Grammar School for Girls and Orpington College of Further Education. English Language was her favourite subject at school, as it allowed her to indulge her growing passion for writing.

Lisa wrote her first short story at the age of eight and continued to write creatively throughout her time in education. Since then, she’s penned numerous short stories and screenplays of many different genres. Amazing Gracie is her first full-length novel.

When she’s not writing, Lisa enjoys reading, watching cult television shows, and cheering on her favourite football team, Blackburn Rovers. She is currently hard at work writing her second novel, an intriguing fantasy/horror/chick-lit hybrid.

Find out more about Lisa Jane Weller by visiting the Troll Boy Books website: www.trollboybooks.com

 AMAZING GRACIE

Dumped by her fiance, stuck in a dead end job, and living at home with her parents - things certainly look grim for twenty-four-year-old Gracie Parker. But when Gracie lands a personal assistant's position, working for heart-throb actor Roman Pearson, her life takes a sudden turn for the better. Under Roman's guidance, Gracie finds herself thrown into a world of glamour, excitement and fame - a world in which nothing is quite as it seems. For behind the scenes, Roman's life is a mess, and Gracie finds herself having to pick up the pieces alongside Roman's loyal aide, Billy. But as Gracie and Billy grow closer, a familiar face reappears on the scene. Suddenly, Gracie finds herself overwhelmed with choices to make about love and life...

John Ruttley

The Devil Finds Work

( Holroyd Publications)

John Ruttley has been writing for twelve years. He has had numerous magazine articles published, including commissioned pieces for local Antiquarian and History societies, self-published two local interest books, which are still selling well, and was runner-up in a BBC/Orange short story competition.

He has had a varied employment career - always useful to a writer - working in a warehouse, nightclub, the Merchant Navy, a foundry, shipyard, brewery and, for the last twenty-one years of his working life, insurance. He retired (very) early from the position of Area Manager in 2000.

He is currently putting the finishing touches to his second novel, Idle Hands, and has also started work on his third book, a detective thriller.

THE DEVIL FINDS WORK

This novel captures the atmosphere of the north's shipyards in the 1970s, the humour, resourcefulness and comradeship of the men, and their feelings of desperation and emasculation when they are unable to work.
Against a background of national industrial unrest, a small group of ordinary shipyard labourers fight a David and Goliath battle against organised crime as they fight to save their workplace from being taken over. They struggle to find enough money to survive during a series of unofficial strikes, which are endangering the yard's very survival. When they discover that an American crime syndicate is behind the yard's industrial disputes, proposed takeover and the death of a workmate, things really start to move.

Unfinished Journey

Dorys Lemus Valiente

Political upheaval, kidnappings, and expulsions provided the pattern of social conflict of the 1970s-80s, convulsing the smallest country of Central America, San Salvador, and pushing Dorys and her family across the Atlantic Ocean. Her book tells the story as she moves from the stability of her protected middle-class childhood to becoming a sympathiser of outspoken critics of the government, demanding civil rights and social justice. Right-wing death squads began to assassinate anyone who was perceived as a threat to established interests, so she came to London in 1971 and since then has travelled back and forward to her country, since then. Her story is one of strength and survival, a tale of the English and Salvadorian ways of living - from the time she came to London for the first time to facing the decision to stay put for ever. Here is a host of insightful material on San Salvador - its legends, local customs, and manners, handled with firsthand knowledge, widely open eyes, humour, and a good deal of passion, as well as a story of personal tragedy.