Denise Cory Blake – författare

Russia.with its wild untamed lands of vast open Steppes, of marshlands, of rivers, of unfathomable people, some as wild as their country, yet with a culture of religion, of art, of buildings of great beauty. Into this forbidding landscape came the French with all their arrogant innocence, proclaiming a victory they had yet to win.Amongst them Guy De Tournet, Captain of cavalry, who kept silent vigil over his own thoughts. It would take more than defiant words to win this war. It would take men, blood and guts. His and that of other valiant Frenchmen; the cannon fodder. The year was 1812, the antagonists Bonaparte, who fashioned himself like a Roman Emperor, and Alexander I , the suspicious autocratic Tsar of all Russia.

The passing of time can be as meaningful, or as meaning less as a glimmer of water, or as painful as a SHARD OF GLASS. No matter what period it illuminates, and briefly washes over, in its haste to tell yet another story, as timeless as history itself, it casts its magic. Such is the story of Zac Guthrie, an Anglo- American youngster, afflicted by both phenomena. Is it a gift or a curse he possesses, which sends him off into the realms of the past? It goes where it wills, with him enchained. Go with him. Don't try to understand the logic, for there is none. It is as it is.

There was to be no public display of emotion at the train station. The Wharton brothers, Joe, Harry, and Ernie, strode off to war, grins etched on their faces. Out -of-step strides carried them through the cheers that echoed by. Joe, the eldest of the brothers, his eyes never still, searched the crowd desperately for a glimpse of his girl Dulcie, where was she? whilst his mind replayed the sombre farewell scenes of home. The disconsolate look on his father's face, his mother's courage as she fought the tears, the urgent hugs from his sister Cissy. The thuds of their regimented strides resounded eerily through the streets, swallowed up by the crowds, as the three marched of to war, and into history.

A Family affair, could just be a play on words. About an affair? About a family?In this case, about both. Which takes precedence? The family or the affair?In this, sometimes whimsical, humorous, poignant, heart- felt story, it can be said, to be all this, and more. Many diverse, vibrant, true to life plethora of characters, paragraphs of people, tread these corridors of words, which lead where? To Life, to love, to hope . To dead-ends? Filling the pages with expectancy, desire, it tells the story primarily of a young man, Liam, and his love for Paula. She, however, is not all she would seem to be. There are many layers to her personality, and she has many men in her life. Not least being, Alistair McKendrick, Liam s father. What did Liam or his father mean to her? You will have to read the book to find out. Who would she choose? Did she want or need to?Not just a love story, far more than that! For running throughout its pages, is entwined, another, which recounts that of an ageing adventurer, Hector Carruthers, a reluctant thrill seeker, told through his journals, left to his wife Geraldine. She, never interested in his exploits, left them to gather dust, until Liam s arrival in her life, when they were resurrected, dusted down, and devoured with interest by him. Hector s story is intermingled with that of the other. Yet another layer, of the story s intricate web, to catch the imagination of the reader.

Sailor, Sailor tells the story of Syd Williams, an ex-submariner in the thirties and forties, vow to his even younger wife Connie. Their love story, their lives, their tragedy and their mishaps, their survival through desperately hard times. With many other characters intermingled throughout its pages, Reg, Syd's elder brother takes prominence, as we follow his story, as much as Syd's, & that of Stephen, Reg's son, trying to unravel the mystery of his father's past. A father who sustained a life changing injury at the evacuation of Dunkirk, having to live with that, & its devastating consequences.