Category Archives: fiction

fiction

Lillias
Joanne McShane

Lillias
Joanne McShane
Lillias Hepburn’s life spanned ninety-six years from 1817 until 1913. It was a full life with more than its fair share of ups and downs. But there is more to Lillias’s story than simply the details of her own life, for her very existence was due to a strange combination of events. The only clue to these events was contained in a preamble which her father, Robert Hepburn, wrote to his will.

The Preamble to the will of Captain Robert Hepburn RN (1782-1866)
This is the last Will and Testament of me Robert Hepburn of Roy’s Hill in the District of Fingal in Tasmania Esquire (Lineal descendant by my father Captain Hepburn of the family of Hepburn of Keith East Lothian Scotland, and by my mother Mary Ann Roy, great grandson of Rob Roy McGregor, and by my grandmother Isabella Princess of Diabenti, daughter of the King of the Koromantic Nation of the Gold Coast of Africa I am Prince of Diabenti Lineal descendant of the King of that nation in Africa.)
Published: Sept 2020
Paperback: 240 pages
Price: £9.99
ISBN: 9-781913-425456

UK Only
£9.99 (+ £2.50 postage)
Number of copies:

Available on Amazon

For Australia and USA, order from Amazon.com
For the historical details of Lillias’s life and the lives of the other people featured in the story I have used information available online and in historical documents. The rest is conjecture. It is a story, not a historical document.

Books by Joanne McShane...

 Honora and Arthur - the Last Plantagenets

Mistress Whiddon

Lillias

Adela Basset

Miss Jane

Reviews...

 Eve Schumann
I want to thank Joanne McShane for this beautifully written escape into another era. A breath of fresh air from our current pandemic reality. This book was masterfully written and researched. The author's talent proved itself by the hold and engagement it took of my mind, while making me feel as if I were right there, witnessing the story and experiencing the events. Wonderful way to hit the pause button in this nutty reality we're all sharing. Thank you, beautiful Joanne. You're a true gift.

Cynthia Brock
Loved the book. Humanity depicted as it should be lived. All its diamonds and warts on show. Power, fear, compassion and abiding love and trust. Wonderful research and engaging writing. Thank you, Joanne.

Reviewed on Amazon Australia on 23 November 2020
I found this historical novel very difficult to put down, I became totally engrossed with the lives of our family ancestors. Joanne McShane’s research has once again produced amazing results, and her interpretation of the day to day lives of all these characters, who together form our family tree, gives the reader a wonderful grasp of how their achievements and failures have influenced the lives their descendants.

★★★★★ Lidwina Taylor, 25 May 2021
Great read!
I really enjoyed reading “Lillias”. The characters were very real and engaging.
It gave such a vivid insight into the migration stories of people from Ireland, England, Africa, and Jamaica who ended up in Tasmania Australia.

★★★★★ EmJay, 24 May 2021
Loved the putting some flesh on the bones of my ancestral relations both Wood and McShane.
Thank you for your wonderful work

★★★★★ Jeannie, 10 June 2021
Wow, what a delight to read such an extraordinary history.

fiction

Knights of the Gold Cross
Jack Shortman

Knights of the Gold Cross
by Jack Shortman

 A Myth that was Lost for Centuries,
Searched for by Generations but never Discovered.

When the Earl of Halfreton finds that a priceless Gold Cross belonging to the family for generations has gone missing, he is set upon by thugs trying to steal the Cross. He calls his brother for help. When the British Secret Service and then the Israeli Secret Service become involved things start to look very serious.

A young woman, an Israeli agent, is abducted by MI5 because she posed a threat to the Earl. The two brothers sail to Malta in pursuit of answers. The story wheels to its conclusion in a scintillating, fast-moving whirl of activity.
Published: Jan 2021
Paperback: 101 pages
Price: £6.99
ISBN: 9-781913-425678

UK Only
£6.99 (+ £2.50 postage)
Number of copies:

Available on Amazon
Jack Shortman was born in 1937 in Shrewsbury, Shropshire. His mother died soon after his birth and he was brought up by his uncle and aunt.
At the age of fifteen he left school and took up an apprentice as a bricklayer, until the age of eighteen when he had to enlist as a National Serviceman.
He was posted to Carlisle in the Royal Armoured Corps and was then rebadged to the Royal Horse Guards. He went with his regiment to Cyprus from 1955 to his demob in 1957 and then moved to Oswestry, Shropshire, where he met and married his wife Mary. He worked for a short time on the local railways but in 1960 he re-enlisted with his old regiment and served for two years in Knightsbridge on Her Majesty's duties. He was posted to Windsor and then to Germany until 1966.
In 1969 the regiment amalgamated with the Royal Dragoons and Jack joined the Life Guards, the other household cavalry regiment. He served with them in Windsor and Germany until his final demob in 1978.
fiction

Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell
Eleanor Harriet Loxley

Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell
Post-War France: Two Familes, Two Secrets, One Tragedy

In 1950, when newly-married Nancy is taken to France by her husband Tom, they find themselves living next door to Monsieur and Madame Aubin, whom Tom knew during the War. Nancy is disconcerted to discover that the Aubins know far more about her new husband than Nancy does. She is homesick for England and after the birth of her first child the Aubins have to come to her aid. Tragedy stalks both families. Deep emotional scars inflicted during the war distort the two families’ responses to misfortune and loss - throughout their lives.
There seems to be light at the end of the tunnel when Nancy’s second daughter, Rosemary, sets out to unravel the mysteries surrounding her parents and the mysterious Aubins. Nothing is certain and the result is unpredictable.
Published: Dec 2020
Paperback: 260 pages
Price: £9.99
ISBN: 9-781913-425524

UK Only
£9.99 (+ £2.50 postage)
Number of copies:

Available on Amazon
Eleanor appeared in Essex, trained as a nurse in Surrey, read Psychology at Bedford College at London University and became a Clinical Psychologist in Birmingham. At some point she acquired a PhD in English Literature. She works part time, writes part time and gardens with gusto. She lives in Shropshire with several Siamese cats. She does not live with her partner because he has the house next door.
fiction

Secrets from the Red Phone Box
Philomena Plunkett

Have you ever had unfettered access to people’s private conversations and lives!!
Here is your chance to enjoy fun and light-hearted good humour.
After years of listening to private unedited conversations from people from all walks of life the ‘Spirit’ of the Red Phone Box has a kaleidoscope of stories to tell. It has provided a red cloak of privacy, a safe space for humans to come and communicate with others, often letting their guard down and revealing a bit extra in the privacy of the Red Phone Box. My motto was always “what is said in my box stays in my box” That was up until 2020.
Finally with no holding back the Red Phone Box is spilling the beans to allow you into its world and the private world of its customers over the years.
The stories from telephone conversations that I was given unrestricted access to are amusing, happy, sad, and full of hope.
If you think the level of intrigue is reduced when I am reincarnated as a library, think again.
Published: Dec 2020
Paperback: 67 pages
Price: £5.99
ISBN: 9-781913-425586

UK Only
£5.99 (+ £2.50 postage)
Number of copies:

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The library lends itself to a shadier side of the human nature, when we think no one is observing we can truly be ourselves and misbehave a little.

Philomena Plunkett was born and brought up in Dublin before embarking on the wider adventures of life. She took a psychology degree at Liverpool University and has roamed the world finally settling in England. She is a practicing psychotherapist, keen photographer, and avid observer of life.
fiction

The Lands of de Gressier – Book 1 of the de Gressier Quartet
C. S. Bunker

The Lands of de Gressier
Book 1 of the de Gressier Quartet

When Penrose Dovingdon, a wealthy young officer, and his sister Juliette, a nurse and former debutante, arrive in France at the start of World War I, they have no idea that a notorious national scandal will drive their family apart.
The demands of war-torn France are a long way from high-society London, but brother and sister learn fast. World War 1 creates a series of moral and ethical dilemmas which they must navigate, as must the family of Étienne Guégan, Juliette’s future husband.
Should one man be shot to save one million? Can corruption be justied when it is for a good cause? Should you forsake marrying the man you love in order to protect your brother’s life? Should the law be broken to keep the family business alive and their community in jobs? Is there ever a good reason to become best friends with your husband’s mistress?
Published: January 2021
Paperback: 520 pages
Price: £15.99
ISBN: 9-781913-425326

UK Only
£15.99 (+ £3 postage)
Number of copies:

Available on Amazon

For Australia and USA, please order from Amazon.com
Set against the battlefields of the western front and the vineyards of Bordeaux, this is a story of love, passion, betrayal, human resilience and endeavour as those involved struggle to come to terms with the hurt caused by events outside their control.

C.S. Bunker is a former international corporate financier. Using over thirty years of business experience and a lifelong interest in history and politics, Bunker started to write because he had a series of truth-based stories he wanted to tell. Inspired by three very personal songs and places he knew, his first four interconnected books took over twelve years to plan and research, followed by seven years of dedicated crafting and writing. He lives in England.

fiction, YouCaxton

The Vines of de Gressier – Book 2 of the de Gressier Quartet
C. S. Bunker

The Vines of de Gressier
Book 2 of the de Gressier Quartet

When the German army occupies Bordeaux in August 1940, the lives of Juliette Guégan, David Daunier and Dominique Hilaire are again thrown into flux; but it is the arrival at Château de Gressier of Leutnant Heinrik Klugman, a pilot in the Luftwaffe, which twists the kaleidoscope of their lives and sends them in different directions.

Once again, war creates a series of moral and ethical dilemmas to be navigated. Should you put the lives of your family at risk to work with the Resistance? Should you find comfort in the arms of your best friend’s son? How do you fight collaboration and corruption when it pervades the reputation of the very institution you have sworn to uphold? Should there be a penalty for going to the bed of your family’s enemy? Should love deny differences in age and race?
Published: March 2021
Paperback: 406 pages
Price: £15.99
ISBN: 9-781913-425821


Available on Amazon

For Australia and USA, please order from Amazon.com
Set against the vineyards of Bordeaux and South Africa, and the battlefields of the Eastern Front, The Vines of de Gressier continues as a story of love, betrayal, corruption and, above all, human resilience.

With much-loved characters from The Lands of de Gressier, C.S. Bunker has written another well-researched page-turner, with clever plots and sub-plots, all interwoven with people and events of history. Another must-read!

fiction, Front Page

The Soul of de Gressier – Book 3 of the de Gressier Quartet
C. S. Bunker

The Soul of de Gressier
Book 3 of the de Gressier Quartet

Henry Bellanger, the heir apparent to the de Gressier vineyards in Bordeaux, was born with a silver spoon in his mouth, and a secret.
David Daunier, a fugitive from British ‘justice’ and the owner of a successful vineyard in the winelands of South Africa, lives under the tyranny of apartheid and has a secret.
Sophie Elleswell, a young German ‘million-dollar’ supermodel, unwittingly carries deep within her psyche, her mother’s secret.
Set against the backdrops of vineyards and wineries, the dealings of the drug and wine trades, and the intrigues of the City of London, the happenchance of life brings the Bellanger, Daunier and Elleswell families happily together until crime and corruption involve them in events beyond their control.
Using his style of short chapters, intermingling plots and sub-plots, and strong and engaging characters, C.S. Bunker has created another gripping page-turner of love, passion, dishonesty, betrayal, tragedy and this time, revenge!
Published: Sept 2021
Paperback: 591 pages
Price: £15.99
ISBN: 978-1-914424-22-9

Available on Amazon
C.S. Bunker is a former international corporate financier. Using over thirty years of business experience and a lifelong interest in history and politics, Bunker started to write because he had a series of truth-based stories he wanted to tell. Inspired by three very personal songs and places he knew, his first four interconnected books took over twelve years to plan and research, followed by seven years of dedicated crafting and writing.

fiction, Front Page

The Watches of de Gressier – Book 4 of the de Gressier Quartet
C. S. Bunker

The Watches of de Gressier
Book 4 of the de Gressier Quartet

When Henry Guégan arrives in Moldova to help privatise its wine industry, he has no idea how dramatically his life is going to change. The country is coming out from under the yoke of communism and is in the vice-like grip of the mafia, gangsters and political corruption.
Falling in love with Tania Plesca, and with the vineyards of Moldova capturing his heart, Henry is driven by ambition. He becomes deeply involved in the moral and ethical dilemmas facing the country, but with devastating effect on him and all those around.
Running for his life, Henry leaves Moldova with the answer to the question that had plagued him since childhood, and with a secret; both are later uncovered by his sons and revealed to the world in a public and climactic ending.
In this fourth book of the de Gressier quartet, C.S. Bunker has produced another utterly engrossing, well-researched, modern historical novel. A fast-moving story, full of excitement, drama, crime, tragedy and love, but above all, with bravery at its heart.
Published: Oct 2021
Paperback: 395 pages
Price: £15.99
ISBN: 978-1-914424-26-7

Available on Amazon
C.S. Bunker is a former international corporate financier. Using over thirty years of business experience and a lifelong interest in history and politics, Bunker started to write because he had a series of truth-based stories he wanted to tell. Inspired by three very personal songs and places he knew, his first four interconnected books took over twelve years to plan and research, followed by seven years of dedicated crafting and writing.