JUST A SIMPLE COUNTRY BOY
A Novel
by
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Tom Stearsby sat on the edge of his prison cot with his fingers clasped loosely together between his denimed knees, staring at the narrow shaft of sunlight that had slipped through the bars of the high window of his cell and formed a yellow pool on the stone floor. It reminded him of the day he had sat beside Mary’s bed in the hospital Intensive Care Unit and watched her life slowly ebb away.
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About the Book
This is a fictional crime story interspersed with actual historical events and locations. All characters are fictitious except for one prominent industrialist and entrepreneur who lived in the northeast of England. His name and the name of his mansion has been changed. The existence of a great niece mentioned in this book is a figment of imagination.
About the Author
Specialist magazine editor 1998–2008. Writer of fiction and nonfiction and verse. Born of working-class parents in the South London borough of Dulwich, England, in 1930. Motherless at twenty months, lived with grandparents in deprived Thameside area of Bermondsey until four years of age, when father remarried. Evacuated to Folkestone, Kent, during the outbreak of the war in 1939, then to South Wales. Qualified for grammar school education 1941. Returned to London when father died in 1944. Left school in 1946, worked briefly in London City office until joining Thames pleasure paddle steamer as steward. Thereafter served on cargo freighters until 1950 when called up into Royal Air Force. Served twelve years as aircraft armaments fitter. On demob, joined the insurance industry until retirement in 1992. Postretirement, began horticultural business while writing as a hobby. Married for fifty-five years. Now widowed. Have four daughters and countless grandchildren and great-grandchildren. Now living in Hertfordshire, England.