I’ve recently reissued my first novel, To The Fair Land , with a new cover. Set in the eighteenth century during the Age of Sail, it tells the story of struggling writer Ben Dearlove’s quest to discover the anonymous author of a best-selling book about a fictitious voyage to the South Seas. Far from engaging in a genteel literary pursuit, Ben finds himself up against some ruthless people who will lie, steal and even kill to stop him.   The new cover of To The Fair Land Both the British Royal and merchant navies were all-male preserves. However, female sailors were not unknown in the Age of Sail. Wives accompanied their husbands in Nelson’s warships. They helped to tend the sick, and during battles carried powder to the guns or looked after the wounded. Officially, though, they were not part of the ship’s muster, and so they were not paid or provisioned. Some women didn’t travel as wives. There are many stirring tales of women who disguised themselves as men in order to go to sea....

In August 2018 I saw the British Library exhibition “Captain Cook: The Voyages”. I was particularly interested in it because Cook’s voyages were one of the inspirations behind my first historical novel, To The Fair Land . It was 250 years since Captain Cook set sail from Plymouth on HMS Endeavour on 26 August 1768. The voyage lasted until 1771, and was followed by two further expeditions from 1772 to 1775 and 1776 to 1780. Cook was killed in a skirmish on Hawaii on 14 February 1779.   The voyages were motivated by a combination of scientific curiosity and expansionism. The goal of the first voyage was to observe the Transit of Venus at Tahiti, though it also had another, secret motive. This was the search for the Great Southern Continent, a land mass which was believed to exist in the southern hemisphere. By the end of the second voyage, Cook had proved that the continent did not exist. Though that was disappointing for a Britain looking to extend its empire, there were pl...