Quarterdeck Celebrating Nautical and Historical Fiction

Author Interviews Julian Stockwin Karl Friedrich Richard Woodman

May 2012 Quarterdeck

Tall Ships Communications

Quarterdeck is published monthly by Tall Ships Communications 6952 Cypress Bay Drive Kalamazoo, MI 49009

EDITOR George D. Jepson Tel 269-372-4673 Contents [email protected] MAY 2012

DEPARTMENTS 3 Scuttlebutt Quarterdeck is distributed by The latest in news about authors and McBooks Press, Inc. forthcoming titles in nautical and historical ID Booth Building fiction. 520 North Meadow Street 4 By George! Ithaca, NY 14850 Out of the Shadows. PUBLISHER 5 Bookshelf Alexander Skutt Conquest by Julian Stockwin. Tel 607-272-2114 [email protected] FEATURES

6 Julian Stockwin English author Julian Stockwin chats about his current Thomas Kydd sea adventure,Conquest. 10 Karl Friedrich American author Karl Friedrich’s discusses his debut novel Wings – A Novel of World War II Flygirls. 13 Richard Woodman English author Richard Woodman brings readers up to date on his latest novel and looks to the furture.

RECENT RELEASES 17 Naval Fiction and Historical Fiction

ON THE COVER – Detail from English artist Geoffrey Huband’s oil painting of USS Constitution vs. HMS Guerriere during the War of 1812.

2 RichardAN OBSESSION Woodman

t the age of “fifty-something, with an arthritic hip,” Captain Richard AWoodman retired as the commanding officer of the Trinity House flagship Patricia only to join the Endeavour Replica under sail. “I’m told it is an obsession,” he said at the time. “… keep the Ships and the sea have never been far from faith! Maritime Woodman’s thoughts or vocation. In 1981, Woodman’s manuscript for a novel history is called An Eye of the Fleet was accepted for publication by publisher John Murray. endlessly A LIFE AT SEA … The book introduced Midshipman Nathaniel fascinating, Richard Woodman first Drinkwater of the to readers who went to sea profession- had sailed with C. S. Forester and Alexander whether one ally as a 16-year-old Kent. It was the beginning of a writing career midshipman in the Blue that continues today. reads it or Funnel and Glen Lines of Alfred Holt of Liver- After fourteen novels – concluding with Ebb writes it.” pool. A requirement for Tide – Woodman ended Drinkwater’s career at midshipman to keep a about the same time his own vocation at sea was daily journal, he says, ending. At the time, Woodman revealed that he eventually led to “writ- “had long ago decided how Drinkwater was ing as my experience of life at sea increased.” going to die. It seemed therefore that his life had Richard lives and writes run its course … and it was simply time for him near the North Sea. to pass the bar.”

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length of my life-span. I’m not “One of the spin-offs of writing history certain which is the less reliable. is that you come across many Are there maritime or naval history topics that you would like interesting narratives.” to write about, which you have not yet embraced? With the Drinkwater series, Your most recent fiction, A Ship which remains in print in the for the King and For King or This is always a difficult question United States with Sheridan House Commonwealth, follow to answer, though I appreciate trade paperback editions, in his Faulkner’s adventures at sea. readers would like advance wake, Woodman has mixed fiction What can you tell us about his life warning, so to speak. I am usually with British maritime history over in these two novels? cautious in thinking that my output the past decade. cannot go much further, then I The author’s latest book, For Essentially Faulkner is a foil for an discover a subject of interest and King or Commonwealth, is the important part of Mainwaring’s life. this will often – though not always second about a new character called Later he in turn gains an existence – gestate for some time before Kit Faulkner. Woodman recently of his own. My thesis is that suggesting an idea. I suppose that if brought Quarterdeck up to date on Mainwaring was known to have you were to press me I would have his writing: been influential in the history of the to say that judging by the increasing Royal Navy when it was going number of obscure books on the Since our last interview nearly through a difficult time under the subject that are filling my already three years ago, you have early Stuart kings – James I and grossly over-loaded bookshelves (I published three novels even as Charles I. In his attempts to make a am haunted by a fear that one night you were completing your five- difference, he is on the lookout for my house will collapse under the volume history of the British likely young men and he discovers weight of books), I might one day Merchant Navy and a history of the waif Faulkner on the Bristol do something about the East India Trinity House. What brought you dockside. In an exchange Company. At the moment the back to fiction? Mainwaring realizes this is a bright notion is no more than a small lad and takes him up. Faulkner then cloud on the horizon and I am One of the spin-offs of writing rises as does Mainwaring. Whilst increasingly conscious of my own history is that you come across so taking part in several exploits with mortality, but being a compulsive many interesting narratives. One Mainwaring, Faulkner eventually word-smith, I guess that in the can only touch upon them in a participates in various historically absence of a better idea, this one general review of events and in accurate incidents, particularly the might take form. writing a pocket biography the attack on the Moroccan port of possibilities of expansion strike Sallee. He is later caught up in the You have spent considerable time one. When writing my history of and I wanted to with Trinity House since you the British Merchant Navy I use this as a character-forming retired from the sea. What is encountered Henry Mainwaring as backdrop with a bit of romantic your current involvement with a converted pirate, but learned tussle built-in! the Corporation? much more about him when researching for my history of Is a third Faulkner novel in the As you probably know, I was Trinity House. However, offing? appointed a Younger Brother in information about him is scant, so it 2000 and six years later I was occurred to me to write about a Certainly there is material for a elected an Elder Brother. Although fictional character in whose life third and final novel. Whether it this all sounds rather archaic we Mainwaring would be important. gets written depends upon the sales have a number of statutory Thus was Kit Faulkner born. and success of the first two and the functions, the most important of

14 RICHARD WOODMAN which is to keep our offshore Kit Faulkner Sea Adventures waters under a constant review to ensure that we do what we can to A Ship for the King ensure the international mariner can by Richard Woodman make his passage safely, even if all his modern on board navaids (Severn House, $28.95, US Hardcover/£19.99, UK Hardback) Bristol, , 1618 – Kit (navigation aids) fail, by providing Faulkner is a young vagrant orphan, taking life sufficient aids to navigation by way as he finds it in the rough world of the docks. of buoys, lighthouses, lightvessels But after an encounter with two gentlemen and so forth. I make regular trips to while scavenging for apples, his fortunes are sea, some of which last a week or changed forever. Kit is taken aboard the so, to inspect aids to navigation, Swallow, a large merchant ship partly owned by and when called upon to do so I am the two men, Captain Henry Mainwaring and one of several colleagues who Captain Gideon Strange, and after spotting provide expert advice to the judge some promising qualities in him they decide to when cases come before the train the boy for a life at sea. And so begin the Admiralty Court. Cases are often adventures of Kit Faulkner, which see him rise tried in London under English Law, through the ranks and risk all in encounters with even when they occur on the far pirates and a French man-of-war. Meanwhile, England edges ever side of the globe since we have closer to civil war, and very soon Kit must chose which side he will literally hundreds of years fight for. experience in the field. I also play a part in the governance of the Corporation For King or Commonwealth which owns substantial properties, by Richard Woodman mostly in central London and (Severn House, $28.95, US Hardcover/£19.99, UK disperses the income thereof for the Hardback) This is the second title in the Kit relief of poverty among seafarers. Faulkner novels. 1649 – England has been torn We also give grants for training and asunder by a civil war that has pitted maritime education. There are other Parliamentarians against Royalists. Captain Kit tasks, some of which are cere- Faulkner, bound to the Royalist cause, has been monial, such as one I attended on living in exile for the past four years. Faulkner Sunday, 15 April, along with the must now support himself with the tiny rump of citizens of Lichfield in the Royal Navy that remains loyal. But his Staffordshire, marking the loyalties are torn, partly by the desire of his old centenary of the Titanic. Why patron, Sir Henry Mainwaring, who wishes to Lichfield? Well it is not far from return home, and partly by the predatory nature the birthplace of Captain Edward of Prince Charles, who has his eyes on the Smith, the Titanic’s master, and beautiful Katherine Villiers. there is a statue of him near the cathedral which was sculpted by Katherine Scott, widow of Captain finishing touches to the Corpora- copies find their way across the Robert Falcon Scott, the centenary tion’s official history. Explaining Atlantic so that the curious may of whose death in Antarctica also the function of Trinity House to my discover what makes the organi- falls this year. We Brits are rather fellow countrymen is bad enough, zation both a curiosity and an good at heroic failure, it seems. to do so to your readers is not at all important player in our national life. Speaking of centenaries, Trinity easy. Indeed it has taken 650 pages House itself has its fifth in two of typescript to accomplish it for What is the state of the Britain’s years time. I am putting the publication, but I hope that a few rich seafaring history in this

15 RICHARD WOODMAN second decade of the 21st Continued from page 4 century? Kindle, Nook and similar e-book order books from virtually It is always difficult to gauge the platforms has further changed the anywhere on the planet. Tall Ships state of intellectual ferment about landscape. Communications (formerly Tall British maritime history – whether Although I am now connected Ships Books) will produce the purely naval variety or the with the electronic books via an e- Quarterdeck. McBooks Press will wider aspects thereof. At the reader, pad and computer, I prefer distribute each issue. moment we are being inundated by to grasp a printed volume – The real joy in producing programs, films, plays, images and hardcover or paperback – that Quarterdeck is the search for features about the Titanic. What the allows me to have the tactile sense authors and titles in the nautical and consequences of this will be, I of covers and pages. And, yes, I historical fiction genre, as well as would not care to predict. Some- frequent Amazon, B&N and The historians, and introducing them to times something that grabs the Book Depository, along with the readers. With the publication of public attention like this generates a few independent shops still in each new book authors generally residual and widening interest, but I existence. And now McBooks Press have a fresh story to tell about the suspect it will all be lost in the hoo- offers its books online at a 30% research and development leading haa over the Queen’s Diamond discount from list prices. to the published product. The Jubilee and then the Olympics! We So, where does Quarterdeck fit economic doldrums of the past few are doing our bit, however, and I in this new world? Well, to begin, years have forced publishers to shall be attending one of two books are no longer available for slash budgets, often having to conferences next week at sale through the publication, which choose which books to promote and Portsmouth Dockyard where I hope is the primary difference between which to gain readership on their we will be stimulating interest today and the past. Our mission is own. The latter group is where outside already dedicated naval and to bring readers interviews with Quarterdeck can make a modest maritime history buffs. authors and information on new and difference. forthcoming titles. At the same So that’s our story. We hope you Will you spend time aboard your time, we will direct readers to will enjoy our features and related sailboat Andromeda this sources for the books on both sides information. summer? of the Atlantic. The Worldwide George Jepson Web has made it rather simple to Undoubtedly – and probably during the summer Olympics in and around London! Having loathed Online Book Sources sport at school, this is one triumph I would have wished on the French! McBooks Press Andromeda is already looking www.mcbooks.com pretty trim and I hope to have her Independent Publisher’s Group (IPG) in the water in a week or two. Now www.ipgbook.com I am a grandfather I have a new Tel 800-888-4741 generation to train up, which should keep me busy. Amazon www.amazon.com or www.amazon.co.uk

Is there anything else you would Barnes & Noble like to share with our readers? www.barnesandnoble.com

Only to keep the faith! Maritime The Book Depository history is endlessly fascinating, www.bookdepository.com whether one reads it or writes it.

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