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Author has Horsham’s answer to Wonder Woman
JPCT 191112 Michael Harling - author of new book, Finding Rachel Davenport. Photo by Derek Martin
Step aside Peter James, a Bishopric author has created Horsham’s very own crime fighter in his first fictional work, ‘Finding Rachel Davenport’.
Michael Harling’s crime adventure tells the tale of a local busybody who works as a travel agent in Horsham by day and as a superhero protecting the sleepy streets of West Sussex by night.
Michael explains: “She’s a Wonder Woman style superhero who goes around trying to right wrongs.
“She gets into a whole lot of trouble with bad guys, the police and a nosey neighbour that are all after her.”
Michael may be a new name to the realm of crime, but has left his mark in travel writing with his humorous trilogy ‘Postcards From Across the Pond’ about an American on British and Irish soil.
Raised in upstate New York, Michael moved to West Sussex several years ago and immediately fell in love with Horsham.
“As soon as I landed in England and started walking down the street I felt at home here.”
It was his infatuation with the British way of life that inspired him to set the novel in Sussex.
“A lot of the businesses that Rachel visits are real places. I included as many of the shops as I could fit in.
“She stops in a well known panini place and has a sandwich, she also walks by the Panda House takeaway .
“But I had to change the name of some of the places where the real action takes place, like a bike shop and some of the apartment blocks.”
With the superhero story aptly described as unconventional, Rachel Davenport does not have any super powers to boast.
“It’s not written as a fantasy; it’s written as real life. If a real life person put on a bodysuit and ran around at night trying to fight crime they would get into a huge amount of trouble.”
The book is available as an Amazon ebook by Opis Imprint and Michael took on the task of self publishing tangible copies for his readers to buy.
“People think it’s a lot more work to create a paperback, but it’s not. You just upload it to Amazon like an ebook with the cover.”
Yet, the Horsham novelist believes self publishing is the wrong avenue for most aspiring authors.
“Unfortunatley you get a lot of self published books and I don’t think that self publishing for most people is the way to go.”
‘Finding Rachel Davenport’ is a fun mixture of crime and chick-lit with a good measure of explosive action.
The book is available now on Amazon ebook for £2.94 by Opis Imprint and in paperback for £5.62.
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Weather for Horsham
Tuesday 21 May 2013
Today
Cloudy
Temperature: 10 C to 16 C
Wind Speed: 18 mph
Wind direction: North
Tomorrow
Cloudy
Temperature: 5 C to 16 C
Wind Speed: 16 mph
Wind direction: North west
