Historical Novels Series

This trilogy covers the life and times of a young Scottish lad, Angus McCaw, between the years 1745 and 1812. After the terrible defeat of Bonny Prince Charley at Culloden Moor back in 1745, Angus and a friend leave Scotland and try their luck in the wilderness of the New World. In the wilds of what will one day be Upstate New York, one adventure leads to another and soon Angus must choose between jail or the British army. There he meets up with the infamous Major Robert Rogers of 'Roger's Rangers' fame and gladly trades his redcoat for one of a darker hue that blends in with the vast forest that surround them. Book One follows Angus from a wide-eyed fifteen year old lad in 1746 at the Battle of Culloden to the seasoned veteran who fights with his 'band of brothers' in 1759 on the Plains of Abraham at the fall of Quebec. Angus and his 'brothers in arms' go from one well documented historic battle to another, coloring each with their own special blend of rough humour and savage honour. Come with them if you will --- and if you dare.

In ‘God’s Cleansing’, we meet Wayland Crow, the sheriff of the sleepy little modern town of Robert Lee, Texas. To celebrate their betrothal, he and his girlfriend Wynona go on a three week cruise from Rome to Australia. As they enter the Indian Ocean the luxury ship is boarded by Somalian pirates and both crew and passengers are terrorized --- until Wayland and Wynona decide to fight back.

Everybody loves to hate a ‘bad guy’ and Shakespeare’s ‘Richard III’ is one of the 'badest' to ever grace a stage or bloody a page! ‘Murder most foul’ is his specialty, sparing neither friends, family, nor children! In this ‘alternate tale’, Richard’s ‘ghost’ comes back to ‘set the record straight’. Travel back to fifteenth century England when the Lancasters and the Yorks were caught up in the civil war known as the ‘War of the Roses’ and follow in Richard’s bloody wake as he piles up the bodies on his murderous way to his brother’s throne.

Angus McCaw and his Ranger friends take part in the infamous and much debated 1759 Raid on Odanak, a small Native village just south of Quebec City, and endure the subsequent hardships from returning from that terrible ordeal. Angus and his close knit 'band of brothers' soon march on Montreal in 1760, then go on to travel with Robert Rogers westward to help put down the Pontiac Rebellion at Detroit in 1763. With the French & Indian War now over, Angus and his 'Band of Brothers' follow their rich and very eccentric leader, Captain Putney Smyth, back to London to claim his rich inheritance. The rough, backwoods boys, along with several Mohawk braves led by Tahnahani, the blood brother of Angus, have adventures from the steamy brothels of London to the windswept Highlands of Scotland. After a time, 'Sir Putney' finances a 'privateering expedition' to the 'Sugar Islands', where they try their hand at being legalized pirates for the king! The adventures continues with kidnappings and daring rescues and book two ends when on an April morning in 1776, WAR breaks out between the Thirteen Colonies and Great Britain --- and the 'Band of Brothers' are forced to choose whose side they will fight on in the coming revolution!

Welcome, Gentles all, to the beginning of our tale on a subject that you probably think that you know quite well. All we can humbly say is that --- you are wrong. We hope to please you with our tale of Bold Robin. To entertain you, to thrill you, and to bring you joy. But most of all we desire to simply tell you the truth. Not sugar coated or fancily fabricated. Not blunt edged nor prettily played on a lute. But bare, brutal and often bloody; As were the times and the people that lived in them. In that way, Robin’s tale is much like your own, and wants Love’s tinted glass to shine warmly on things that should have been --- but never really were. So if it’s fancy songs and fairness that you crave, look not for them in these pages. Honour and Love, Beauty and Goodness there is, but they are dispersed with a hesitant hand; and are shot through with Fate’s cruel twists. While fire and sword, war and famine are found here in abundance. Sadly, much as they are in our own world. So come along, Gentles all, and list to our true tale of Bold Robin! For I was there with him from the start, And stood with him at the end, And pray to a god that oft times seems deaf, that I’ll be with him once again! Told by W. Scarlet / Copied by F. Tuck 1225 A.D. --- Sherwood

Robin and Marian. Names you’ve known all your life; more familiar than Anthony and Cleopatra or Romeo and Juliet. Come join these two ‘star crossed lovers’ on the adventure of a lifetime, acted out on the hot, desert sands of the Holy Land, the pirate infested waters of the Mediterranean and in the cool, dark shadows of Sherwood Forest! Robin and Marian, along with Will, Much and Little John, have been forced to flee England after being accused by the powerful Sir Guy of Gisbourn of a number of grisly murders, including that of Marian’s uncle, Sir Robert Locksley. In 1190 Richard the Lionheart was gathering an army to take on the Third Crusade, and so, after joining a company of archers, Robin and his band (including Marian), set out for the Holy Land --- what the crusaders of the time called ‘Outramere’. After a number of adventures, including being shipwrecked on Cyprus and being held for ransom, Robin has rescues Marian and her tough female camp followers along with Berengaria, the Lionheart’s beautiful bride to be. All are once again sailing with King Richard’s convoy on its way to the scorching sands of ‘Outramere’ --- while secretly longing for the cool comfort of Sherwood. Come along on their adventure and see Robin & Marian all over again ‘for the very first time’!

Robin and Marian, along with Will, Much and Little John, have all made it safely back home to Locksley Hall from the Holy Land. King Richard however, has not. Captured and held for ransom by Duke Leopold of Austria, his mother Eleanor and his wife Berengaria must now raise a fortune in silver. Prince John has used Richard’s misfortune as a stepping stone to the empty throne. Many of the barons however, reject John’s self-centered rule and rebel. A civil war erupts with John getting aid from another of Richard’s enemies, Philip II of France. Sir Guy of Gisbourn and his cousin, the Sheriff of Nottingham, have given Marian and her followers till the end of September to vacate Locksley Hall --- or suffer the consequences. At the end of Book II, Prince John, urged on by his beautiful witch-like mistress, Hawdwise of Chalus, was leading a combined English & French army north to fight the rebels under the command of someone known only as the ‘Hooded-Ghost of Sherwood’. This ‘hooded ghost’ is really Marian’s brother, Sir Hugh Fitzwalter who, now, seriously wounded, can no longer lead his troops. Robin, Sir Hugh’s sometime lieutenant, steps in to take his place. The last thing we saw was Robin organizing a ‘special greeting’ for the Sheriff and his men when they come to evict Marian from Locksley Hall. Meanwhile, Prince John is slowly leading his large force northward, planning eventually to lay siege to Sherwood itself if he has to in order to crush this ‘hooded ghost’! Join us now for the third and final book of ‘SHERWOOD’ where Robin & Marian come ‘Home At Last’.

‘Eric Brighteyes’ is an epic tale founded on the Icelandic sagas of the 8th to the 11th centuries. ‘What is a saga?’ All the ‘good things’ about a story rolled into one: adventure, drama, love, magic, tragedy, sex and honour. Oh yes, and revenge! Kind of like what Shakespeare did in the 17th century. H. Rider Haggard’s ‘Eric Brighteyes’ was first published in 1890, is one of the books that inspired J.R.R. Tolkien to write his masterpiece, ‘Lord of the Rings’ --- and, like Hamlet, Macbeth and LOTR, it is still going strong. Lots of history, action & strong female characters. ENJOY!

It’s 44 BC and Julius Caesar’s invading legions have just arrived at a wave-tossed island at the end of the world. Beautiful, red headed Britannia watches as Caesar’s legions come splashing ashore. She and her fellow warriors attack the red cloaked ‘metal men’ and she soon comes face to face with Centurion Quintus Vello --- the man she immediately tries to kill and will eventually, against all odds, come to love.

In 1715, beautiful, red headed Lady Catherine Graham of the English ‘Borderlands’ meets two very different Scottish lords. The first one, the king’s bastard brother, Angus MacDuff, she falls madly in love with; the second one, the rich and powerful Lord Alistair MacGregor, kidnaps her and sails off to his castle on the Isle of Mull --- leaving Angus to follow and rescue her --- if he can.

W.Wm.Mee’s ‘LEAR’ is a fresh look at a very old story; ‘the foolish old king that gives his kingdom away to his grasping, money grubbing children.’ A tale that seems right out of today’s ‘Fake News’ or the ‘Dr. Phil’ show --- BUT WITH A TWIST! The main character tells the tale ‘in his own words’ (along with some rather ‘creative editing’ of the Bard’s play tossed in.) Come meet Lear, loyal Kent, the handsome snake Edmund, the fair Cordelia and the two heartless harpies of the play, Lear’s elder daughters Goneril and Regan --- only this time see them all through LEAR’S EYES. Iron Age Britain’s ‘royal family’ will seem like the squabbling neighbours next door! The ‘No Fear Shakespeare Series’ continues!

Come and read it again, but for the first time in MacBeth's own words! Through a mixture of verse and prose, W.Wm.Mee makes Shakespeare's most hated villain come to life! MacBeth himself comes back to tell his own version of 'the wickedest play ever penned', giving reasons why he did what he did and who he did it for! So come, Gentle Reader, back to the twelfth century in savage Scotland and walk with MacBeth's ghost through Dunsinaine's stony halls and stand by his side as he plunges the dagger into the sleeping king in order to steal his crown and make the love of his life into a queen!

Clouds of steel-tipped Death rain down from the skies! It’s the Year of Our Lord 1296 and King Edward Longshanks of England is waging war against the rebellious Scots. Longshanks has the largest army in Christendom, but he lacks one thing--- archers. Men who have trained since childhood to bend the infamous English longbow and send their yard long shafts tipped with steel bodkins through chain, scale and plate armor. To recruit such highly skilled men Longshanks offers the promise of money, land and a pardon for all earlier crimes against the crown. Archer Hugh Blackthorn, living in the forest as an outlaw, takes the king’s pardon and marches northward with Longshanks’ army. There Hugh meets Molly O’Grady, the love of his life; Sir Owen Wren, a Welsh knight who swears that one of them must die; comes face to face with the outlaw William Wallace and befriends the future king of Scotland, Robert the Bruce. Step back in time nearly a thousand years to an age when wars were fought face to face with bared steel in hand and a ‘long shot’ came not from a sniper’s rifle, but from an equally skilled soldier using an English longbow.

Over a thousand years ago brave men and women sailed the Whales Road in search of new land, fame and fortune. The Norse were the leaders in this outward expansion. They took their families, their culture, their stories and their gods with them. This is the story of how Swanhild, a beautiful a Halfenwraith (half god & half human) went in search of a hero to marry.

I first read Alfred Noyes’s powerful poem when I was just entering my teens. Back then I was drawn to the daring theme, the relentless action and the sudden, shocking violence; but also the choice and ‘flow’ of the poet’s words worked their own magic on me --- as did the obvious sexual attraction of ‘Bess the landlord’s daughter --- the landlord’s black-eyed daughter --- Plaiting a dark red love-knot into her long black hair.’ I have rather shamelessly but I hope always respectfully taken Alfred Noyes’s timeless story of love, honour, hate and revenge and ‘retold’ it in novel form. I did this not to attempt to make it ‘better’ --- for how can one improve a masterpiece?! I did it in order to explore the characters that Mr. Noyes created in more detail --- to get into their minds and, loving or hating them, to get to know them better. In doing so I have woven many strands of my own into his beautifully crafted tale, fleshing out the main characters and adding a fair number more. I hope you enjoy reading my version as much as I enjoyed creating it. ‘Sleep ye gentle, rest ye sound.’