The Boy Who Sailed to Spain Book 2
Fiction
Date Published: January 19, 2019
A five year old girl-child living in poverty defends her family against the aggressive advances of a drunken and scheming father.
Set in the Moroccan and Algerian Sahara. Malak escapes with her family, to the Saharan birthplace of her mother Tanirt, guided and protected by a mysterious giant.
The feisty child has an unexpected effect on powerful people and becomes a mystically motivated catalyst in events that will have earthshaking consequences for the mysterious desert
Interview with Author Paul O'Garra
As a writer, what would you choose as your
mascot/avatar/spirit animal?
My animal spirit as an author
would be an otter. I´ve always loved the way they are and the dams they build,
so sleek and clever.
How many hours a day do you put into your writing?
I try to put in two hours each
day. However that is what I intend and rarely what I do, as these things,
creativity and dreams,tend to have a mind of their own.
Do you read your book reviews? If yes, do they affect
what you write in the future?
Yes of course, and absolutely.
For me writing is my way of communicating, and many reviews are other people´s
heartfelt replies.
Do you leave hidden messages in your books that only a
few people will find?
I suppose we all do this, hidden
nuances or unexplained happenings. The right people do understand everything,
although often in a different way to what i intended.
Can you tell us a little bit about the characters in Desert
Child?
Yes of course, although they do
just happen, they tell their own tale as the story evolves. Malak is just a
baby who has certain powers, such as fearlessness, strength and belief in
herself and in her God. Masuhun, a young school teacher
from an ancient family who fights his daily battle to do the right things, in
response to circumstances. His friend is Ruben,
an eccentric Englishman with a strange and archaic sense of humour and
manner of speaking, and a somewhat over impulsive inclination to resort to
fisticuffs if friends are threatened. Pete is a mystery man, a very large and
powerful personage who appears at just the right moment to save the child and
her family, part of his history and identity emerges as the story progesses.
Pete has a tendency to get emotional, as do so many people, but in his case
it´s somewhat incongruous given his calling. General Chenouali is the most
confusing character in the book, with his pragmatic nature and subsequent all
pervading remorse. Chenouali can also be devious, curt, and dictatorial, saved
only by his ever active conscience.
Can you tell us a little bit about your next books or
what you have planned for the future?
The future is in the hands of
God. I would like to continue with the series. You see,in my mind we need
heroes who are followers of traditional values. When I read about the Russian
Revolution, I see that we are reliving it today in a different form, and I feel
that writers can play a big part in guiding people towards a gentler and more
loving way of life. I will also be bringing out a book of short stories.
Do you allow yourself a certain number of hours to
write or do you write as long as the words come?
I´ll stay all night if the flow
begins. There have been times when I have just got carried away, and next day,
on reading what I had written the previous night it often seemed to me that I
myself had not written the relevant passages, they were too good, the work of
Angels mayhap or pixies or elves, just like the tale of the old shoemaker.
Do you have a certain number of words or pages you
write per day?
No, I am too spontaneous to
achieve any such discipline
What inspires you to write?
The dawning of another wonderful
day, and to find myself alive. I had cancer, they removed a kidney, half of
each lung ,then I lost most of my eyesight. Yet today I see,I live,write walk
swim and a friend said that the Lord was leading me by the hand, and frankly I
believe that he is. That, is inspiration.
Would
you rather
Read fiction or non-fiction?
Fiction
Read series or stand-alone?
If it´s good it doesn´t matter at
all. in any event if I like something I read every single book they ever wrote,
as with Faulkner, Bunin.
Read Science fiction or horror?
Neither, thanks very much, not my
cup of tea.
Read Stephen King or Dean Koontz
I have tried but it´s not my
favourite genre.
Read the book or watch the movie?
Read the book and later watch the
movie, and hope they have not made a dog´s dinner out of it. There are times
however when i have watched the movie first , for example, “To kill a mocking
bird” or “Gladiator”, and have gloried in the skill and ability of the
film-makers, and later loved the book.
I confess I never did read Gladiator
Read an ebook or paperback?
Paperback please, Perhaps I am
too set in my ways, but I love to get my hands on a nice solid book, and keep
them. What for I dont know, my home is a library, It´s nice to have them
around.
Be trapped alone for one month in a library with no
computer or a room with a computer and Wi-Fi only?
I´d much rather be trapped on a
sunny beach, with my mobile home packed with books just up the sand. Sorry I
evaded that one.
Do a cross-country book store tour or blog tour
online?
Cross country book store tour,
good grief. Think of all those wonderful folk I´ll be meeting, and all the new
places I will see. The virtual and digital world is truly wonderful, but it´s
not my life.
About the Author
Paul O´Garra was born in Gibraltar on the 8th May 1952. So many Gibraltarian people exiled by war to the Uk, and to further off, and more exotic places such as Madeira, French Morocco, Jamaica, and Northern Ireland, were returning on troopships, heavy with tears of nostalgia for a homeland which had been, and would never be again.
They, Paul and his three siblings were the children of schoolteachers and were reared with English discipline, learning romantic literature on the one hand, with a large local family of uncles, aunts, cousins and a doting grandmother, who was Spanish from Cadiz, on the other.
Childhood was spent roaming across the Up South, Rosia, and Europa point areas of Gibraltar engaging in childish games and adventures, reading extensively books such as Enid Blyton’ adventure series, ‘Famous Five,’ ‘Secret Seven,’ ‘Swallows and Amazons Forever,’ John Buchan and the ‘Gorbals Die-hards.’ Saturday mornings were a day for avoiding the displeased grimaces of monocled and overweight colonels, delving and searching through the shelves of the old Garrison library to discover new horizons, characters, and stories. The journey of discovery that had begun with Baba the Elephant eventually began to grow richer as the classics were devoured.
In 1967, he looked on as fellow students of Jewish persuasion prepare to leave for Tel Aviv to defend Israel. Shortly after, the arrival of General Moshe Dayan at the gates of Cairo, signaled to the world that Israel´s direst moment had been overcome. Paul, at the earliest time possible, set off in a steamer from Tangiers, sailing to Southampton. After a spell in London, he left the UK to discover his roots in Malta. In 1974 he wept with the crowds in the Athenian Coliseum the night the Colonels fell, and Nana Mouskouri sang a song to freedom, Verdi´s Nabuco. Later it was a case of returning to Gib. Only to fly away again to discover new places. He alternated callings as a tour guide of Morocco and recoverer of broken down rented cars in the desert, tour guide of south Spain and eventually running a flamenco club on the Costa del Sol, in the days when the Costa was still a new and exciting place to visit.
Eventually, he set off again to discover new places in the Middle and the Far East and the Philippines, and when Perestroika and Glasnost finally arrived at the hands of Mihail Gorbacheff and the Soviet Union was open, set off to discover the East there. He studied Russian at St Petersburg and spent time travelling to the Republic of Udmurtia, Kazan, Siberia and up an uncharted river to meet Tribes that still lived in the area. Nizhny Novgorod and the South Volga. Then to the Ukraine travelling from city to city, falling more and more in love with the great Russian writers and painters as he went. Seventeen years ago at the age of fifty, Paul contracted renal cancer. He was operated on successfully at the Bullfighters Hospital in Pamplona in North Spain. The operation had been a success as the tumour had been totally encapsulated within the removed kidney. Metastasis was practically impossible the surgeons happily reported. Two years later the cancer metastasised to his lungs on which he was duly operated, and half of his lungs were removed. Later for reasons undefined he suffered strokes in both eyes and lost partial sight in one eye and total in the left which he duly recovered by swimming and praying. Seventeen years have gone by since the renal cancer was first discovered, and seven years since his last operation and everything is fine, remission seems to be total.
Paul’s still swims at least one or two kilometres per day all year round, travels, practises martial arts and fervently believes that the Lord leads him by the hand. After leaving the hospital he spent some time in Tangiers, hairless, gaunt and on crutches, but enjoying the warmth and affection of many new friends there. Then off to Prague to study filmmaking, made several shorts but finally decided that he would first write and then make movies when the time came.
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1 comments:
thanks for hosting
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