Calum Lachlan, a 40-year-old bachelor, landowner and hero of World War Two, is driving along a lonely Lakeland road when he is flagged down by a highly distressed young woman who appears to have been the victim of a violent attack. The stranger merely introduces herself as September and will say nothing about how she came to be where she is, where she is going to or from whence she came. It is raining and late on a Sunday evening and, reluctantly, Calum feels it incumbent upon himself to offer the woman food and shelter for the night.Thus commences a journey which, whilst beginning in good faith and charity, rapidly moves the reader through many of the fraught emotions and behaviours which, sadly, so often define human life – loneliness, decency, love, romance and even adultery. Then, as this darker side of human nature manifests itself, raw evil, and cynical treachery combine to create the dire but often inevitable corollary of such an unholy pairing – brutal, pre-meditated, cold-blooded murder!Now incarcerated in the dark reaches of the 12th century castle prison at Lancaster, abandoned by the wife who so successfully and comprehensively framed him and in the long, threatening, and sinister shadow of the gallows and the hangman's noose; Calum waits. Waits with only the company of the spectre of someone from the shadowy reaches of his violent past to comfort him, waits to learn about his own, very uncertain future; or perhaps more accurately, if he is to be allowed to have one. Born in Cheshire, England, Len studied at Stockport College and the Open university where he read for a degree in psychology and criminology. His work, as a risk assessment engineer, took him to many parts of the world and into many interesting places, including gas exploration platforms in the North Sea, nuclear submarines and many of Scotland's and Northern England's prisons. This mind-broadening lifestyle has given him a vast and comprehensive insight into the diverse and complicated world in which we live and whether writing for children, as R.M. McLeod, or an older readership, his travels and experiences have given him an ability to write with authority, humour and an understanding of both his characters and his craft that is very hard to match.Now retired from his 'usual day job', he lives 'quietly, apart from when the grandchildren (code-named the SAS) come round' with his wife and Pip the Border collie dog.Len writes children's books under the pseudonym R.M. McLeod. (Ross Michael McLeod@redpandapress1)
