Hello and welcome to my site! I'm a dad, a husband, and a believer in things magical, which is why I love writing children's books.
Billy and the Match Girl is about a twelve year old boy who travels back in time to stop his Great Gran Milly from contracting the dreaded bone disease, Phossy Jaw in a Victorian match factory. Changing history was never going to be easy and my latest story is an adventure with a magical twist!
* Long listed for the Canadian Society of Children's Authors, Illustrators and Performers (CANSCAIP) 2020 Writing for Children Competition.
Echo and the Magical Whispers and Lost Echo are books one and two in THE WHISPERS SERIES, a magical realism about elephants for children aged 9-12. As you may know, the outlook for African elephants is not great, given the poaching that is occurring. The WHISPERS books, written from the elephants' point of view, have a theme of conservation mixed in with the magic with profits going to Elephants For Africa, a registered charity in England & Wales and a registered NGO in Botswana.
Joe and the Ghoul is a magical realism about a modern day Dennis The Menace who meets a Ghoul and steps through a portal in his local art gallery into a world of fantasy (for children aged 9-12).
New Writing:
Caleb and the Brass Ring (unpublished; manuscript complete).
Caleb knows that the decaying German bunker at Rocquaine Bay on his island of Guernsey is haunted. Samuel Vogel, his nemesis at school, has told him. But when his Grandpa Berty hands him a brass ring that could have saved his Great Grandpa Alfred, a Spitfire pilot, from being shot down during World War 2, and learns of the arrest by the occupying Nazis of his Great Grandma Mary, Caleb knows he has to go back in time to fix things.
Accompanied by his beloved sheepdog, Twitchy, Caleb braves the ghost of ‘Herr Skull and Cross Bones’, emerging from the bunker to find himself back in 1940, days before the Germans will invade the island.
Now begins the tricky bit: persuading Mary and nine-year-old Berty (his Grandpa's younger self) to evacuate before the island is crawling with enemy soldiers, and then finding a way to hand the brass ring to Alfred at his air base on the mainland. All the while, keeping secret who he and Twitchy really are!
An except is included in the News section!
My books are available on Amazon under my personal imprint, Magic Ink Press. I am un-agented, but welcoming to an approach for Caleb and the Brass Ring.
Comments/ reviews of my books are gladly received, via email (greateditnow@gmail.com), social media (Facebook and Twitter links are below), or via Amazon!
Happy reading!
Paul
Billy and the Match Girl
12 year old Billy travels back to 1888 to stop his Great Gran Milly from contracting the dreaded 'Phossy Jaw' in a Victorian match factory.
Changing history was never going to be easy and this latest story by Paul Haston is an adventure with a magical twist!
Long listed for the Canadian Society of Children's Authors, Illustrators & Performers (CANSCAIP) 2020 Writing for Children Competition.
1 THE START OF IT
I often wonder about time. Ticking forward, the clocks of history bringing change to our lives.
Like the flyover above our roof. One day it wasn’t there. And those of us beneath were quite happy for its absence. The next, ‘progress’ arrived at Lime Street: vast cranes lifting pylons for the new road; towers of metal that stopped the sun from shining. A giant morphed into the sky, people like me, Ma, Grandpa and Lottie cowering beneath its thunder, breathing the fumes of our newly elevated ‘neighbours’ and their flashy new cars.
“Billy, you’re under my feet,” Ma screeches, positioning the towel between our yellow stained window and its sill.
I pull a face. “It won’t work, Ma,” I say, trying to explain.
MY BOOKS FOR CHILDREN
