CORNWALL in the 19th Century is the setting for The Ghost Ship for Alton author Caroline Barnett’s first novel, a fictional work she admits that she never thought she would write.

The tale of mystery, piracy and murder is set in 1855 and the ship of the title, a three-masted barque, is not an ethereal one but one that is unregistered and sails the waters around Lou and Fowey and its hero a farmer-turned-detective called Jack Devlin.

Caroline, 55, has published her first novel without the help of an agent, but she admitted: “I’m desperate to find one. However, I think it’s a bit of a closed shop so I’m looking at American agents now as I have another two novels bubbling along and it would be a great help to have the backing of an agent to get them published.”

Not that she has done badly on her own. After a “short battle”, the book is now available on Amazon as well as in Alton and Bordon libraries and can also be bought from The Second Hand Bookshop Alton.

Writing is a new career for Caroline who was a successful amateur artist and who her work exhibited.

She combined her art with a career in retail and at one time was in charge of several Laura Ashley shops. The job took her all over the UK but when it came to holiday time one of her favourite places to visit was Cornwall.

The county also inspires her paintings so it was natural for her to set her first novel in the south-west of England and follow her love of history to take the story back to a time when Cornwall’s coastline, fringed with hidden coves and long sandy beaches, was ideal for smugglers to land small boats filled with contraband.

“I thought I would take two years to write it but in the end it took four as after leaving it for a while then coming back to read it I often re-wrote some of the pages.

“I get a lot of help from my father, Colonel Toby Barnett, who reads what I have written and tells me if he thinks it is good or bad.

“Much the story concerns Cornish myths and legends and I got a lot of help on researching these from the landlord of The Jolly Miller pub in East Lou, where I stayed, and from the man in charge of the museum there.

“Also, after I finished the novel I went on the South Coast Walk which gave me a chance to check my facts as I visited all the places I have written about in the book."

The Ghost Ship is priced £8.99 and available from cfbarnett.co.uk.