The Owner of the Crown: 2. Saliman Attacks by T. J. P. CAMPBELL

T. J. P. CAMPBELL’S LETTER OF INSPIRATION FOR HIS THE OWNER OF THE CROWN TRILOGY:

Dear Reader,

 I was initially inspired to write The Owner of the Crown trilogy by my fruitless attempts to teach some Geordie pupils in Blyth, Northumberland a number of years ago.

 Some strange goings on took place at the school I taught in— very strange. And even though this trilogy involves ghosts, aliens, afterlife worlds and starships, there are noisy rumours it portrays a true story.

 You might be interested to know that a few years after I left the school, it was completely demolished. Flattened into a car park. The school being Blyth Delaval County Middle School on the Plessey Road. Google it!

 However, even if this trilogy may be based on some solid facts (as impossible as such a thing might be to believe) I want you to know the characters and the school it features are entirely fictitious (though the school’s grounds its buildings and their rooms are accurately based on the now demolished Delaval County Middle School). Of course, those of you with high intelligence may very well conclude that this does not mean the characters do not exist— just that they do not exist in our world. There is much more of this sort of quantum craziness in the trilogy.

 So this trilogy features, among other strange things, some pupils and other characters from the town of Blyth. As some of you may know, Blyth is a Northumbrian town 11½ miles north of Newcastle-upon-Tyne. Now the Geordie dialect and accent can sometimes seem unfathomable to the likes of me, so just in case you’re new to it, I’ve put some “normal” English translations of common Geordie words and phrases at the beginning of each book. You can also look up famous Geordie celebrities on YouTube. The best example might be the famous Geordie comedian Ross Noble. Why? Because it was his mother who used to teach in my tutor room before I joined the school. A copper nameplate on the classroom door read “Mrs Noble”. You won’t find that on Google, though it does mention on Wikipedia that both Ross Noble’s parents were teachers.

 Let me just say, though every Geordie pupil appears to be a natural stand-up comedian, I can’t for the life of me explain the way they think. I’d have to have a Nobel Prize in psychology to even attempt to do such a silly thing. I do have a school 10-yard swimming certificate, but this doesn’t seem to help either— although I wouldn’t be surprised to find that a Geordie pupil might easily prove it should. That’s the magical inimitable Geordies for you. You get the picture?

 Finally, I hope readers of all ages, adults and children, get to enjoy this trilogy. I wrote it to be understood at many different levels, such as scientifically, philosophically, politically and sociologically. However, it should fundamentally stand out as a vast cinematic awesome rollicking science fiction space opera odyssey. At its heart a splendiferous tale of derring-do and the perennial fight of good versus evil. Hopefully this trilogy will lift up even further the spirits of all Geordies and really put Blyth deservedly on the International literary map. So dear reader, let me take your mind by the hand and lead it through a Universe of diverse extraordinary imagination …

 T. J. P. Campbell