Rye author releases her fifth book since turning 80

An article on the anticipated population explosion in this country was the starting point for the latest book from 86-year-old Rye author Pamela Buxton, writing as Pamela D Holloway.
Pamela BuxtonPamela Buxton
Pamela Buxton

New Beginnings and An Unusual Friendship is published by Matador/Troubador at £9.99.

“My first book was published aged 80, and this latest is my fifth. I am working hard to see if I can finish another!

“My former role in Rye as the wife of the rector of St Mary’s, and working full time gave me little time to write, although I had always written short stories and poetry under various pseudonyms.”

In this latest work, Pamela is writing about “a boy with a difficult childhood who through sheer drive becomes a highly successful man, but becomes caught up in a very controversial group that considers tampering with the water supplies to kill off the elderly, very frail and severely damaged babies…

“Strangely enough, it was an article on the anticipated population explosion expected in this country that was the starting point.

“Then, an idea popped into my head and seemed to take hold.

“The starting point was that difficulties are often the route to success. As I wrote during the hot and Covid summer I found my main character also had to deal with Covid, among many other challenges.

“My readers are usually female but I have some generously-minded male readers too. Writing during the hot weather was interesting in that I wanted to be in the garden, but I needed to write more!”

Her first book was A Different Kind of Life. (2017, set in Rye Paris and New York) and then Clair’s Story, about the sister in book one (2018). Then came Blood in the Snow (set in Serbia and the UK, 2019) and The Portuguese House (2020, set mostly in Goa, India).

“I have always written. Even at school, aged about 14, an English teacher wrote ‘Pamela, every essay does not have to turn into a story.’ So I have written short stories and poetry all my life.

“Then a family member suggested I should publish a full-length book I had completed and it rather took off from there.”

Inevitably the pandemic has proved frustrating: “I had lots of book events arranged for 2020, which were cancelled because of lockdown. Having ordered all the book for these events, I couldn’t continue to store them so donated them to East Sussex Library, who kindly collected all the boxes. I do hope they spread the books around.”

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