Dear Bernard, thank you for the books you have written so far & long may you continue to write. You have a rare & great talent not only to take actual periods of history & turn them into a believable story,you also create low born characters & put them into the centre of the action.This enables us the reader to see history unfold from the ordinary persons perspective & what the decisions of the elete few had for the many.Your writing has awakened my childhood interest in history.I am disabled & cannot read in the normal way,I “read your audio books”.I always wait for the unabridged version which seem to be six months to a year behind the “normal” book & abridged audio book hitting the book shops.I know you will not have a lot to do with this side of your books being published. However perhaps you could answer this question. If the publisher can issue the abridged version of one of your novels @ the same time as the hardback.(I surmise it must take longer to abridge a book than just take the whole book & give it to a reader to read.)Yet as I have said you can wait for up to a year to “read” your latest novel.I did put this to a publisher(not yours).They just stated I could get the abridged version.However I believe that if an author has researched & sweated for whatever time it takes to write that book.Then I as a reader ought to take just a small amount time to read the whole book.I am sorry to “bang on”about this but it is very frustrating to see a new Sharpe or the 2nd or 3rd book in a series become available & not be able to read it.It really is like to people sitting down to eat a hot meal & one person being able to eat it hot & fresh & the other being told that they cannot eat thiers for a few hours.It is just not fair! You are such a good writer that when I have finished one of your books I am ready for the next instalment.I have just finished Crowning Mercy & it was so enjoyable I did not want it to end.So once more I just want to say a big thank you for putting pen to paper & doing it so well.
Stephen Ashmore-Hughes