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Wednesday, November 2, 2011 Orono Weekly Times - 5 Newcastle novelists write about real life by Sue Weigand NEWCASTLE ­ Read any gripping novels by Newcastle authors lately? If you didn't know that any existed, the recent efforts of two local writers are meant to change all that. While neither man's books came by way of a big name publishing company, these authors can both attest that sometimes a story is too good to keep to yourself. Just ask Robert Kerby. A graphic designer by trade (who is now "slipping into semi-retirement"), Kerby says that when he started, he "never intended to write a book." He was instead doing genealogical research, looking for a few factual details about a mysterious ancestor. "When I was young, I heard stories about a strange aunt," he explains. "I grew up thinking she was an aunt, but she actually turned out to be my great-grandmother on my mother's father's side. As I got older, I started to get more and more curious about her. I tried to track her down to see if all the stories about her were true. I discovered that a lot of the things she was heavily criticized for, she had good reason to do." Kerby realized the family only knew half the story. "I wanted to set the record straight and see if I could redeem her reputation to some degree. I originally set out to write a small book about her life, strictly for the benefit of my children and family," he says, adding with a laugh, "but my wife said it's too good a story to waste on the kids." What resulted was a fictionalized version of his great-grandmother's story that became The Regiment's Woman. It follows the "truelife adventures of the beautiful, yet scandalous Janetta Rundel, who would stop at nothing to rise out of poverty and become a lady," tracing her life from 1864 until 1902, when she mysteriously disappears. Published by Olympia Publishers in the UK, and available from Amazon in the UK and the US, The Regiment's Woman was a semi-finalist in the 2008 Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award, and a finalist in the ForeWord Review Book of the Year Award. Kerby grew up in Essex, England, emigrating to Canada in 1968. He met his wife, Jenny, who is also British, and they lived in Scarborough for over 30 years, before moving to Newcastle six years ago. The couple used to perform in the Argentine tango dance troop Los Milongueros, and Kerby still teaches the Argentine tango and ballroom dancing photo supplied Robert Kerby is shown promoting his first novel, The Regiment's Woman, at the Chapters store at Bayview Village last February. The Newcastle author will be at the Markham Chapters on Nov. 13, and the Kennedy Commons Chapters on Nov. 20, to sign copies of his latest book, The Undermerchant's Woman. in Oshawa. "I have to admit I've always been a romantic," says Kerby, but he calls The Regiment's Woman a "gritty romance" because it's about a woman using her love affairs to further her ambitions. "I didn't set out to write a woman's book, but 90 percent of the books I've sold have been to women." However, he says his new book, The Undermerchant's Woman, is "more of a swashbuckling adventure" which may appeal more to men. The story is "100 percent factual," says Kerby, an "epic true-life adventure," which traces the journey of Lucretia, the young wife of Undermerchant Boudewijn van der Mijlen, as she sets sail in 1629 aboard a Dutch East India Company's ship to join her husband in Java. "Everyone has heard of the Titanic, and the Mutiny on the Bounty," says Kerby, of other shipwreck tales. "This is ten times more horrific. It's an absolutely heartrending story. It's a true story about actual people. They say that fact is stranger than fiction, and it's very, very true. One thing led to another that led to disaster. That's what makes for a fascinating story. It is actual, recorded history. All I've done is written it as a novel; I've just written dialogue." The book will be officially released midway through this month, but it can already be purchased from the publisher's website: www.publishamerica.com. Kerby will be at the Chapters store in Markham on Nov. 13, and the Kennedy Commons Chapters on Nov. 20, to sign copies of The Undermerchant's Wo- man. Check his website www.robertkerbybooks.com for future signing dates closer to home, or to order either of his books. Kerby says he hopes to find a Canadian publisher for his next novel, one of three he is working on. All are based on factual events: The Mafeking Woman, about the siege of Mafeking in South Africa during the Boer War; The Sea Wall, the true story of a 12-year-old boy who gets blood poisoning from a leg injury and spends his teenage years in a hospital; and a story focusing on a piece of local history. Newcastle resident Andy Borger also wanted to use his writing to preserve some facts for posterity. He says he wanted to impart some of the experiences of Dutch Calvinist immigrants during the mid-20th Century to the younger generations. Like Kerby, Borger chose to fictionalize his account of a society long since gone. But unlike Kerby, Borger's characters are not based on real people, at least not completely. The Crooked Road follows the experiences of Gary and Ann Van denBerg, young AUTHORS see page 7