June 11, 2007
Africa: not all doom and Joseph Conrad
Amanda Craig, writing in the Saturday Times, comments on how Africa has recently become "the most fashionable setting for film, and now for children's fiction. Perhaps it took the delightful Alexander McCall-Smith's The No 1 Ladies' Detective Agency series to remind us that the continent doesn't have to be all doom and Joseph Conrad. It can also be a place of modern adventure."
I loved writing The Yellowcake Conspiracy so I have started another adventure story set in Africa. The Timbuktu Enigma will be about two teenage boys, Omar (a garibou in Mali) and Danny (a computer hacker in Battersea), brought together by the discovery of an ancient Timbuktu manuscript. The manuscript describes the biggest heist in African history: eleven tonnes of gold nuggets from Mansa Musa's 1342 pilgrimage convoy. Omar and Danny set out on a quest to unearth the stolen treasure, but equally hot on the trail is a powerful marabout and a family of London mobsters. Noice.