Northumberland Cold War thriller finally published 40 years after it was written
Tom Walker never saw his novel in print. Four decades later, his daughter has helped bring it to bookshelves
A novel inspired by Cold War tensions, women’s peace camps and the landscapes of Northumberland is finally being published - four decades after it was first written.
Hobthrush, originally penned by Ryton writer and former Newcastle Polytechnic lecturer Tom Walker in the 1980s, imagines a chilling alternative history in which American nuclear missiles are stationed on Holy Island following protests similar to those seen at Greenham Common and RAF bases across Britain.
Tom was unable to find a publisher during his lifetime and the typewritten manuscript remained tucked away in a drawer for years after being completed.
It was only after Tom and his wife moved into a care home following his stroke that his daughter, Sue, rediscovered the novel while clearing the family home.
Tom died in 2013 and it wasn’t until a decade later that Sue sat down to read the manuscript properly and recognised its potential.
She began editing and expanding the story, eventually becoming co-author before Durham publisher Sacristy Press agreed to bring the book to print.
Set across a single day, the novel follows stressed history lecturer and reluctant anti-nuclear campaigner Arnold Prestwick as he travels up the Northumberland coast to confront the far-right activist he blames for the death of his wife during a protest at a missile site.
As a convoy of US cruise missiles prepares to arrive on Holy Island, Arnold finds himself pursued by police while events move towards an increasingly surreal climax on the small island of Hobthrush, off Lindisfarne’s shore.
The story’s setting was deeply personal to Tom, whose family had roots among Lindisfarne’s fishing community and who spent much of his childhood visiting the island.
Several of the novel’s characters were inspired by relatives and local people he knew, while the central character’s role as a lecturer mirrors Walker’s own career at Newcastle Polytechnic, now Northumbria University.
Hobthrush is available to buy now