My first foray into historical fiction was the Powder Monkey series - a trilogy of books about Sam Witchall, a boy in Nelson’s Navy. I was inspired to write this series after seeing a brilliant painting by Denis Dighton called The Fall of Nelson.
As I peered into the carnage on the weather deck of HMS Victory I saw a young lad - about 12 by the look of him - carrying gunpowder and just that moment shot in the leg. It was disturbing to see such a young sailor among the death and destruction and it made me think it would be a good idea to write about Navy life from someone at the bottom of the ship’s hierarchy, rather than the usual stories about midshipmen and captains.
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Historical teen novel author and former senior editor with Usborne, Paul Dowswell, at http://writinghistoricalnovels.com/2013/01/22/research-for-my-powder-monkey-series-by-paul-dowswell
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