jonathan-gillespie-blog

[jonathan-gillespie-blog]

The Adlon Conspiracy

The Adlon Conspiracy - Chapter 10 - The Serpentine meeting - 1936 https://www.wattpad.com/962013402-the-adlon-conspiracy-chapter-10-the-serpentine?utm_source=web&utm_medium=email&utm_content=share_reading

Will Hutchins go over to the Russians? Is Colonel Broad a traitor?

[jonathan-gillespie-blog]

The Polish Woman - Polska Kobieta

It is time that I set aside some time to create the back story for "The Polish Woman - Polska Kobieta" (working title). In life you meet people where circumstance brings out hidden strengths. Once the episode in their life has finished, they just become the person next door.in the early 1980s, I lived next door to a Polish lady, she was twice widowed. Her first husband was a Polish officer who was murdered in the Katyn forest massacre. Her second husband was a pilot in the Free Polish Air Force.She had survived and escaped from both a German and Russian prison camp and made her way through to Persia and the UK. I won't give too much away, but she spoke several languages fluently. In her last years she had the onset of dementia, this was such a cruel disease. It regressed her on some days to the dark days of the War, when she was in the camps. On those days she would be in perfect Russian or German. The dark side of this was that if she saw the neighbours Alsatian dog in the garden she would literally cower and cry. Her old friend told us that in the camps, the guards would depending on their whim, set the dogs on people they singled out for their malice.

[jonathan-gillespie-blog]

I was fortunate to be in Quebec a few years ago, at the time I was writing "Never Look North". The main character Luke Burns leaves England in the 1930s, for a better life in Canada. The Second World War brings him back to England and the rekindling of a forbidden romance. On my sightseeing tour of the Quebec, I visited the Royal 22 Regiment museum and saw the details of their War. I purchased the book as part of my research, allowing me to look at their campaigns and loosely place his character in their ranks. “Never Look North” can be found on the usual WattPad and Inkitt sites.

[jonathan-gillespie-blog]

Walking through time

I wanted to focus "The Adlon Conspiracy on Germany over two time periods; 1936 and sometime in the last few years. In the latter, the secondary character, a gay young man escapes persecution in his homeland and seeks refuge in Berlin. His ability to live under-the-radar is essential in the primary characters escape. It is always a joy to visit Berlin. When passing the memorials I feel very fortunate that I am not living in those times. To some, intolerance is still present even today. My secondary character shows how people adapt to survive it.

[jonathan-gillespie-blog]

Finding Harry Lime

I always like to find a bookshop when I am travelling. If possible, buy a book set in that country. Shakespeare & Co in Sterngasse, Vienna. A nice half-hour of browsing.

[jonathan-gillespie-blog]

As my main character in the Adlon Conspiracy needs to travel to Vienna in a few chapters, I thought. Time to take inspiration from a few holiday snaps. This location in Leopoldstadt, may be a little bit too well known. I can see Orson Welles (Harry Lime, The Third Man), walking across the carousel to the Wiener Riesenrad to meet Joseph Cotton (Holly Martins). or was it the other way round! And that memorable dialogue in the ferris wheel. The one that isn't in the Graham Greene book, as Orson Welles penned it. Maybe, I'll move my character to somewhere across the river near St Stephen's.

[jonathan-gillespie-blog]

The Adlon Conspiracy - Chapter 9 - A travel agent takes a booking (on Wattpad) https://my.w.tt/S4BDIQJjd7 It's 1936 and Major Hutchins is a man with his best days behind him. Is this his last chance or one he was waiting for? Seventy years on, a room in Berlin is opened. Some secrets are destined never to be revealed. Major Hutchins is tired of life. It is the 1930s his Great War is behind him and he is fast approaching middle age. Retired from the services and now eking out his days as a clerk in a shipping office, he is once more asked to serve his country. However, perhaps the secret he already holds is more dangerous than the mission he is sent on. When nothing is sure Hutchins befriends a young woman in danger whose philosophy is far different from his own. Kristian Schmidt enjoys life. After the reunification of Berlin, he has spent the last twenty years developing parts of the city. His latest acquisition will open up a secret buried for over 70 years and unravel a trail of deception which will lead Kristian and his companion on a journey half way round the world, one step ahead of those whose purpose is to silence the secret.

[jonathan-gillespie-blog]

The Adlon Conspiracy - Chapter 8 - Visitors (on Wattpad) https://my.w.tt/OE4rktbZ96 It's 1936 and Major Hutchins is a man with his best days behind him. Is this his last chance or one he was waiting for? Seventy years on, a room in Berlin is opened. Some secrets are destined never to be revealed. Major Hutchins is tired of life. It is the 1930s his Great War is behind him and he is fast approaching middle age. Retired from the services and now eking out his days as a clerk in a shipping office, he is once more asked to serve his country. However, perhaps the secret he already holds is more dangerous than the mission he is sent on. When nothing is sure Hutchins befriends a young woman in danger whose philosophy is far different from his own. Kristian Schmidt enjoys life. After the reunification of Berlin, he has spent the last twenty years developing parts of the city. His latest acquisition will open up a secret buried for over 70 years and unravel a trail of deception which will lead Kristian and his companion on a journey half way round the world, one step ahead of those whose purpose is to silence the secret.

[jonathan-gillespie-blog]

The Adlon Conspiracy - Chapter 6 - Deep clean (on Wattpad) https://my.w.tt/KZiiqlTm86 It's 1936 and Major Hutchins is a man with his best days behind him. Is this his last chance or one he was waiting for? Seventy years on, a room in Berlin is opened. Some secrets are destined never to be revealed. Major Hutchins is tired of life. It is the 1930s his Great War is behind him and he is fast approaching middle age. Retired from the services and now eking out his days as a clerk in a shipping office, he is once more asked to serve his country. However, perhaps the secret he already holds is more dangerous than the mission he is sent on. When nothing is sure Hutchins befriends a young woman in danger whose philosophy is far different from his own. Kristian Schmidt enjoys life. After the reunification of Berlin, he has spent the last twenty years developing parts of the city. His latest acquisition will open up a secret buried for over 70 years and unravel a trail of deception which will lead Kristian and his companion on a journey half way round the world, one step ahead of those whose purpose is to silence the secret.

[jonathan-gillespie-blog]

Chapter 6 - the secret has risen,  now online. This sees a message intercepted by one of the clandestine security services. The race begins.

[jonathan-gillespie-blog]

The Adlon Conspiracy - Chapter 6 - The secret has risen (on Wattpad) https://my.w.tt/x3tYCtZF56 It's 1936 and Major Hutchins is a man with his best days behind him. Is this his last chance or one he was waiting for? Seventy years on, a room in Berlin is opened. Some secrets are destined never to be revealed. Major Hutchins is tired of life. It is the 1930s his Great War is behind him and he is fast approaching middle age. Retired from the services and now eking out his days as a clerk in a shipping office, he is once more asked to serve his country. However, perhaps the secret he already holds is more dangerous than the mission he is sent on. When nothing is sure Hutchins befriends a young woman in danger whose philosophy is far different from his own. Kristian Schmidt enjoys life. After the reunification of Berlin, he has spent the last twenty years developing parts of the city. His latest acquisition will open up a secret buried for over 70 years and unravel a trail of deception which will lead Kristian and his companion on a journey half way round the world, one step ahead of those whose purpose is to silence the secret.

[jonathan-gillespie-blog]

Chapter 5 sees Major Hutchins step into danger for the first time. the enemy is not the one he thought it would be,

[jonathan-gillespie-blog]

Harrisons buildings, Sunderland

I went to Harrisons buildings (the first social housing in Sunderland) as a child with my grandmother. She wanted to show me where she had lived with her parents. she lived through the Spanish flue pandemic which claimed her sister in that building. She finally left to marry in the early 1930s. Her mother remained there until she became infirm. I saw the German butcher's shop which was ransacked in the Great War and High Garth. I remember the Grand Hotel and the Salvation Army Citadel in Lambton Street. I remember the General Wolf pub where my great grandmother became landlady in the 1920s. it was renamed so long ago that no one remembers it by this name. And the Seamans Mission Orphanage in the East End where my two great uncles were cared for. Each of these, in some cases forgotten places is brought back to life in the books that can be found through the links on the previous posts.

[jonathan-gillespie-blog]

Garrison Fields - Chapter Listing (on Wattpad) https://my.w.tt/MAR97B1sI6 The first five chapters are online, the others will follow in due course. This is the first book in the series and is set in Sunderland and commences in 1905. It tracks the Burns family as they cope with Edwardian life on the river Wear.The Burns Pit - The 2nd book in the series, chapters to be published shortly, looks at the aftermath of the West Stanley colliery disaster, and how the children of the dead miners were taken and put into care.We meet the daughter of one of the miners, who marries one of the Burns sons.Harrisons buildings - The 3rd book. First chapters to be put online shortly. Martha and Joe Donkin, move into the first council accommodation in Sunderland. it charts how they and the Burn's family get through the Great War.Never look North - is the 4th, but not the last book in the series and takes you from the Great Depression and the Jarrow March all the way through to the Second World War as Luke Burns leaves the North to find work.

[jonathan-gillespie-blog]

Will soon have edited Chapter 5. This finds Major Hutchins life turned upside down as he is committed to a sanatorium that is a front for the security services.

[jonathan-gillespie-blog]

Chapter 3 - now online. This see Luke leaving home in the 1930s aged 14, having just left school and joining the army as a drummer boy. It's lucky he can look after himself, with what happens in this chapter!

[jonathan-gillespie-blog]

Just put chapter 2 online. This chapter gives the early life of Luke Burns and why he wants to leave home.