New
Badman: The Ghost of King
John
In between writing new stories for Little Red Tractor and
working on other projects, I had
an idea for a ghost story.
We were living in an old Norfolk manor house at the time and
as King John had a close association with Norfolk, I based the
plot around an imagined haunting of the manor house and the
last eight days of King
John's reign.
Towards the end of
2014, when events for
the 800th anniversary
of Magna Carta were
being publicised, it
dawned on me (I was
always a bit slow on
the uptake) that I
would have to get
cracking if I wanted to
launch the book on the
800th anniversary
following bad King
John's death.
October 5th 1216: King John is in the Norfolk Port of Lynn.
On the same day, 800 years later, a new family move into
a Norfolk Manor House. They are excited at the prospect
of living in such an historic building, but that is before
they meet the ghost! The ghost is is thought to be King John,
searching for his lost treasure. Edna Catchpole, the housekeeper
expects another quick exit. Most tenants flee the old house within
a few weeks, but Fiona (13) and Nick (10) have other ideas. They
team-up with Edna and their great aunt Daphne to confront the
ghost. After several hair raising experiences, they realise that
the ghost is trying to tell them something. Under his directions
they
find secret stairs, tunnels and a skeleton. The tunnel with
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