The Shore was three years in the making, although it didn’t take that long to write. It is slightly lengthier than the previous novels at ~148,000 words, but the main cause of its long gestation was real life getting in the way. Just as the oil industry was feeling the squeeze in 2015, I put my property in Aberdeen up for sale. Cue six extremely nervous months, which were anything but conducive to writing, before it finally sold, followed by the 101 things that need sorting when moving. Fortunately, I didn’t move far (as I rather like this part of the country) just south a smidgeon to rural Perthshire. A very different pace of life, a much larger place with a decent-sized garden, and a lot of time was pulled away from writing.

From the scene Tuesday 13th January, Gloriously sunny:

I’d meant to drive into town to stock up with food, then perhaps go for a walk in the woods around the local castle, a favourite haunt of mine. See how some elements come directly from life? There is no similarity between Jon’s castle on the headland and the real, but nevertheless how prominently it features in his world. Maybe that was the germination of the seed. Before the front door had even closed behind me, I knew my supplies would last another day and shopping could wait. Instead of heading to the car, I embarked on a search for the story the dream had tantalised me with.

Before I’d even left the village behind, a phrase came into my head: “The sun beat down mercilessly on the beach.” Accompanying the words was a picture of a man skimming stones into the sea. It immediately brought to mind childhood trips to such shores with my dad. We’d throw stones at random pieces of wood, plastic bottles, in fact anything we could find that would float. ‘Bombing’ them with huge rocks was perfectly within the rules too. The only goal was to sink them or send them out to sea beyond our reach.

The journal scenes are of course fictional, but do contain a smattering of background reality. The weather, music, and most interestingly, the dates do accurately reflect what was going on around me whilst I was writing the first draft; the idea for the novel really did come on Tuesday, January 13th 2015 whilst out for a sunny walk roaming the empty streets of Aberdeen; there really was a dream. When the fictional author speaks of visiting a local castle and going for walks around its woods, I had in mind Crathes Castle. Although Duncluff Castle itself is entirely imaginary, its setting was somewhat inspired by Dunnotar Castle.

As for the shore itself, it was inspired by a very specific beach, Skatie Shore (just north of Stonehaven). There, we really did used to skim stones into an inlet and attempt to sink random pieces of junk.

As for the cover of the book, it is a picture of picture. The beach is once again from Skatie Shore, and the footsteps leading into the sea are more than a subtle hint about one of the major themes of the novel. Whilst taking sample pictures of the framed photograph, I noticed reflections of the camera in some of the shots. Rather than changing the angle or lighting, I incorporated the effect so a person and door are just visible.