Seaflower Books
Books on the Channel Islands
Reprinted in 2021:
JERSEY RAMBLES: Coast & Country by John Le Dain
JERSEY WAR WALKS: Exploring the fortified isle by Ian Ronayne
Published in 2020:
PHILIP DE CARTERET R.N. Jersey’s exceptional but forgotten explorer
The intention had been to launch this new title in Jersey in March 2020. However, the onslaught of the pandemic meant that publication has had to be postponed. In the event I have been forced to abandon an official launch altogether and simply made the book available to local booksellers and other outlets in Spring 2020. Plus, of course, copies may be ordered via this website.
LES MINQUIERS: Jersey’s Southern Outpost
This is an updated and revised edition of the book we originally published in 2011. There have been a number of developments including the establishment of a Residents Association, new conservation legislation, a further wreck, a third hoisting of a Patagonian flag, additional natural history observations and disputes between Jersey and France concerning jurisdiction. The new edition also contains several new illustrations, including four pages of colour plates.
Published in 2019:
August saw publication of JERSEY: SECRETS OF THE SEA, the long awaited sister volume to the author’s much admired 2015 publication, JERSEY: THE HIDDEN HISTORIES. Readers will not be disappointed with Paul Darroch’s latest which, like his previous book, relates stirring episodes from Jersey’s history, but this time with a particular emphasis on maritime matters. The back cover blurb describes the book as follows:
‘The story of Jersey is shaped by the sea. The treacherous Channel waters drowned the King of England’s son in the White plunged his realm into chaos. Jersey legends tell of the waves that swept away the doomed manor of La Brecquette and sprung the fearsome trap of the Golden Chair.
Yet the ocean’s call of adventure inspired the mariners of Jersey to traverse the world. It tempted Sir Walter Raleigh, Jersey’s fallen Governor, into his fatal quest for El Dorado, and drove local boy Tom Davis to build a fortune in Africa. The same pioneering spirit led Lilian Grandin, Jersey’s first female doctor, to set sail for China, where she would sacrifice her life.
Jersey: Secrets of the Sea is their story, imagined in their own words. Step onto the bridge of RMS Titanic with her Jersey quartermaster just as the deadly iceberg looms into view, while Islander Lucy Duff-Gordon slumbers in her first-class suite below. Discover the story of her sister Elinor Glyn, who found fame at the peak of Hollywood’s Golden Age.
Stand with the Jersey Company volunteers as they leave St Helier for the Great War; and watch the lone boatman in 1941 slipping away from the shadow of the German Occupation.
Jersey: Secrets of the Sea is the panoramic story of an Island forged by the seas, set at the crossroads of maritime history, and told through the voices of the Jersey seafarers who made it.’
Sales of JERSEY: THE HIDDEN HISTORIES have remained steady so that a second reprint was demanded in late 2019.