Wigan author makes latest release a double with two new books

John Sharrock Taylor, who hails from Ince, has brought out his latest works – From Wigan Pier to Andalucia and A Rocket For The Lodgers.

The first volume looks at how John and wife Val, together with their four-legged friends, made the life they currently enjoy in southern Spain and gives accounts of Andalucia and the people there.

The second book, on the other hand, takes readers on a nostalgic trip back to John’s childhood in Wigan in the 1950s and 60s.

John said: “From Wigan Pier to Andalucia is about the life Val and I lead on our olive farm in the hills of southern Spain, and the animals who share it.

"A Rocket for the Lodgers is about growing up in 50s and 60s Lancashire, when Wigan was as real as Weatherfield isn’t now.”

From Wigan Pier to Andalucia talks rapturously about the landscapes and wildlife of the south of Spain, a land of white houses, olive-clad hills, foxes and badgers and eagles and vultures soaring above the crags.

John’s website suggests some of the book’s contents may come in useful for anyone thinking of uprooting and heading for a new life in Europe.

He also puts in the pages some of the memorable people who he has a met, with the book’s cast including a Geordie fixer, a master builder and a tone-deaf music critic.

Like many of John’s previous works From Wigan Pier to Andalucia also celebrates his love of travelling, taking readers to locations in America including the fabled Route 66, the Mojave Desert, the Grand Canyon and the Black Hills of Dakota.

A Rocket for the Lodgers, on the other hand, takes Wigan readers back to a very different time when the town and borough was home to boys on trolleys terrorising bus queues and a phantom rabbit stalked the cobbles.

The book also includes descriptions of the rivalry between the Millgate gang and the Lodgers of the title and a young couple’s love story.

Based on John’s 2010 book A Wigan Childhood, A Rocket For The Lodgers includes several new chapters and more than 30 photographs.

Both books are available now. For more on his writing, visit https://johnsharrocktaylor.webs.com/

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