ENCOUNTERS NEEDED A GOOD PLACE TO SITE A PRISON

Right back at the start, when I was planning ENCOUNTERS, I knew at least one of my characters was going to find themselves in an hermetically sealed room. When I researched Suffolk looking for a suitable place to site my prison cell I was delighted to discover a Martello Tower was just down the coast - exactly where I wanted it to be.


These coastal defence forts were built by the British Army during the nineteenth century. The army built towers using this design, all over the British Empire, from Ireland to Canada, and many still survive. 

The name Martello originates from a circular stone tower built in Corsica, at Mortella Point. French troops occupied the island, and the Corsican patriots pleaded for British help to drive the French out. The tower fell after several days concerted effort and its strength impressed enough for the British army to build a lot of them.

Do you want to try describing a castle that looks like it was made from three buckets of very solid sand? ;)

Not a castle, the tower’s flat top was hemmed with a single low rail and two security guards – but they were probably detachable. The three curving walls they could see from the side made it look as if a child had emptied large buckets of sand there - three or four times. Built onto a shingle beach, access to the tower was across a wooden drawbridge. It would be easy to defend.