Running After Maria by Eddie Gubbins

Running After Maria by Eddie Gubbins

James Ashleigh lives the perfect life. Plenty of money, plenty of women and plenty of drink. Carefree, he is not tied to one place. He sails from port to port as a ships officer. Then he meets Maria in Finland and his life changes. Tied now to one woman no longer playing the game as his friend calls the chatting up of women. 

This novel charts the progress of those changes and the twisting path of James' life.

This is the opening lines of my tragic romantic novel, Running After Maria.

Chapter 1

Henri and I walked through the rest of the summer of my troubles, hand in hand, Helen, Alice and all the others forgotten. Close together, our hands clasped, we strolled along golden beaches by the sea to the sound of waves breaking and the screech of sea gulls. At other times we walked across fields and through the woods of England's green and pleasant land. The warmth of the air and the brightness of the sunshine, for that is how I remember that summer, resulting in warm sunny days and clear warm nights, making our senses tingle and the blood run excitedly through our veins. We lunched whenever we could in some isolated thatched country pub by tinkling streams or village greens. Sometimes we picnicked by the sea ignoring any other people by becoming enclosed in our world. For me, time appeared to stand still or to go very slowly as we focused all our attention on enjoying each others company.

Henri’s mother and father welcomed me into their house, shyly at first but soon with quiet  confidence. Without any fuss, Henri came home with me to meet my mother who soon  relaxed in her company. The soothing influence of Henri enabled me to relax and I had visited the library at the  college where I was studying. This was something I had not done since starting the course of study for my Master’s Certificate in the spring of that year. Often during those days, I would return home with an arm load of books to find Henri waiting for me, sitting talking to my mother in the kitchen of my mother’s house. 

When we were alone together, we seemed to be talking all the time but I cannot now remember what we talked about. Under the calming impact of Henri and the approving gaze of my mother, my studies progressed to the point where I had reached the place  in the syllabus I should have reached by the end of term, weeks before. At that point, Henri and I had even more time for each other because I left my books on the shelves in my room ready for the start of the next term. Thus the summer passed and I hardly thought anymore about Maria and Karl.

Running After Maria by Eddie Gubbins is available as an ebook through Kindle and as a paperback through Amazon. It is also available as a paperback from www.createspace.com.