Five Cornish Stories

About the Book

These five stories are either partially set in Cornwall, or future Cousin Jacks, as Cornish hard rock mines are called, world wide and beyond.

In the first, Cousin Jack story, the modern bearer of a famous Cornish name, Richard Trevithick, has a spotlight in human history.  He believes the spotlight shone on Cornwall, which, with its mineral wealth, ushered in the Industrial revolution.  Now, large Nations have been broken up into small ones, by the Financial Interests of the Three Cities Federation.  Both the Republic of California and Cornish Free State face serious problems from debt defaults.  Trevithick, knowledgeable about Lyall and Hutton, believes the spotlight can once more fall on Cornwall, as he sets out to mine gold on Mars.

The second story, about rich Lulu Belle,  features a Cornish miner and poet on Mars,  The third story, Trainee St. Agnes,  is a re-telling of an old Cornish Legend.  The fourth story Intellectual Property, is one of the author’s Patent Attorney stories sent in Corwnall.

The final story, When The Magic Went Away, is, in part a fantasy relating to King Arthur myths with overtones of World War II.

About the Author

Brian C. Coad, a metallurgist, (next best thing to being a mining engineer) worked on aerospace and electronic materials in the United States.  Born in Cornwall, England, he grew up near the Cornish mini-mountain called St. Agnes Beacon, featured in the Cousin Jack story in this book.  He lived in a village much like the one providing the location for the last story, When The Magic Went Away.   His SF stories appear in leading magazines, Analog and Asimov’s, as well as books published by AuthorHouse.  AuthorHouse has also published his collected poems, many of which are science fiction oriented, many of which have appeared in various poetry magazines.