Richard Larn

I have earned my living from the sea since I was sixteen when I started a Deck Officer Cadetship with the South American Saint Line in 1946. Prior to that I was wearing Royal Navy uniform and sleeping in a hammock from 14 at the Training Ship HMS Mercury. Time with the Merchant Navy completed I transferred to the Royal Navy and was on HMS Vengeance and then Glory in the Korean War. I served 22 years, left as a Chief Petty Officer 1st Class Mechanician & Diver, during which I dived all over the world, initiated the idea of Aircrew Diver when stationed in Malta by dropping out of a Dragonfly chopper 10 miles out to sea, and putting strops etc on radio controlled gunfire target aircraft when they crash landed in 3,000ft of water, sharks and all!

Wrote my first book in the navy, published in 1969 and since then have had 66 maritime non-fiction books published with 10 publishers. Latest is "The Isles of Scilly in the Great War" (Pen & Sword Publishing Ltd) and currently writing the text for a coffee-table book "Great Cornish Shipwrecks" for Mabecronbooks.

I very much enjoy writing about ships and the sea, because that is what I know best. I have two novels on the stocks which I hope to complete in 2018, one titled "Finders Losers", about a missing treasure galleon in the Clyde Estuary, the other is "Captor", a Falkland's War story, with Argentine Navy officers seeking to revenge the sinking of the Balgrano - again, set in the Clyde Estuary. I live in the Isles of Scilly with my wife Bridget, which is a fabulous place to retire.