The Dagenham Loop
The Dagenham Loop is a connected world of crime, secrets, and fractured justice where ordinary people are pulled into extraordinary situations, and the line between right and wrong blurs with every step.
Set in and around the fictionalised edges of Dagenham, the series spans small-town mysteries, accidental cover-ups, underground groups, and the quiet tension of lives gone sideways. Each story stands alone but links into a larger web of characters, incidents, and shadowy forces.
From the vigilante acts of Vigilantes Anonymous to the spiraling consequences of a body gone missing in The Shack in the Woods, the stories are about people in over their heads, and not quite knowing what's going on.
Vigilantes Anonymous
Shortlisted for the Pen to Print Book Challenge 2025
Fiction
Vigilantes Anonymous is a club where they don’t use the word “crime”. It’s a weekly gathering of like-minded people. Sharing is optional, but it’s rude to turn down a cup of tea.
Todd is an overlooked IT worker whose days are spent in the office or at home with his cat avoiding the social side of life.
Until one particularly bad Monday pushes him too far. An uncharacteristic outburst involving two illegally parked trucks, a tyre iron, and a couple of smashed bumpers earns him a mysterious card.
An invitation.
Drawn into the group, and close to the group’s linchpin Poppy, he finds himself swept up in their enjoyable, but petty, vigilante justice. As these activities begin to escalate, he is emboldened to start righting the wrongs beyond the group, solving workplace issues in ways his job description never mentioned.
But as the risks grow and the consequences close in, Todd attracts attention from someone far more dangerous than he could imagine, someone that he doesn’t know is there.
The Shack in the Woods
Dark Cosy Crime
One dead teacher. Two panicked teens. And a shack full of secrets no one was meant to find.
Jack didn’t mean to kill anyone. But when an attempt to help an old teacher goes horribly wrong, he and his best friend Ronnie find themselves in over their heads. Before they can even clean up the mess, the body disappears — and in its place, a bag of money and a reciept for its delivery.
Somewhere else in town, Jasper — quiet, observant, and not as harmless as he looks — Used to only follwing his orders he is given a task and to a insight into the wider elements of the shady business that goes on in the Shack. As he follows the loose threads, he crosses paths with Lou, the no-nonsense handler with a plan of her own, and Wyatt, a missing persons officer who’s starting to realise something is seriously off in his town.
The rest of the story unfolds following the good guys, the bad guys, and those in between who don't quite know what is going on.
Alternate Universe / Future
Within the City Walls
Young Adult (YA) / Speculative fiction
The City of London has separated from the rest of the UK. By retaking its total financial income it has allowed it to swell it's technical abilities and further it's money making prospects and in the process becoming a standalone entity in the otherwise poverty stricken UK.
Physically it is a surrounded City, not exactly under siege but always under threat.
Defending the City Walls, erected once more to protect the fragile financial bubble, is to become Noah Maxwell's new career. Living in Dagenham, one of the City's feeder towns, he is taking his first steps into the City of London's Defence Force. He joins a team of fellow apprentices to think and fight his way through the challenges faced by a City that has left the surrounding areas behind, a City that is the envy of international and local populations alike.
Being from a township rather than the City itself, Noah has much to learn about the Smart Technology that the City's financials has allowed to develop and prosper and learn about the ever present threats to the day to day lives of those around him.
