Daughters of Warrington author Brian Darwent release rest of his works

Brian Darwent, originally of Great Sankey, was described as a ‘self-taught book lover and prolific writer’, having penned many books during his lifetime.

His daughters Rebecca Ravetto and Suzanne Cox spent his final years helping him to publish some of the stories he had written following his retirement working as a draughtsman.

And after Brian’s sad death in 2022, following a battle with prostate cancer, the devoted daughters have continued and successfully managed to publish the last of his works.

Speaking on her father and his natural born creativity, Rebecca said: “Dad was a self-taught book lover and a prolific writer of short stories.

“He was artistic in a visual sense with a great talent for drawing and a successful career as a draughtsman.

“Writing was far more important to him as a creative outlet though and he felt a strong need to leave behind a legacy for family and friends.”

Brian Darwent (Image: Supplied) The 54-year-old secondary school teacher described how her father “devoted chunks of time at home and during his lunch hour at work to writing stories” and labelled him a “perfectionist in every way possible”.

“All aspects of presentation had to be just so - punctuation, spacing, indentation etc - and he enjoyed the process of compiling each manuscript.”

Brian’s first published book, Italy Again and Again was released in February 1998 and was a memoir of his travels around the country.

This was followed up by his novel How to be an Older Writer which was published in August 2006.

And then Driving Through Life which was released online in 2020.

Brian was born in Great Sankey and went to Great Sankey High School before going onto Wade Deacon Grammar School.

He eventually left the area, but Rebecca and Suzanne explained that due to the onset of the pandemic in 2020, this brought the writer back to Warrington, residing in Frodsham nearby to Rebecca so he could be close to family.

Rebecca went on to detail how the mission to publish the rest of his works came about.

She said: “It was during this time that we started talking about unpublished manuscripts and made contact with Michael Terence Publishing in London.

“Dad always felt disappointed that nobody showed much interest in his writing and had pretty much given up on any further activity, but we talked about what he would like to see published and started discussing front covers.

Brian's daughters have devoted time since his death to getting the remainder of his literary works published in memory of him (Image: Supplied) “We'd like to think that Dad felt motivated and re-energised by these plans, and we imagined a collection of the six paperbacks on a bookshelf and how satisfying that would be.”

Sadly, Brian became ill in 2022, and the trio only managed to publish Driving Through Life, a motoring novel, released in the November before his death.

“He was involved in the design of the cover and was very happy with the result. On what turned out to be his last day in hospital, we discussed the cover for Inside the Globe, another of his fictional stories.”

“He had been told as young boy that if you dug a flap of earth from the ground, you could actually see inside the globe,” Rebecca continued.

 “In his hospital bed, he described a young boy in shorts kneeling on the ground and peering inside a globe.

“We were able to describe this to an illustrator who captured this image perfectly.”

Inside the Globe was successfully published with the persistence of Rebecca and Suzanne in April 2023.

And one of his final works to be published most recently was Back to the Drawing Board.

“This book chronicles the struggles and successes of Dad's working life including during the Merchant Navy. Whilst his final book, Bertrand Russell at the Free Trade Hall, which is to be published imminently, devotes a chapter to each of his literary heroes.”

During the authors final weeks battling cancer, Rebecca and Suzanne would sit by his hospital bedside and Rebecca would read him a bedtime story – she noted that “more often than not he would ask for one of his own stories.

“When I had finished, he would say ‘It's rather good, isn't it?’ and I would say ‘Yes, Dad, it really is’.

“The best tribute we can make to our much-loved Dad is to publicise his books, particularly in the Warrington area where he grew up.”

Suzanne described how the efforts to publish the rest of his literary works during his later life brought the three closer together and her and her sister continued to work at getting the remaining stories published to carry on his legacy after his death.

All of Brian’s titles are available to purchase on Amazon in hard back edition, as well as in the Curious Cat Bookshop in Frodsham.