A former deputy editor has made his debut as a novelist by writing a sequel to another author’s work.

Michael Davies, who was second in command at both the Oxford Mail and the Stratford Herald during his career, has turned his hand to fiction with the publication of Outback.

The novel is a sequel to Desmond Bagley’s Domino Island, which was published posthumously following his death in 1983.

In an interview with the Herald, Michael explained how he was involved with both publishing that novel and now writing its sequel.

He said: “I worked on Domino Island for HarperCollins after the first draft of Bagley’s manuscript was discovered in his archives a few years ago. He’d died in 1983 and it was thought that after two posthumous novels there was nothing left to publish.

“But when this manuscript was discovered, the publisher, David Brawn, asked me if I’d like to read it. I’d been in touch with him over many years after pitching the idea of a Bagley biography and, while that never quite happened, it did put me in pole position when it came to preparing the first draft of Domino Island for publication in 2019.

“This year is the centenary of Bagley’s birth and David was looking for ideas of ways to mark it, so I jumped at the chance of pitching a new novel using the same protagonist – Bill Kemp – in an original adventure, although still set in the 1970s.

“Outback is being billed as the ‘Desmond Bagley Centenary Novel’ – not an attempt to mimic the great man, but a tribute to him.”

Mr Bagley wrote 17 novels and was one of the world’s bestselling authors in the 1960s and 1970s.

Michael, 59, added: “it’s a bit of a trope that most journalists think they have a novel in them, so I’m probably something of a cliché.

“In fact, it’s not my first novel – that was a very naive thing that remains firmly locked in the proverbial bottom drawer – but my background in newspapers has definitely helped me when it comes to not being precious about my words, being willing to edit ruthlessly and sticking to deadlines.

“As a journalist, you’re not allowed the luxury of waiting for the Muse to strike: you just have to get on with writing your piece. That mentality, drummed into me early on, really focused the mind on sitting down and getting on with writing the novel.

“It’s only taken forty years since I started on my first newspaper.”