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Couzens-lake Publishing Releases First Title

I established Couzens-Lake Publishing because, after many years working as an author, ghostwriter and editor, it seemed a natural extension of everything I was already doing.

I have now worked on more than thirty books and know how difficult it can be for writers to find a route into publishing, regardless of the quality of their work. Traditional publishing can appear inaccessible, while self-publishing often leaves the author responsible for navigating the entire process alone.

I wanted to offer something more personal: an approachable and affordable publishing service in which every author and manuscript receives individual attention.

Couzens-Lake Publishing was created to support authentic voices and well-told stories, including those by writers who might otherwise be overlooked because they lack industry connections or do not fit neatly into a publisher’s commercial expectations.

Its first title is One Way Traffic , the fourth novel by West Sussex author John Charles Hall.

John has lived and worked in West Sussex throughout his adult life, with a professional background in agricultural and horticultural businesses. His knowledge of the county, together with his fascination for its farming communities and rural way of life, has provided the setting and inspiration for much of his writing.

His first three novels form an alternative-history trilogy based upon one enormous question: what might have happened to ordinary people in Sussex if Nazi Germany had successfully invaded and occupied Southern England during the Second World War?

Under the Yew Tree introduces Joseph and Julia and the close-knit Sussex farming community around them. The villagers must somehow continue with their everyday lives while learning to exist under—and resist—an occupying power.

Stacked copies of one way traffic by john hall

Ash Before Oak continues the story of the people of Watersham as the English Resistance grows in confidence and begins actively defending its community, countryside and way of life. John drew upon extensive research into wartime resistance movements, Tangmere and Britain’s own secret preparations for a possible German occupation.

The trilogy concludes with The Holly and the Ivy , completing John’s counterfactual account of wartime Sussex and the ordinary people caught up in a very different version of the Second World War.

One Way Traffic takes John’s writing in an entirely new direction. Although West Sussex remains at the heart of the story, this is a contemporary international crime thriller involving murder, organised crime, people trafficking and corporate corruption.

The story begins with a peaceful morning walk through the woods at Goodwood. That peace is abruptly shattered when a dog discovers the body of Jonathan Green, Finance Director of the Chichester-based company Associated Sea Containers.

There initially appears to be little to explain his death, but freelance business journalist George Freeman has already been investigating the company for an article. The deeper he looks into its activities, the more questions begin to emerge.

John hall with a stack of ash before oak book

Alongside George is his partner, Scarlet Faust, a former Chief Inspector in the German police. Her distinguished career included leading a major international investigation into the trafficking of young women across Europe.

That investigation became known within European policing circles as ‘one way traffic’.

As Sussex Police investigate Jonathan Green’s death, Scarlet begins to recognise some deeply troubling similarities between the case unfolding in West Sussex and the dangerous criminal world she thought she had left behind.

George and Scarlet follow a trail which leads from Chichester to Scotland, Germany, Spain and Albania. Associated Sea Containers appears to be an ordinary international business, but behind its legitimate operations may lie something considerably darker.

People are frightened. Others disappear.

And someone, it seems, is prepared to kill to prevent the truth emerging.

Despite the international scale of the story, One Way Traffic retains John’s strong sense of place. Goodwood, Chichester and the surrounding West Sussex countryside provide a recognisable home territory from which an increasingly disturbing investigation spreads far beyond Britain.

John is already working on his fifth book, Tales of Time and Tide , which returns emphatically to the Sussex landscape—but has a very different story to tell.

Centred upon Clymping and the West Sussex coast, the book journeys through centuries of life beside the sea, exploring communities which have depended upon it, feared it and, in some cases, disappeared beneath it.

The lost settlement of Cudlow, coastal erosion, great storms and the changing relationship between people, land and water provide a thread running through the book. Its story will eventually look beyond history and the present day towards the possible effects of climate change on the coastline of the future.

Part history, part human story and part warning for the future, Tales of Time and Tide will also be published by Couzens-Lake Publishing, with further details to follow.

For the moment, however, the focus is firmly upon One Way Traffic .

John will shortly be setting out on the publicity trail, with local book signings, author talks and other appearances planned across the West Sussex area. These will give readers an opportunity to meet him, hear more about the inspiration and research behind the novel and obtain a signed copy.

Details of confirmed dates and venues will be announced on this website and through our social-media channels.

Bookshops, libraries, reading groups, community organisations and other venues interested in hosting a signing, talk or question-and-answer session with John are warmly invited to contact me.

One Way Traffic is available now, published by Couzens-Lake Publishing.