An Ely author, who stood as a Green Party candidate, has published his fourth novel.

Ely Standard: Clive Semmens has published his fourth novel, ExileClive Semmens has published his fourth novel, Exile (Image: Archant)

Clive Semmens’s novel, Exile, focuses on a resourceful young dissident who flees England’s murderous, authoritarian regime and finds himself in a strange country where he doesn’t know the local language or culture.

Stuck in a place where no-one speaks his language, many of the people he meets are friendly and helpful, but it’s not all plain sailing…

Clive said: “This is by no means a recount, it’s entirely fiction, but is certainly much informed by Clive’s own experience in rural India, where the locals have not a word of English, and he initially had not a word of Hindi.”

Clive met his wife of 33 years in India so speaks with experience of feeling out of place in a foreign culture.

Ely Standard: Clive Semmens has published his fourth novel, ExileClive Semmens has published his fourth novel, Exile (Image: Archant)

He brings Exile’s world and its people to life.

He said: “According to legend, some sort of controlled flight had been commonplace in ancient times.

“I suspected there was more truth in the legends than most people believed.”

Clive retired in 2007, after a varied career in engineering, education, providing technical advice for a charity in India, academic publishing, and technical writing.

His first novel, The Reminiscences of Penny Lane, appeared in 2010. Exile is his fourth novel, following Pawns, and Pawns’s sequel, Going Forth.

They were published shortly before the general election in 2015, when Clive was the Green Party candidate in South East Cambridgeshire.

• At £9.99 the book is available from Amazon.