AN AWARD-winning Devon journalist and writer has penned a new thriller about one of the Westcountry’s epic swimming challenges.

Jason Mann’s novel Hidden Depths focuses on the themes of lost love, the murky world of fraud and climaxes with an extraordinary 28-mile swim between the Isles of Scilly and Cornwall.

In the story, a Cornishwoman facing the bleak prospect of years in prison devises a desperate plan to use her skills as a former competitive swimmer to disappear.

Jason, a shore-based volunteer for the RNLI at Teignmouth, who publishes under the name J.H.Mann, said: ‘Hidden Depths was inspired by a number of famous real-life disappearance cases, such as the Canoe Man John Darwin and Australian businesswoman Melissa Caddick.

‘The story examines the desperation and determination of mother and wife Catherine Carlyon who secretly decides the only way out is to leave her family and everything she holds dear.’

Hidden Depths is available on Amazon in ebook and paperback formats.

Two experienced marathon swimmers who have attempted the swim between Scilly and Land’s End provided advice on the swim scenes.

Mark Richards, from Perranporth, Cornwall, became the first man and only the third person to complete the distance in 2019 after battling winds and tides for nineteen hours and fifty minutes.

Vicky Middlemast, from Sale, Greater Manchester, attempted the swim in 2016 but was forced to give up in darkness less than two miles from the Cornish coast after seventeen and a half hours.

Jason, himself a keen open water swimmer who last year was the volunteer shop manager for the Teignmouth RNLI, said: ‘I am hugely grateful to Vicky and Mark - they helped me bring an authenticity to a key part of my story.

‘Hidden Depths is, of course, fictional but many of Vicky and Mark’s experiences during their swims are included.

‘I have lived in Devon most of my life but have strong family connections with Cornwall - my father was one of the county’s early lifeguards at Bude. My parents’ stories of Cornwall and my own swimming experiences are often the inspiration for my novels.’