A killing as “an act of compassion” was the inspiration for a new book Maybe it’s Because (Holland Press, £3.99 ebook, available on Amazon) from Chichester author, 79-year-old Geoff Lavender.

Geoff explains: “The book is very loosely based on the case of R v Cocker (1989). This was a tragic case where a man killed his wife as an act of compassion after she repeatedly begged and cajoled him over a period of time. As the law stood then and, I believe, does now, this man was guilty of murder because he clearly had the intention to kill. He served a custodial sentence as a result.

“I began writing the novel in 2016, have written another one since and am currently working on a novel which I think will be longer. It will be my fourth. Part of the planning for the novel involved researching prison life.

“For this I am indebted to the late Erwin James, whose book, A Life Inside was a useful source of information. My interest in the law dates back to the 1990s when I was teaching A Level Law at a sixth-form college. I also studied law at the same time so I was aware of the case mentioned above.

“The whole issue of mercy killing has, of course, been of significance recently because of the heated debates around assisted dying. In the end my novel is a very human story about a man who serves time for what he views as a compassionate act and his efforts to find life worth living post-release in spite of all that has happened to him. It is also a book about London, hence the title.

“Maybe it’s Because is my second novel. I have been writing for most of my adult life, on and off, but it’s only since completing an MA in creative writing at the University of Chichester in 2007 that I have started writing novels as well as short stories. For me, writing is something I have always felt compelled to do. Playing the piano was also a similar obsession for a considerable period of my life.

“I do not plan any sequels to this particular novel. My two subsequent novels have been about two brothers who are due to reunite after years of estrangement and about a man looking back at his life as a musician on the London pub circuit in the 1970s while he waits to find out if he fathered a child he knew nothing about. Some of the material for my current novel will come inevitably from my own experience as the keyboard player in a pub rock band.

“This is the first time a novel of mine has been published. I have had minor successes in the past. I have a piece in the 2020 Bath Anthology of Flash Fiction and another short piece in the literary magazine Popshot.

“I probably started writing as a teenager and I went through a period in my twenties when I wrote terrible poetry. I would hate to come across any of it now. I think writing appealed to me from a relatively young age because I learnt to read early – I think I was about five – and always enjoyed reading stories. I think avid readers often want to become writers and I’m no different in that respect.”