A PASSION for space and astronomy inspired the first novel by a surgeon working at the James Paget University Hospital.Steve Cutts started writing sci-fi adventure Viking Village during idle hours on call as a final-year surgical registrar at a hospital in Coventry.

A PASSION for space and astronomy inspired the first novel by a surgeon working at the James Paget University Hospital.

Steve Cutts started writing sci-fi adventure Viking Village during idle hours on call as a final-year surgical registrar at a hospital in Coventry. The book was finished after he moved to the Great Yarmouth area this year and has just been published.

Set about 50 years in the future, it details an attempt to save of a group of astronauts stranded at a base on Mars. US naval officers David Hewish and Nobohito Kazu volunteer to embark on a perilous rescue mission.

Steve, influenced by the writing style of sci-fi author Arthur C Clarke, decided it was topical to set the book on the red planet following recent unmanned explorations there. He said: “As a trauma surgeon, things are often very dull on call if we have no patients, but you have to linger near or in the hospital in case we have emergency admissions.

“A novel is quite a good project to have on the go in such circumstances, especially in the days of modern laptops.

“This is an accurate sci-fi book which puts limits on the story but creates opportunities, too, as the astronauts have to think of realistic solutions to the problems of running out of food, rocket fuel, oxygen and water.

“Added to this are the problems of internal conflict between the personalities on the base and an argument as to who should be the first group to return to home when their space-ship is ready.”

The book has been published by Pen Press and is being serialised in 1st Edition Maga-zine. In the past, Steve has written a medical textbook and has had articles pub-lished in a national newspaper.

Copies of Viking Village are available online from the websites Amazon and Play.com.