Why Boscastle’s harbour came before the pirate in a new novel

Picture Boscastle in deep winter. The visitors have gone, rain comes in sideways off the Atlantic and mist hangs in the mouth of the harbour. That was the version of the village author Robert Porter had in his head long before he had a story to put in it.

What came out of it is The Winter Raven: The Pirate of Boscastle Bay, a historical novel built around piracy, a love affair and gold hidden under the floorboards of a house above the harbour.

A pirate who came ashore to rob the village

The book opens with pirate captain Elias Teach landing at Boscastle to raid it. What he doesn’t plan for is Anne Penrose.

Across several winters of danger, separation and return, their relationship becomes tied to stolen gold stashed beneath the floorboards of a white house overlooking the harbour. All the while, the Royal Navy is closing in.

The novel mixes historical adventure, romance and Cornish folklore. It was published on 10 September 2026.

Why the village came first

Robert, a British author and founder of Porter Professional Publishing, says he has known this part of Cornwall for years. In a guest post about the book for the What Cathy Read Next blog, he explained that he wasn’t hunting for a pretty harbour to drop a pirate into. Boscastle came first. The pirate followed.

He set out to avoid the swaggering storybook pirate. Elias can command a ship and frighten people, but he can also be uncertain, vulnerable and at times faintly ridiculous. And Anne was never written to stand at a window waiting to be rescued. She argues with him and laughs at him.

What the pair dream of is an ordinary life. A house, horses, a kitchen garden, a fire of their own. The gold under the floorboards becomes their way of buying it, and the closer they get to having enough, the more fragile that future looks.

How a story turns into a legend

Folklore runs through the book. Robert wanted the village’s memory of Elias and Anne to drift away from what really happened to them, in the way stories shift as they’re retold and the awkward details quietly fall out.

“I think its real subject is memory,” he wrote.

Where to find it

The Winter Raven is out in paperback and ebook through Amazon. Robert says several independent Cornish bookshops have been sent details on ordering stock through Ingram’s distribution network.

He has a second Cornwall-inspired book on the way too, a Christmas title, which will also come out in paperback and ebook.

📷The Winter Raven: The Pirate of Boscastle Bay by Robert Porter. Credit: Robert Porter

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