Upper Slaughter Tourist Information & Travel Guide

Naked Slaughter (Author Nigel Lampard)

Seduced, Kidnapped and Betrayed

Upper Slaughter is a quintessential English village, yet underneath the cosy veneer of small village life lurk many festering secrets. Enchanted by the village and its surrounds, Sarah and Phillip move into Primrose Cottage with great expectations. However, paths cross, fates twist, misunderstandings occur and the one issue that exists between Sarah and Phillip rears up, causing fissures in their marriage. Phillip thinks Sarah has left him, Sarah thinks a sexual deviant has kidnapped her, and a very close friend uses this opportunity to play the seductive predator.
In the shadows of this previously idyllic setting, one man, a loner, seems to be in control of everyone’s destiny except his own. Despite the beauty of their new home, the journey for Sarah and Phillip is fraught with danger, anguish, and betrayal.

Naked Slaughter is a noir mystery exposing the sinister side of humanity and
the wavering flame of love's pallid candle.

The Story behind 'Naked Slaughter' - the author wrote the following especially for Cotswolds.Info.

Ask one hundred authors of fiction about what inspires them to write a particular story and you will get a lot more than one hundred answers. It can be anything: a person, a group of people, an experience, wishful thinking, a dream, a nightmare and so on. For me the inspiration for 'Naked Slaughter' was the village of Upper Slaughter in the Cotswolds. From the moment my wife, Jane, and I visited for the first time in 1997, Upper Slaughter became like a magnet for me. Every time we stayed in the area — Moreton-in-Marsh, Broadway, Burford, Blockley and Chipping Campden — I had to return. I would walk round the village in relative silence taking in every nook and cranny, every house and cottage, every bend in the road. But most of all I sensed the village’s aura; it had its own personality and magic. During every visit I always stopped on the footbridge over the River Eye and allowed my imagination to run wild as the water flowed beneath my feet.

It was during my third visit when I saw Michael walking up from the ford towards the village green. I saw him walk past Sarah and Phillip Preston as they fell in love with Primrose Cottage. I saw Old Greg at his garden gate as he watched everyone and everything. Most importantly though, I saw how I could bring these products of my imagination together into a story that would allow me to recount the imaginary secrets of Upper Slaughter. I always felt that it wasn’t the people who lived there who were watching me, it was the village itself. The feeling was so strong I knew that to do it justice I had to encompass the nooks and crannies, the cottages and houses, the bends in the road and a lot more into Michael and Sarah’s story. The Cotswolds are exquisite, the towns and villages border on chocolate box perfection, but with the magic of Upper Slaughter you also get mystery. The village has its secrets which I'm sure it shares with no-one, so please remember; 'Naked Slaughter' is a work of fiction!

About the Author

Nigel Lampard was a Lieutenant-Colonel in the British Army when he retired from active service in 1999. Trained as an ammunition and explosives expert, he travelled all over the world and was appointed an Order of the British Empire for services to his country. As a second career, and with a post-graduate diploma in Organisational Psychology, he helped British Forces personnel transition to civilian life. During a tour in Berlin in the early 1980s he fell in love with the city, its people and its isolation.

When he left the city in late 1983 he needed to continue the affair and the only way he could do this was to write about it, so he began writing his first novel. Other book titles by Nigel include — In Denial (set in Loch Lomond, Ashbourne, Derbyshire and Hong Kong); Obsession (set in Westerham, Kent); Pooh Bridge (set in Medbourne, Leicestershire, Germany  and Brunei), The Loser Has To Fall (set in Sarawak, Malaysia during WW2 and Leamington Spa, Warwickshire) and Subliminal (set in Ashby St Ledgers, Northamptonshire). All of these books are available as e-books and/or paperbacks from Amazon . The books set in Berlin, his first two novels, will be published shortly.