Rottingdean Rhyme

When a broken heart drives clerk and poet Yard Pilkin from London to Rottingdean, it seems he has traveled hundreds of years into the past. The village seems backwards compared to London, and its inhabitants distrustful of strangers. Yard strikes up an unlikely friendship though, with one of the locals, which opens the door to integration. Then he discovers that every man, woman, and child in Rottingdean conspire to conceal a collective secret. A Sussex Steampunk Tale featuring Alice Kittyhawk. Please be advised, this is a short novella, not a novel-length story.