People across the nation have been taking part in National Read a Book Day.

The initiative, celebrated annually on September 6, aims to get young and old celebrating the joys of reading - a pastime which is not only enjoyable it’s proven to improve memory and concentration.

Recently we’ve seen exciting photos of a the star-studded movie production of Sarah Perry’s Victorian drama, The Essex Serpent,being filmed here in Essex. Location sets have been seen in Alresford, Brightlingsea, North Fambridge and Maldon.

The film, for Apple TV will star Claire Danes and Tom Hiddleston and is sure to re-ignite the popularity of Essex once it is released.

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However, there are several famous books that have Essex connections that might have gone unnoticed.

THE BLUE LAGOON- By Henry De Vere Stacpoole The romance novel was a huge success when it was penned in 1908 by Irish writer Henry De Vere Stacpoole.

The author had enjoyed a career as a ship’s doctor, which had taken him to numerous exotic locations in the South Pacific Ocean- inspiration he later used in The Blue Lagoon.

The book was made into a blockbuster film in 1980 starring Brook Shields. Stacpoole lived for many years in the village of Stebbing near Dunmow and was even an Essex Justice of the Peace for before relocating to the Isle of Wight in the 1920s.

THE FRENCH LIEUTENANT’S WOMAN – By John Fowles.

The author of this Victorian-era romance- published in 1969m and famously made into a film in 1981 starring Meryl Steep and Jeremy Irons- was John Robert Fowles, who was born in Leigh.

Fowles studied at the Alleyn Court Preparatory School in Westcliff and went onto become a novelist of international renown.

THE TURN OF THE SCREW- By Henry James This 1898 horror novella, regarded by many as one of the finest ghost stories ever written tells the story of a young governess sent to a country house in Essex to take charge of two orphans.

Unsettled by a sense of intense evil in the house she soon becomes obsessed with the idea that something malevolent is stalking the children in her care.

DRACULA – By Bram Stoker Bram Stoker made Purfleet famous when he included it in his 1897 Gothic horror, Dracula as the location for one of Count Dracula’s estates.

In the novel, the book’s protagonist Jonathan Harker writes: “At Purfleet, on a by-road, I came across just such a place as seemed to be required, and where was displayed a dilapidated notice that the place was for sale. It was surrounded by a high wall. The estate is called Carfax.”

EMMA -By Jane Austen One of Jane Austen’s most popular works, Emma, published in 1815 mentions Southend as the resort where John and Isabella Knightly travel by stagecoach, for their seaside vacation.

In 1996 the book was turned into a blockbuster film starring Gwyneth Paltrow while a remake starring Anna Taylor-Joy has recently been released.

THE ONE HUNDRED AND ONE DALMATIANS- By Dodie Smith Dorothy Gladys (Dodie Smith) was an English children’s novelist and playwright, known best for her popular novel The Hundred and One Dalmatians (1956) which was turned into one of the most successful Disney films of all time, as well as other works including I Capture the Castle (1948). She lived in a grade two listed cottage in Fitchingfield from 1934 until her death in 1990, which she bought for £425.