Author Leslie Thomas, who died in May at the age of 83, was all the rage in the Watford Observer 40 years ago this month. Although by 1974, he hadn’t lived in the area for six years, the man most remembered for his novel The Virgin Soldiers, had just published “a bawdy new best-seller – based on his life in Carpenders Park.

In an article headed “Tongues are wagging in Leslie’s flat-roof land”, Thomas discussed the book and spoke about his life in the area.

It reads: “Tropic of Ruislip (published by Eyre Methuen at £2.25) is described as an exposé of flat-roof man, probing the “fears, snobberies, frustrations and lusts” of people living on a modern executive housing estate 30 miles from Central London.

“Leslie Thomas lived in On the Hill until six years ago and has drawn freely on his experiences there for his latest novel.

“Although he has changed the name of the area from Carpenders Park to Plummers Park, anyone knowing the district will not find it difficult to recognise.

"For one thing, the modern estate is separated by a railway track embankment from a massive council estate built to house the overflow population from London, which closely resembles the GLC South Oxhey complex.

“But Mr Thomas told the Watford Observer from his Dorset home: ‘Although the setting is Carpenders Park, I have taken great care with the people and I don’t think you will find the invidiuals in the book living there.

“‘The attitudes are fairly general, coloured by living in that sort of environment. I was a flat-roof man myself and I am not sneering at them. There are no villains and the conclusions do not accuse anyone. I think it is just observing something that is under our noses.

“‘I don’t think there is anything in the book to offend people living in Carpenders Park.’

“The ‘hero’ of Tropic of Ruislip is a slothful local newspaper reporter called Andrew Maiby, who has an affair with a young girl from ‘the other side of the tracks’. Mr Thomas says the reporter character is mostly fictional (‘I was not so lazy, I was very ambitious when I was on local papers’) and rejects claims that there is a lot of wife-swapping in the novel. ‘It is not Peyton Place and it is not supposed to be,’ he adds definitely.

“Mr Thomas sees the book as a social document as well as a good read. His subjects and settings – the army, Dr Barnardo’s Homes and the South Seas among them – are all things he has experienced at first hand.

“The flat-roof man exposé was born in a Hampshire hotel lounge when he overheard a batch of executive housewives talking about the oddities of their environment.

“I decided that a good deal had been written about big cities, slums, villages and everywhere else. But after I had moved from Carpenders Park it struck me that I had been living in the middle of a sociological fact,” he explained.

“These executive housing estates are all over the country outside any big city. But they never seem part of the country, they are manufactured almost.

“And it did seem to me that here was an opportunity to write a book about something people had never written about before.’

“The climax of the book – when Andrew Maiby is badly burned while rescuing people from a blazing house – is based on the true-life drama in which Leslie Thomas was involved.

“In August 1966, he received severe burns after saving twins from a burning house in On the Hill. One man died in that fire and four people, including three children, were injured.

“Although the details of the fire in the book are fictional, the horror of actually being trapped in a burning building are vividly conveyed. It is something Mr Thomas does not like to recall.

“He said simply: ‘I had the experience of being in a fire and used it. It happened a long time ago and the sooner it is forgotten the better. They presented me with a bravery award, but a week later I lost it. I just wanted to forget about it.’

“Now, the people of Carpenders Park, may find themselves on the tourist track if readers of the book want to see the ‘real thing’. And plenty of people are reading Tropic of Ruislip, which Mr Thomas believes will be his most successful novel since The Virgin Soldiers.”