DO you enjoy reading? Visiting your local to quaff a pint of ale, while listening to a good tale or two? Or perhaps even both?

Then local writer Keith Johnson might just have the answer to your whims with the launch of his new book, The Pubs of Pembroke, Pembroke Dock, Tenby and South Pembrokeshire.

But this new book is much more than just a guide to the local hostelries; it details the history and social background of the hotels, taverns and inns that have existed in the towns, villages and hamlets of the area. All existing hostelries are included, along with the many that have come and gone.

And Keith is certainly well qualified to relate the fascinating tales, for he himself was born in a Pembrokeshire pub, the Carew Inn, and has spent most of his working life as a journalist in West Wales, either on the Western Telegraph or the Carmarthen Journal.

Currently he combines freelance writing with editing Pembrokeshire Life magazine. And, perhaps appropriately, he lives in a tiny hamlet close to Cresswell Quay... and the infamous 'Fire Water' of his local, the Cresselly Arms.

The first chapters of this new book cover the changes in drinking habits and licensing laws over the years, including the local effects of the Temperance Movement, the arguments over Sunday drinking, the introduction of compensation arrangements to allow magistrates to 'buy out' existing licences and changing atttudes to pubs in recent years.

A series of chapters then deals with pubs in south Pembrokeshire by geographical area, with tales of pubs, of landlords and of goings on. There are stories of poachers, of smugglers, of someone who was so far gone that he felt he could shake hands with a dancing bear, of up market coaching inns and of others where the pigs had to be turned out of the parlour so that customers could sit down.

With the concentration of the military in the area, and with the naval dockyard flourishing for several decades, it is unsurprising that there are many tales of drunken brawls in inns. As early as the end of the 1700s, troopers of the Castlemartin Yeomanry in Pembroke were reputedly so drunk that several slid off their horses on parade, with the kettle drummer playing his instrument with his head.

In Pembroke Dock the fortunes of pubs varied with the vicissitudes affecting the dockyard, while several were lost in the Second World War bombing. In the meantime, a number were frequented by 'certain kinds of women' - one pub was even described as a waiting room for the primary activity of a nearby establishment.

In contrast, Tenby played host to a strong anti drinking movement in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, reducing the number of licensed premises to just 20 by 1926, many of them coaching inns.

Nevertheless, at one hotel the drinkers faced a 45-yard walk to the toilets in the stables - needless to say, not all ventured that far!

With Christmas just round the corner, the book is sure to be a popular stocking-filler. It is published by Logaston Press and is available now, price £9.95.