LANG SUAN, THAILAND — The Gulf of Thailand meets the shoreline here in a series of palm- fringed crescents, some populated with darkly tanned fishermen, others covered with little but sand and gently lapping waves.

Halfway down one of these beaches is where Colin Cotterill, an itinerant Englishman and crime novelist, lives and works.

His commute to the office involves stepping from one yellow bungalow in his compound to a smaller one, a distance that the local sand crabs can scamper in a few seconds.

Mr. Cotterill’s life here, about 500 kilometers, or 300 miles, south of Bangkok, is many a writer’s dream. An interview with him is interrupted by his wife, Jessi, a former English teacher from the northern Thai city of Chiang Mai, who informs him that the local coconut collection team — a man and his tree-climbing monkey — will be arriving shortly.