Tavistock at work 200 years ago

The problem with looking into the history of a place is that sometimes you end up with a feeling of total disconnect – a feeling that the place you know so well could not possibly have been anything like what your research tells you.

Less than two hundred years ago Tavistock was completely and utterly different. It was an industrial town which depended on people to provide most of the power needed to drive that industry.

One thing is certain, 200 years ago there was no Book Stop. It was here, as I am sure most of you know, that the launch party for Marcia's first novel Those Who Serve was held. That was a long time ago but the book is still in print and continues to sell in both print and ebook editions.

In the early 1800’s copper in considerable quantities were found in and near Tavistock. This simple fact had a huge impact on the townspeople in general but what I want to talk about is what happened to numbers of young girls and women: they were employed in the copper mines carrying out filthy, back-breaking work all of which started when they were no more than thirteen years old.

No Bedford Hotel . . .

They weren’t employed underground (or, if they were, there is no record of this happening) but it was their job to carry out all the work needed to convert the ore bearing rocks and detritus that was dug out below and brought to the surface. The whole process was called ‘dressing’ and the areas where most of the work was carried out were called ‘dressing floors’. Some were covered, others were in the open air.

No Crebers . . .

First all the material that had been mined had to be taken from the mine head to the dressing floors. This was done by teams of two women using shovels and hand barrows: usually in their twenties because this work demanded great strength.

Next was work for the younger girls: to wash out the rubbish and put to one side the lumps of rock in which there would be copper ore. It was important that these girls neither discarded valuable ore nor allowed useless material to be passed on to the next process. In short it demanded knowledge and considerable concentration. New girls would work alongside those with experience in order to learn the job and all day their hands – and often their clothing – would be wet as they carried out this physically demanding work: they would be lumping around pieces of rock that could weight up the thirty pounds or so all day long.

No Duke Street . . .

All this work built up their strength and they would be moved onto breaking up the rock and turning it into a powder. This was done in two stages. The first used short and heavy club hammers to break the rocks down to the size of pebbles – the second used flat headed hammers to break up the pebbles and grind them to powder.

Then would be the final stage: the separation of the particle of copper ore from the ‘guange’ (pronounced ‘gang’) which comprised all the bits of stone and so on which were of no value. This part of the job is almost exactly the same as panning for gold – using water to separate out the lighter guange from the heavier metal or ore.

No Pannier Market.

We are talking about quite big concerns: we know that one mine employed over a thousand workers at one time and the other was a somewhat larger operation. That would mean that a third of the town’s population was involved.

Can you imagine what those working conditions were like? Can you imagine any of our youngsters today being prepared to carry out such work?

One thing is for sure: none of Marcia’s characters would recognise the Tavistock of 200 years ago. It was the copper that lined the pockets of the Duke of Bedford who was to use much of this wealth to rebuild the town in the 1830’s. Few of the buildings in the centre of the town existed then: no Guildhall, no Pannier Market, no Duke Street, no Crebers in which to meet Felicity out shopping and no Bedford Hotel in which to eavesdrop on Kate and Cass gossiping over coffee.

This is the cover of Postcards from the Past as published in the USA. The painting is by Vitali Komarov and Marcia loves his work (we have one of his original oils hanging in our sitting room) and she was thrilled to bits when St Martin's Press decided to use his work on the covers of her books. If you want to see more examples of Vitali's work, click here. 

Vitali Komarov

The real loss is that there was no Marcia Willett in those days to leave behind a word picture to enable us to imagine what it felt like to be living there at that time.

Three Moors

In recent days, Marcia and I have trying to find the answer to the following question: what is it that makes a novel a pager-turner? Obviously there are all sorts of possible reasons and I would really like to know what you who read my blogs would suggest. Go on, put up your answers as a comment below. In one of Marjory Allingham’s wonderful Campion mystery stories Cargo of Eagles there is a delightful character who goes by the name of Monica Weatherby. She is, as she puts it, ‘the string man in these parts’ (freelance journalist for those who need a translation) and one of her sayings is, ‘I only ask because I want to know’. Well, that’s why I am asking for your help in this matter.

Incidentally, if you haven’t read any of the Campion books you have missed some beautiful writing, a wonderful if understated sense of humour, some delightful characterisation and some thumping good yarns. Be that as it may, back to the question.

We conclude that the number one requirement is that at all times the reader is able to suspend disbelief without even realising that this is happening. Thus one coincidence too many; one character doing, saying or even thinking something ‘out of character’; one reference to somewhere real that contains an inaccuracy; a plant in flower in the wrong season: all of these sorts of things can stop the reader and destroy that suspension of disbelief and that, once destroyed, is usually gone for good.

Putting the characters to one side – very definitely Marcia’s department – the rest of it is what I describe as ‘the geology of the book’ since it the very rocks below the surface of the earth that determines all above it. For the last two weeks I have been brooding on matters associated with Dartmoor which it is the largest area of granite in Great Britain. That, and the fact that it is ‘unglaciated’ (the ice shield that covered most of this country stopped just short of this moor) makes it a very special place.

Five views of Dartmoor including Marcia at Bonehills.

Just as special, but completely different thanks to having a very different geology, is Exmoor. Here the rocks are sedimentary – muds laid down by the silt settling in the seas. They are old: the earliest were being laid down in the Devonian geological age some 400 million years ago. Over time, these were distorted by two crustal plates (one to the north, the other to the south) drifting towards each other, pushing the layers of rock up to form an east to west ridge or arch-like fold. That is, of course, an over-simplification: over time there were all sorts of minor movements superimposed on that basic fold and some of the resulting contortions can be seen where the moor meets the sea. These rocks contain no fossils.

For about 200 million years this area was above sea level but during the Jurassic Age (from about 210 to 145 million years ago) parts of this moor was again covered by the sea. The sediments laid down during this period are full of fossils and are very similar to those on the south coast of Dorset which is known as the ‘Jurassic Coast’.

Then there was more shoving and heaving and, of course, constant erosion due to water aided and abetted during the ice age. Was this moor covered by ice? Probably not permanently in the way we think of the ice shield but there is evidence of the surface being repeatedly frozen and then thawed: with shards of frost-broken rock scattered down the hillsides and jumbles of unsorted fragments lying in the valley floors. All of this creates a very different landscape to Dartmoor. Rarely do you see exposed solid rock except on the coast (which is truly one of the most spectacular coastlines in the country). Instead you have softly rounded hills with deep valleys formed by streams and rivers cutting through rocks very much softer than the granite on Dartmoor.

Five views of Exmoor - with Marcia somewhat dwarfed by the landscape.

Then there is Bodmin Moor. Here we are back to granite again but this moor is much smaller than Dartmoor and, to my eyes at least, there is a bleakness about it – probably because, like so much of Cornwall, there are far less trees than there are in Devon.

And here we are on Bodmin. The second down is rather interesting. Marcia wanted to set a house (this was in The Way We Were) here on Treswallock Down. I was saying there was absolutely no reason why there should be a house up here - full stop. Then we came across this hut circle and Marcia, quite reasonably, pointed out that if people had been living here about six thousand years ago then there was no reason why they couldn't be doing it now. So it was that this is the exact site of Julia's home and I had to come up with the best possible reason for it being there. Oh, and that's her in the next picture down near where she set Mellinpons in Postcards of the Past.

One thing they all have in common: if you know where to stand and which way to look from Dartmoor and Bodmin you can catch glimpses of the sea; on Exmoor they are hardly glimpses: the northern boundary of the moor is the Bristol Channel or, as some call it, the Severn Sea.

I am sure you will all agree that we really do know which of these moors we are on when reading Marcia’s books. I am not sure how she achieves this but somehow she manages to evoke the differences in her wonderful descriptive passages and with only one exception (as far as I know) all the books are true to the geology of the settings. I will explain how that error crept in next week and I have to admit that this was entirely my fault – not hers.

From daffodils in Devon to snowy owls in Bermuda

We woke up to a very hard frost today. The field outside our bedroom was white as white – as was the scut on a rabbit that was running along the hedge line. I’m not sure how cold it was during the night but the temperature certainly started with a minus sign.

Since my last blog we have received copies of two more editions of Postcards From the Past - the UK Large Print and, below, the German hard back.

Only a week ago we were basking (well, everything is relative) in daytime temperatures in double figures with the nights rarely dropping below 5°. It is the effect this contrast is having on the plants and wildlife around us that has been in my mind the last few days. For example, last Wednesday as we drove from Totnes towards Avonwick we passed a bank on which there were daffodils in full bloom: in January.

In Cornwall they grow daffodils in their hundreds of thousands and when the fields down there are in full bloom – usually in February – they are a wonderful sight even though the flowers are picked whilst the buds are quite tight. The sale of these blooms, most of which go to London, are an important part of the local economy as are the sale of bulbs.

When I trawled through the various photographs of daffodils that I have taken, I find that the one below was taken on 3 March in 2011 which was a ‘late year’ compared to 2012 (when, for some reason I didn’t take any). It is not that this year is proving to be an ‘early’ one but that it is totally muddled. Following a wonderfully mild autumn and early winter we are now in the grip of extreme cold (extreme for this part of the world that is) and I fear for the plants – and probably animals, too – that have been fooled into thinking spring had arrived.

My main worry is to do with timing – although I fully appreciate that the weather this winter is in no way unique and nature is extremely good at solving these problems. Nevertheless, they do cause difficulties for some species. 

One of my favourite birds is the blue tit: they are pugnacious little people who always wear an expression of intense irritation. Baby blue tits are fed almost exclusively on “green caterpillars” and most bird books state quite simply that the parents “time their breeding to coincide with the hatching of various species of insects which start life as green caterpillars”.

2009 was a good year for the blue tits. Here are a brood of six youngsters, still in their juvenile yellow feathers, braving the rain and feeding on peanuts.

This is just not really true: I am sure that the birds are aware of changes in the weather and do everything they can to get the timing right but it doesn’t always work. If they get it wrong, the young blue tits often fail to fledge and the associated insect species then have a very good year with many more reaching adulthood. It’s a bit like the lemmings and the snowy owls in the northern parts of Scandinavia although there is becomes a very regular cycle.

A lemming

(Photo: Flickr user leo_seta under a Creative Commons license.)

Year one: there is an abundance of lemmings with the result that the snowy owls are able to able to read larger than usual broods. That means that in year two the lemming population is depleted because there are so many more owls. Nevertheless, the owls still rear a goodly number of youngsters. Their problems start in year three because there are so few lemmings and large number of owlets fail to fledge. In year four both species start from a low ebb but that gives an advantage to the lemmings and by the end of the year their numbers are well up. Then, of course, we start the cycle again. I should add that although snowy owls are the main lemming predators they also face attack from skuas and Arctic foxes – and that this explanation of the lemming cycle is not universally accepted.

Snowy Owl. Photo: Pat Haines under a Creative Commons license

No matter how it came about 2013 was a bumper year for lemmings and, as a result, there was a population explosion among the snowy owls. But a rather odd thing then happened – odd in the sense that this is a first. Some snowy owls left their usual territories and decided to explore pastures new by moving south in North America. They have become common place in south east Canada and a few seem to have taken up residence in Washington, D.C. There is even a report that one was seen as far south as Charleston in South Carolina and another in Bermuda. Bermuda? A snowy owl? Well, the report seems the be genuine. As I remarked, nature has a wonderful way of sorting things out.

Have any of you seen anything unusual? If so, please leave a comment below.

Meanwhile, you may remember that I mentioned that Marcia had been ‘interviewed’ using emails by a girl in Poland. Click here if you want to see read that interview – in English as she publishes her work in both languages.

Pottagers and Squirrels

Today Nancy is coming to lunch. Nancy and Marcia have been friends for rather longer than either of them care to remember: they both married naval officers who elected to enter the submarine service. They are, in the parlance, old naval oppos.

One day – oh, three or four years ago, I suppose – Nancy (who is a member of the Royal Horticultural Society) took Marcia to Rosemoor, an RHS garden in mid-Devon near Great Torrington. This, as you can see from the photograph, is a really serious garden but the important thing is that is has a pottager. As always with a good novelist, nothing is wasted. During the writing of Postcards From the Past, Marcia remembered that visit and, as those of you who have already read the book will remember, Dom has one in his cottage garden.

A really serious garden. (Photo from RHS webwsite)

Since moving here, I have created a couple of raised beds (save a lot of bending, keep things away from rabbits and means the soil can be carefully prepared for each season) but, unfortunately, really a bit late in the season. Anyway, in there are broad beans, nasturtiums, tomatoes, sweet peas and so on. An elevated pottager in miniature. We shall have to see how it progresses. By the way, the paperback of Postcards will be available from September 25.

To say that my life has been dominated in recent days by grey squirrels would be an exaggeration. But only just. If you are a long-term follower of this blog you will remember the fun and games we had with them when we were at The Hermitage. Adjoining our garden was a small broadleaf plantation which was perfect squirrel country and they would pop over the hedge to raid our bird feeders on an ongoing basis. We tried everything we could to stop them whilst at the same time keeping viable feeding stations for birds such as the Great Spotted Woodpecker.

Three youngsters in the garden at The Hermitage

That is not at all easy. Woodpecker bodies and squirrel bodies are about the same size: food in a cage that would keep the squirrels out would keep the woodpeckers out as well. However, woodpeckers can fly which squirrels can't so we tried using unprotected nut feeders in places the squirrels couldn't reach. That turned out to be a big ask. No, that's wrong. That turned out to be an impossible ask. Squirrels are consummate athletes and extremely intelligent. The score when we left was in the order of four hundred and twenty-seven to the squirrel and three to me.

Then we arrived here. Yes, big trees but no sign of squirrels to begin with. It didn't take long before they discovered that once again the Willett's were providing free board (but NOT lodging) to any passing bird or mammal other than the meat eaters (including cats and sparrow hawks) who would have to rely on their usual hunting abilities which might or might not be helped by us upping the prey population. And they are proving just as bad as the ones we had at The Hermitage and, in one case, worse.

A woodpecker and a nuthatch (I think, but it is not easy to be sure) arrive at a nut feeder at the same time. 

Worse because one fellow is slim enough and bright enough to have got himself into one of our caged bird feeders. I took a video of this guy which you can see if you click on the link below.

Male on a nut feeder.

So battle has commenced but I intend to stretch this chap and see what he is made of. New assault courses for him to overcome. New problems for him to solve. I will keep you posted.

You will remember that Roger and I were out on the River Dart a couple of weeks ago. When we go out to take photographs we are allowed to borrow the workboat of the marine engineers, Stephenson Marine of Noss. This is Poppy who is obviously a puppy (look at those paws) and is also a poppet. She belongs to Rob Hingston who owns Stephensons. 

To see the video of the squirrels, CLICK HERE.

When the night wind howls

When the night wind howls
In the chimney cowls,
And the bat in the moonlight flies,

And the inky clouds,
Like funeral shrouds,
Sail over the midnight skies . . .

(From the comic opera Ruddigore: lyric by W S Gilbert)

This last week, it has been the weather that has dominated the news and, as you can believe, our lives. Without wishing to become embroiled in the arguments surrounding global warming or climate change or what have you, I am convinced that there is much more energy in the atmosphere than there was. We seem to experience more gale force winds for longer periods of time and with even more powerful gusts than hitherto. These gales seem to be carrying more rain which must have been picked up by the wind as it crosses the sea. We are told that this is due to the jet stream being stronger than usual. I am happy to accept that but where is all this extra energy coming from?

After a good deal of thought, I realise that other than there is only one sensible photograph to put here other than the blog dog so, instead, I am showing you some rather self-indulgent pictures of the sky.

For the record, but mainly because we have kept away from the places we knew to be affected, we have come through unscathed. Having said that, there was a tree down over a lane we use every time we go into Totnes which, it seems, missed a passing car by inches.

One of our problems (if that is the right word in this case) is that Marcia enjoys a worldwide readership. This means that we are acutely aware of the effects of extreme weather events no matter where they are happening. It seems such a short time ago that we were worrying about people in Australia whose homes were threatened by the forest fires which resulted from a prolonged drought. Now it is North America that is taking a hammering - and not for the first time. We have been watching the weather maps for the other side of the pond with growing concern and we find ourselves worrying about you all.

We are also thinking about readers in the UK. So much water everywhere with people being flooded time and time again as rivers burst their banks or in coastal areas by high spring tides made even higher by low pressure and the strong winds overpowering sea defenses.

We seem to be over the worst now and so yesterday we popped into Totnes to do some shopping. Incidentally, while we were there we bumped into Storm who, as you may remember, was our blog dog back in August. He and his people live on a barge that is moored up Old Mill Creek. Despite the awful weather, they all seem to be thriving.

We had heard that the High Street had been blocked because of problems with a property. It turned out that this was the one in which the shoe shop “Conkers” lives and which is next door to the bistro we often use (and used yesterday) called “Rumour”.

"Conkers", between two bistros, Rumour up the hill and La Fouchette, is now the site of intense activity. They are getting on very well and it should be as god as new within a few more days.

It seems that the front was thick plaster on lathes of wood nailed across timber frames - all has been there for a few hundred years so you can be sure that over that time all the nails had rusted away and the timbers had begun to rot. Then came this awful weather and I am told that the whole of the front started to shake away with bits of plaster hitting cars and falling into the road. Rapid response by the authorities ensured that the road was closed before anyone was hurt and a team of scaffolders arrived on site very quickly to shore everything up. Now builders are busy seeing what needs to be done by way of repairs.

People love the old medieval houses we have in places like Totnes and Dartmouth. What they don’t always realise is that the reason we have them is that until very recently nobody could afford to tear them down and build something more sensible. Then they began to be cherished (rightly so) as a window into the past but the costs involved in repairing them when things go wrong can be astronomical – especially if you bear in mind that they have to be repaired in accordance with some very strict laws laid down in regard to what are called “Listed buildings of historic interest”.

On the wall under East Gate was this. Why?

Now for some rather more cheerful thoughts. Not surprisingly, we have received lots of emails from readers who have loved Postcards from the Past. Marcia is, of course, delighted that people are enjoying it and really thrilled when told that, as a result, they have re-read The Christmas Angel. These emails are arriving at a very good time. Most authors dread “the desert” or the middle bit of the book. The excitement associated with having a new group of characters has worn off and the finishing line is far to far away to act as a motivator. That leaves self-discipline: getting in front of the computer and hitting the keys even when the very last thing you want to do (ever again) is sit in front of a computer and hit the keys. Marcia, as you would expect, has that self-discipline which is why every year, on time, she delivers another wonderful novel. You help hugely by leaving comments here and sending her your emails: please keep it up.

This week's blog dog is a Jack Russell who answers to the name of Rizla. When we were in Totnes, we bumped into Storm who, as you may remember, was our blog dog back in August.

Poems and publications

Quite a few people in recent days have been asking Marcia about the poem from which she quoted in Forgotten Laughter. They want to know where they can read it. Well, the answer is here. The poem was written by Marcia's sister, Bridget, and has not been published. Very few people who write the occasional poem can get their work into print. Of course it is possible to make these available in this electronic age and so I decided to explore and see whether or not there are any web sites devoted to just that. I Googled "web site for poets" and came up with a few that looked quite interesting. However, you do need to know how the internet works to make this work for you and not all poets do (Bridget is one of these).  Anyway, enough: here is the poem.

DIFFERENT VIEW

I sat there in the window

Looking down below

At the cobbles in the courtyard

Dusted white with snow.

The scene was very peaceful

The air was very cold.

The lights from the windows opposite

In the darkness stood out bold.

I sat there in the window

In the evening without light.

I wished I were a grown-up

And could go out in the night.

I stood there in the courtyard

The cobbles wet with snow

The windows all around me

Had a welcome glow.

I stood there in the darkness

Wondering which way to go.

People hurried past me

Keeping their gazes low.

The night was very silent

The air so very cold.

I wish I were a child again

And had a hand to hold.

Thinking of snow, this last week we had the first frost of the winter. The lanes up on the moor were quite icy and so the time has come to bring into shelter some of the pots out in the garden so that what is growing in them has a better chance of surviving and a good start in the spring. It really is amazing how quickly time flies by for it seems as if it was only the other day that Marcia and I set off to start looking for the setting of the book she is now writing. That was one of those brilliant late spring days and so was months ago. Where have they gone?

Marcia with some of the readers after her talk at the Taunton Literary Festival.

We received an email from Chris Smale (Transworld's representative in this part of the world) yesterday with some pictures of Marcia at the talk she gave for the Taunton Literary Festival which is hosted by Brendon Books. This was, as you know, the last function in what is now last year's writing year (simply because the last function after publication day marks the year end) and so we now start all over again - except, of course, that Marcia has been working on another book since that day in spring.

Taken last spring from the corner of a field behind Torcross where
we spent many hours while Marcia connected with her new characters

Publication day is, in one sense, a double event: the arrival of a brand new book in hardback plus the paperback edition of the book first published last year. Readers who turn up at signings and talks have the perfectly reasonable expectation that Marcia will be able to talk quite intelligently about these two books without realising that this is quite difficult. Putting The Sea Garden to one side for a moment, since finishing Postcards from the Past she has written and finalised next year's book (to be called Indian Summer) which will come out in 2014 and is hard at work on the next one (it has a working title but that might be changed so it will remain a secret for now) which should be on the book shelves in 2015. Each book deals with a completely new bunch of characters - although we know that we often come across old friends as well. So, when Marcia looks blank when someone asks, "Will Oliver be able to work from the Tamar?" please understand that for a long, long and, for her, embarrassing moment she has no idea what the questioner is talking about. Really, no idea: she has moved on - which is how it should be.

This week we have Spike, a miniature poodle from the other
side of the Atlantic.

Let the signings commence

So the time for signings is with us again. Usually the first one takes place in the Harbour Bookshop in Kingsbridge but this year the proceedings started in the Totnes Bookshop on the Friday after publication day. Marcia was really delighted that this year the signings started in her home town. Friday in Totnes is, as you know, market day which means the town is very busy and the car parks are full – and especially so in the morning – so this year it was decided to try the afternoon instead. 

In Totnes Bookshop

It just so happened that Marcia's friend for a couple of hundred years or so, Susie (you may remember that our last dog, Jossie, came to live with us after Susie's mother died), was in the town as was a chap called Terry Ford, with whom I worked about fifteen years ago and have not seen for ages. It was a wonderful surprise to see him and to swap news. While we were waiting for Marcia to finish at the bookshop, Susie, Terry, his cousin and I sat chatting around a table in Rumour – the bistro just down the road from the bookshop – where we were joined by Bob Mann: writer and historian (Bob and I have collaborated in a couple of books on local history), literary critic (it was Bob who wrote the very first review of Marcia's first book - Those Who Serve), publisher (he now runs Longmarsh Press which he describes as a "craft publishing house") and good friend. Eventually Marcia joined us and the party really took off. Indeed, it was gone five thirty before we all decided, reluctantly, that the time had come to move on.

Bob Mann: writer, literary critic, historian and publisher.

Next day it was down to Kingsbridge and the Harbour Bookshop. As always here, there was a group of readers waiting for Marcia and a pile of books to be signed for people who were unable to be there in person.

Work is being done on one of the roads we usually use.
As a result we were driving down a lane we haven't used
for years and there, suddenly, in the middle of nowhere
was this lovely group of cyclamen in full bloom/

There seems to have been a subtle change in the signings over the last eighteen years or so. To start with there were far more people at the signings and virtually no books set aside to be signed in the purchaser's absence. Now that is changing. This is probably because more people work these days and so cannot make the signings but, whatever the reason, the number of books Marcia signs steadily increases each year.

This is the first of the foreign editions of
Postcards from the Past to arrive.
Please note the Newfoundland dof!

There was a report of an interview by Benedict Nightingale with Tom Stoppard in Wednesday’s Times. Here is something he said: “There are too many things I find it difficult to say no to. So I’m clearing my desk and planning to work without interruption. When I was younger I could do something useful just by being free for half a day but now I need five days to get the world I’ve left out of my head and ten days or a fortnight of not talking to anyone to hold what I need to hold inside my head. I can’t just put things aside for a day and come back. My brain just isn’t good enough any more.”

I’m a year younger than Tom Stoppard and I have to agree that getting back into gear is taking me far longer than it used to – and, unlike Mr Stoppard, what I do is not creative. These days I find myself starting to stare at the blank screen and then, without really willing it to happen, find I am doing something else by way of displacement therapy. Sometimes this is something useful (like paying the electricity account) but often it is totally pointless. Clearly this needed to be discussed with another creative writer, Marcia (eight years Mr Stoppard’s junior). Did she recognise this problem?

“Yes, very much so. Every year it is harder and harder and so difficult to get people to understand. It doesn’t take me as long to switch from one world to the other as it does Tom Stoppard but stopping for ten minutes to drink coffee with someone may not look much to them but it probably means it is the end of writing for that day. How can you be, say, down on the River Tamar inside Oliver’s head as the world shifts beneath his feet and be talking about something else, something completely away from your inside world at the same time? You can’t and I am going to have to learn to say ‘no’ more often.”

There is a bit of a story about this week’s very tiny blog dog, Beau. He has been rescued from a home where they could no longer afford to keep him and where he lived with a number of flea-ridden cats. These had been such an irritant that he had bitten himself almost bald. Now, after treatment at the vet’s and a few week’s wearing a collar to stop him licking off the medication, he is as right as rain.

A few weeks ago, we had an Oscar of unknown breed and I was asked what he was. Well, I have been hoping to see him again and find out from the owner but no such luck. My guess is that he is a cross and may even have three breeds tucked away inside that strong little body. Do I see a touch of terrier and a bit of labrador? I think I do.

Signings as of today (all signings last 1 hour):

Friday, October 18: Bookstop, Tavistock 10.30 am

Saturday, October 19: The Torbay Bookshop, Paignton 10.30 am

Tuesday, October 22: Bookshelf, Saltash

Saturday, October 26: Waterstone’s, Plymouth 11 am

Saturday, October 26: Waterstone’s, Roman Gate, Exeter 2 pm

To be scheduled: Waterstone’s, Truro and The Bookshop, Liskeard.

Lastly, Marcia will be appearing at the Taunton Book Festival at 7.30 pm on Wednesday, November 6th in Brendon Books, Old Brewery Buildings, Bath Place, Taunton. For details CLICK HERE.