On our way to Dartington Hall

We think (hope?) that we have finally found where we want to live. We can't buy the house because it is extremely unlikely that it will ever be sold on the open market. However, we can rent it and do so for as long as we want to stay put - hopefully for a very long time. It is substantially smaller than the house in which we have been perching for the eighteen months or so but that is not a problem as you will see.

The explanation is that the house in question is on the Dartington Hall Estate. This estate - which has featured here on my blog on a number of occasions in the past - covers over twelve hundred acres, includes Dartington Hall itself (where Marcia has spoken at Ways With Words) as well as a couple of schools, a farm, the Barn Theatre, The White Hart (a pub), The Roundhouse (coffee and snacks), the Cider Press Centre (now called Dartington Shops), a number of office blocks and, crucially, lots of houses and cottages. Click here to see more about Dartington Hall.

In addition to the house we are renting a couple of small offices (which is why we can manage in a much smaller house) and earlier today we took possession of those offices and have started to move things into them.

Gosh - even golly gosh. It has all happened quite quickly and incredibly easily which - rightly or wrongly - persuades us that this move was meant.

From the above you will realise that we have been very busy indeed, sorting things out and beginning to pack up ready for the move which will be in two parts: all the rest of the officey bits next Wednesday and then the house stuff about half way through March to give us time to have curtain poles and so on put in place first. So we are in for a fortnight of general chaos and a tumbling of our usual mediocre cuisine which will, I fear, major on quantities of unhealthy snacks and pub lunches during this period.

Fortunately there is one thing we will not have to worry about. The move is so local that we shall be able to stay with our present doctor and dentist which, for some reason, I find quite comforting.

The proposed cover for Indian Summer which will be published in October.

Meanwhile, on the booky front, last night I finished checking through the copy editing for Indian Summer - the book that will be published next October - and the final mss has gone off to Transworld and to Marcia's agent, Dinah Wiener (for the foreign publishers to read).

Dinah has just returned from the island of Bhola, off the coast of Bangladesh, where there is the headquarters of a children's charity - Bhola's Children - of which Dinah is a trustee. The island is not the easiest place to visit: there is an overnight ferry journey which follows the long flight from London and I cannot help but take my hat off to Dinah who, despite being in her seventies, makes this trip at least twice every year.

There is a big problem looming on the horizon for this charity, one we are beginning to see only too clearly here in the UK. The land that the charity has bought on which the hospital and school have been built is very low lying - as, indeed, is most of Bangladesh. There is an ongoing concern that rising sea levels will make this area untenable - and there is absolutely nothing that can be done to protect the island. Here in the UK we are realising that large areas (such as the Somerset Levels here, in the South West) are under attack in two directions: from rising sea levels and heavy rainfall. Now it seems that it is California that is in the firing line as, after months of drought, it is now facing its second torrential downpour: one that forecasters are suggesting will dump two inches of water in less than twenty-four hours. Hmm.

Colin the collie cross will not be going to Spain with the four "D's" (see last week's blog) but will remain behind to look after Debs' mum.

A beginning, a middle and an ending

For starters – I owe you an apology. Last Friday one of those Google thingies where they ask you whether or not you want to take advantage of something popped up. I do wish they wouldn’t do this. Anyway, I was busy and wasn’t really paying attention and I hit the wrong button. The result was that G+ snaffled the comments on the blog which meant that you couldn’t leave your thoughts except through G+ (which, as far as I am concerned, is a very bad idea). It was drawn to my attention about six last Friday evening but then took me a while to sort out what had happened and a bit longer to find our how to put it right. So, if you did try to leave a comment and couldn’t, I’m sorry. I shall be more careful next time Google asks a question. Having said that, I find what Google does is very good indeed so I am not at all anti.

They say that every story should have a beginning, a middle and an end. Well, a few weeks ago I mentioned “the desert” – the middle of writing a novel – so I thought I would look at these three stages from the writers point of view.

Everything you write needs a beginning, a middle and an end. Some of us use devices to make life easier (like always ending with a blog dog) but that is really cheating. So, here goes.

The Beginning.

This is marked by a huge surge of excitement as new ideas form and new characters chatter away in the background. Who are they? Where are they? What are they doing? We dash about in the car looking for them and have as much fun in drawing blanks as we have when we “find” (to use an old hunting term which is, I suppose, no longer “PC”).

Then it is time to start writing and that means setting the scene and making sure that the characters jump off the page so that the reader becomes a part of the unfolding story.

But is there really a story? Is there enough going on here to make a full length novel? Will Dinah, Marcia’s agent, like it? Will Linda, Marcia’s publisher, like it? Will Emma, Marcia’s editor, like it? Will the readers like it?

The excitement is, however, diluted by a sense of terror.

The Middle

The scene is set, the characters are known and we are on our way. Now there is the need to produce about fifty thousand words as we trundle slowly and steadily towards a conclusion. This is the worst part in one respect. It takes huge self-discipline to sit down each day and write for six or seven hours. With any luck there will be breaks but these will be because some little detail is required and a visit to the book’s location is the only way to make sure that is properly recorded.

If this is a desert for the writer, what will it be for the reader? How will they manage to struggle through this middle section?

The sense of despair is, however, diluted by a sense of terror.

The End

Now the whole novel is there in the mind’s eye. All that has to be done is to write it. One is reminded of a comment that Iris Murdoch made to her husband, John Bayley. “The novel is finished. Now all I have to do is to write it down.”

In some ways this is the worst bit for Marcia. “Will someone steal mu computer?” (It wouldn’t matter if they did – I keep the text backed up on mine and on a memory stick which is kept in a very safe place where no burglar would think of looking.) “What if my computer crashed and died for ever?” (Still wouldn’t matter – see above.) “What if something happened to me and I couldn’t finish it?” (Very valid concern.)

So we enter into the manic writing phase. Usually Marcia’s writing day starts with working through what she wrote on the previous day (she calls this “polishing”) and sometimes working right through from the beginning because some later idea needs to be introduced, given a foundation. Marcia calls this “threading”. Both take time and then she will write from between one to two thousand words.

Not during the end. Now she is running on overdrive. No polishing, no threading just writing at break-neck speed – anything upwards of three thousand words a day. Then, when she gets to the end, she can relax and go back and do all the polishing and threading that is required.

That sense of terror is, however, enhanced by this new sense of terror.

It has been said that whenever you go into a writer’s study you can smell the fear and the despair. Well, I know that to be true for the two of us but I can’t speak for all the others.

Does all this apply when you are writing about crime? I shall look into that and report back.

Our blog dog is called Zulu. He is a Patterdale Terrier and was, when this picture was taken, about to enjoy his Christmas lunch. I know it’s a bit late but “Happy New Year, Zulu”.

The last line of the book

The other day, Marcia said to me, ‘I know the last line of the book.’

‘Oh, when did that happen? Just now?’

‘No,’ she shook her head. ‘A few days ago but I wasn’t sure I had it exactly right until just now.’

‘So you know how it ends?’

‘I think so but I still don’t know how they all get there.’

You will remember from last week that she is about half way through the writing part of this novel. The question that springs to mind is: ‘Just how does this work?’

That is something I have brooded on in the past and never found a sensible answer but today I think I can see how it does work. Perhaps, anyway. Let’s see whether this makes any sense.

You are standing on the top of a hill. The view is incredible: directly in front of you the is a deep valley, in many parts it is wooded but there are a number of areas where there is open pasture in which animals graze and other fields where wheat and other crops are growing. You can be sure that down there, hidden from your view, there is a river running through the valley and looking across at the other side you suspect a number of smaller streams running down the sides of the hills to join it. 

Then there is the hill top opposite. It is a fair distance away but by peering through your binoculars you can see it is a smoothly rounded feature and a small cairn of stones has been built up there to mark the summit.

That summit is your destination. Looking down again you decide on the route you are going to follow but, of course, apart from the first few hundred yards, you are really guessing as you have no idea what you will find on the way . . .

. . . what diversions will be forced upon you, what fascinating distractions will draw you from the direct path, what obstacles you will find that hinder your progress. Above all, for how long will the present state of excitement at the prospect of the journey and the arrival at that cairn last. As all explorers know, there will be times when you really wonder why you are putting yourself through so much pain and suffering but there will be others when the heart sings and you would be in no other place.

So it is that Marcia knows the beginning and she can see her destination in the distance. It’s the bits in between that are going to provide the challenges.

This is without a shadow of a doubt the largest Pekingese I have ever seen. He is, as his name implies, huge. That name? Well, Maxmegapod, obviously. However, I am told that when he is feeling kindly he will answer to Max.

Visitors and the editorial notes

One of Marcia’s friends who lives in south west Wales, Vivien, was on holiday in St Mawes with her parents (leaving her husband behind holding the fort) and, on the way home, she called in to see us. I am delighted to say that she follows my blog and so is well aware of my recent obsession with corrugated iron.

It turns out that I am not the only one: she brought with her a mounted copy of a picture taken by the St Mawes photographer Ray Bradshaw which he has titled “Old Rusty”. It is a lovely pressie and I have found a frame for it and soon it will be hanging beside the tapestry of Trubshawe that Vivien worked for Marcia some time ago.

I would be breaking copyright by showing it to you but if you want to see what I am talking about, click here.

After Vivien had left for Wales, we had lunch at the pub – nobly served by Steph (who had been eating blue bubble-gum ice cream) and John.

* * * * *

We are approaching the moment when Marcia can safely wave good-bye to the characters inhabiting the last book to be written. Approaching - we are not there yet.

The dreaded editorial notes arrived recently. I say dreaded with no exaggeration. Any writing is as dear to the writer as babies are to their mothers. How dare this other person say anything negative about my baby?

We have a rule: nothing that I write goes out of the house until Marcia has read it, commented on it, offered a critique and (hopefully) some positive suggestions. The roles are reversed when she is writing. Obviously, over the years, we have learned to be gentle with each other but there is that initial moment when the process hurts. So, instead of starting off by saying, "The second sentence in paragraph three is rubbish," one starts, "This is really good, love it. By the way, you might like to have another look at the second sentence in the third para. I think you could word that a bit better."

Having said that the editorial notes are awaited with dread, I should add that the sooner they arrive the better it is. This is because the characters that will appear in the next book are beginning to take over but must not be allowed to displace the old lot. Marcia will need to revisit them when those editorial notes arrive and so is presently in that parlous state where she is trying to juggle with two very disparate groups: terrified that the old ones will intrude into the new book and that the new ones will, as it were, contaminate the old ones. That is why I say that the sooner these notes arrive and Marcia has dealt with them the better it is.

It had been arranged some time ago that Marcia would be in the Harbour Book Shop in Kingsbridge. As always, there was much jollity and laughter but had Marcia known when the editorial notes would arrive all this would have happened on another day.

Most editors are aware of the impact that their editorial notes will have on the writer and they tend to follow our practice. This time, sure enough, they start by explaining that the novel is really wonderful. I agree with that, but then, I would, wouldn't I? Then come the matters that the editor feels need to be addressed.

Actually, although I doubt Marcia would agree with this, her editorial notes rarely contain anything of great importance. Sometimes editors require what really amounts to a re-write and that has never happened. Mary Wesley also dreaded what she called "the blue pencil" and after one of the early books, having heard from Marcia what her then editor wanted, said, "That is nothing. If that is all she wants you are very lucky."

It was a great benefit that Marcia knew Mary in those early days. In fact there was a wonderful group of writers based around Totnes then: Joan Brady, James Long, Mary and then, of course, Marcia. These thing never last. Mary is, of course, no longer with us. James has moved to the Bristol area and Joan to the Midlands. As you know, Marcia also moved away but is now back but the town is poorer for the absence of the other three.

Now, as I write, Marcia has almost finished dealing with these editorial notes for the novel that will be called - well, whatever it is that Transworld decide to call it (and if I tell you the working title we shall the same problems as we had over The Ginger Jar which was published as The Prodigal Wife.

Anyway, within the next few days, Marcia should be able to wave good-bye to the old characters and be able to turn her searchlight on the new lot.

This is a rather special blog dog. Bennie is Vivien's father's dog and the two are inseparable.

Badgers and Swans

This week it’s all about links. To be honest, when I woke up this morning I was in a bit of a panic. What on earth would I write about this week? Mind totally blank. Coffee helped to dispel the sheer blind terror but did little to provide a theme, a subject, anything!

The Marcia said something about a member of the family. Nothing of any real consequence, just the idle comments that most couples throw to and fro - the small change of conversation , the contact calls that hold everything together rather like the delightful chattering you get with a flock of long-tailed tits. Out of that comment, and I now have idea what it was, came that thought. Links - I shall talk about links.

From the writer's point of view, thoughts and ideas: plots and characters if the writer is a novelist, bullet points in other cases - these come somewhat out of the blue, hanging there invitingly, asking to be given due consideration and to be remembered come what may. That last is so important. It may well that this 'thing' will have nothing to do with the book or article or blog on which the writer is working. In such a case it can, usually does, cause distraction and muddle but it is there for a reason. It might not be for the next book/article/blog nor even the one that follows that but these are the nuggets of gold that will become the building bricks from which the final work is built.

It is the links that turn these nuggets into stories - and even the most mundane of non-fiction writing should tell a story and tell it in a way that holds the reader's attention to the bitter end. Suddenly it becomes clear that there is a link: to use Marcia's The Sea Garden to illustrate the point, a link between Kate and Joss. At this stage there will be no idea what that link is: only much later will another piece of information be revealed and we learn that Joss has won an award endowed by Kate's late husband.

Sometimes one of these nuggets is in storage for a number of years. The vision of a journalist living in a converted coastguard cottage waited in the wings for many years before Marcia realised that there was a link here with the Chadwicks and, especially, with Jocelyn. Meanwhile, Cordelia (for it was she in The Prodigal Wife) had to be kept firmly at bay until it was time for her to step forward.

I suspect that some of you are wondering why we have the badgers and the swans. Well, the link is that these photographs were sent to us by readers - the swans by Helen in Portsmouth and the badgers by Susan in Kent. Many thanks to you both for sharing them with us.

Now for a terrible confession: I have lost the notebook in which I have recorded the names of the blog dogs. Marcia and I were having a cup of tea in the community shop-cum-cafe in Holne on Dartmoor when we came across this most delightful person but I cannot give you a name. So, if you know this week's blog dog, please post a comment here to put right this terrible wrong.

I should add that they do serve some really superb home made cake  - so keep well away if you are on a diet.

Kate's Kronikles

When we first meet Kate, it is her last day at school and she is saying good-bye to her great friend, Cassandra. Although they do not know it then, their lives are to be inextricably entwined. Both appear in a number of Marcia's books. Just for the record, here are the milestones in Kate's life – indicating in which book the events occur. She was born Katherine Beauchamp shortly after the end of the second world war. In 1957 she was sent to a girls' boarding school on the Quantock Hills where she was to meet Cassandra Mackworth.

Those Who Serve

Cassandra invites her to the 1963 Summer Ball at the Britannia Royal Naval College in Dartmouth. Cassandra is going with her fiancée, Tom Wivenhoe, and it is here that Kate meets her future husband, Mark Webster. Both Mark and Tom are studying at the college and both are to enjoy good careers in the submarine service.

Twelve months later both Kate and Cass are married and Kate gives birth to her twin boys in the September of 1965. She is to spend the next few years watching her marriage fall apart, a process exacerbated by Mark's mental cruelty not just to her but, and this is even worse as far as Kate is concerned, to their sons. Inevitably they separate and, in the March of 1976, she is back in Devon and working in a second hand bookshop. An intense affair with the owner of the bookshop ends when she fears that it is damaging her twins. Finally it is Mark who seeks a divorce, which he does in 1981, and for the next few years Kate is not only lonely but has difficulty in making ends meet as she has refused to take anything from Mark on condition that he continues to support the twins who, like the children of most naval officers at that time, are at boarding school.

Thea's Parrot

One of Kate's friends, Felicity Mainwaring, dies and, much to Kate's astonishment, leaves everything to her. Some eighteen months later she is to meet the famous artist David Porteous who is trying to find Felicity. He is taken aback to find a painting that he had given Felicity hanging on the wall in Kate's house. Gradually he tells Kate all about his relationship with Felicity which he had seen as a mild summer flirtation but she had taken far more seriously. To the surprise of both, they find themselves becoming more and more attached to each other. Finally, in 1991 and between books, they marry.

Apart from a passing reference in The Dipper and a brief flash-back in Starting Over, the next time we meet Kate is in Echoes of the Dance. It is 2004 and life has just dealt her two blows and she is grieving for David and her golden retriever.

Roly, whose son looks after Kate's garden, lives on the northern edge of Bodmin Moor in Cornwall. He is fostering a retriever bitch whose owner has died and he invites Kate down in the hope – one to be fulfilled – that she will give Flossie a home. It is during this book that Roly introduces Kate to Bruno Trevannion. We first meet Bruno and the mini-estate called Paradise in The Golden Cup. Included in Paradise is a row of four cottage, once used by boat builder, and one of these is empty following the departure of a tenant. Kate's house is now far too big for her and she has decided to sell but (and Marcia and I both sympathise with this) has no idea what she wants to buy. To give herself a breathing space, she decides to become Bruno's tenant, a move which is, of course, a drastic down size with the result that much of her furniture has to be left in store.

Now, in Marcia's next book, The Sea Garden, we revisit Kate – and Cassandra. You will, however, have to wait until it is published to find out how life has been treating her over the last four or five years. Furthermore, through some flash-backs, we learn more about what was happening to both girls between leaving school and marrying. Enjoy. 

The River Tamar at high tide on a rather nice day.
We are looking upstream from The Sea Garden.

The Jackdaw Jottings

One slight fear we had when we moved into our tree house was that we would miss the birds that had been such an important part of our lives. Certainly there was no evidence that any visited other than an empty peanut holder that hung on a bracket over the railing around the balcony. This we duly filled and waited – and waited – and waited.

Meanwhile the area was echoing to the harsh contact calls of the local jackdaws who spend their time up at this end of the village. They have a 'lookout' in the form of three tall conifers in a neighbour's garden. From there they fly out on forays, perching on roof tops and chimneys, peering into gutters, and dropping down to grab any small morsel that they can find. No one could possibly miss the jackdaws – or so I thought.

Thinking it would be nice to show you another photograph of one of these enchanting (if irritating) birds, I strolled down to the village with camera at the ready. A middle chap came out of his house, looking somewhat puzzled, and asked me what I was doing.

'I'm taking photographs of the jackdaws,' I explained.

'The what?'

'The jackdaws.' Seeing a look of utter bewilderment on his face I added, pointing, 'Those black birds'.

'Birds? Oh, them.'

Yes, them that you see here is two of them.

Sooner or later I shall take a picture which does not show them in silhouette against the sky. 

Now we are beginning to see more than jackdaws. With a bit of judicious feeding on the balcony we have a blackbird, a robin, a number of blue tits, a few great tits, one coal tit and, much to Marcia's joy because she loves them, a small flock of chattering long tailed tits that now call in twice a day – we have obviously become a part of their daily circuit. 

Blackbird

Robin

Blue Tit

Coal Tit and Great Tit at rear

Long Tailed Tit

And, of course, jackdaws.

Cafe society

Sorry but we leave the realms of the novelist's wonderfully descriptive writing and go back to the more mundane reportage of your typical hack.

It being many years since I have enjoyed café society, it has been a great joy to wander into Totnes every now and then and to chill out in bistros such as Rumour or Woods and to meet old friends in pubs like the Bay Horse Inn.

A very old photo of Marcia with Trubshawe (left) and Bessie.

Rumour holds a very special place in our hearts. Many, many years ago when it was still owned by Jenny and Phil, we used to take our Newfoundland dog in with us. Dear old Bessie was a great favourite with everybody and there were no problems for a long time. Then the idea of taking dogs in became attractive to some whose animals were less conducive to the social scene and one evening the atmosphere was somewhat damaged when two such decided to determine which one was 'top dog'. This fracas led to all dogs being banned and you really couldn't object: it is not possible to say 'yes' to some and 'no' to others. There is always a danger in going back after a gap of eleven years: places can be so disappointing. Not so here: the atmosphere remains much the same, our old friend Chris still works there and there is even a Jenny: a delightful and lovely girl.

I do find that sitting in Rumour gets the juices flowing and I have been writing some of my political pieces in there. That has been in an old fashioned reporters' notepad and so they have had to be typed out again when I get back to the computer. Dragging myself kicking and screaming into the twenty-first century, I have ordered an Acer tablet with a 10” screen which divides, one half being a full size touch keyboard (but without the number pad) and the other the bit where what you type is displayed. I will let you know how I get on with it and what other things I can do with it.

The Narrows in Totnes

Woods is new to me although Marcia used to go in every now and then. It is up in the “Narrows” as the top end of High Street is called where, yes, you've guessed, the houses are built very close together. They all pre-date the motor car but even so I can imagine it was a pretty tight squeeze whenever two pack horses going in opposite directions met there.

Most tourists and visitors never go into the Bay Horse Inn because it is right at the top just before the old road, Cistern Street, meets the new which goes by the glamorous name of Western By-Pass. Thus it retains much of the character of a true pub where you will find well kept real ales and cider, some of the town's great characters and a deal of folk singing, jazz and so on.

The town has great literary connections: the bookshop there is owned by nearby Dartington Hall where each year the literary festival, Ways With Words, is held and famous residents included the late Mary Wesley and Joan Brady whose Theory of War was the first winner of the Whitbread Book of the Year Award back in 1993. Both of them were very kind to Marcia when she was first published. It was Mary Wesley who said, on hearing that Marcia had received her first contract, “Many congratulations. You will never be happy again”. She went on to explain that on the completion of the second book the questions would hover in the air. Will my agent like the book? Will my publisher like the book? What sort of reviews, if any, will the book get when it is published? Will my readers like the new book? All very true, and just as true of book number twenty-eight as book number two.

Before I 'sign off' I would just like to wish Gillian, one of Marcia's readers, many happy returns of the day. The sun may not be shining today in Yorkshire but at least it should remain dry.

* * * * *

Jackdaw Jottings

Well, I said I would give this a go. No promises. First up is from an email that Marcia received from in response to my last blog. Here is a small extract.

The weather has been quite autumnal of late with the expected wet weather. We managed to get a second cut of grass & that’s all baled & waiting to be brought in from the fields. Paul’s tractor decided to go on strike (must be a male tractor as it’s very temperamental. . .) but is now back on form & seems willing to oblige with the said bales. The rooks & jackdaws love to sit on top of them, I think it must be a good vantage point for them, but they also like to peck at the wrapping thus creating holes which then lets the water in!! My job is to go round & put tape over all the holes.

Thank you for that. I look forward to receiving other jackdaw stories as I am not sure that the ones we have here will provide enough news to see us through the winter.

Living upside down

This week's blog was written for you by Marcia.

Living amongst the treetops is a new and wonderful experience. Two ash trees grow just beyond the high stone wall outside the kitchen window; their leaves glimmer green and gold in the early morning sunshine, shivering in the breeze. A group of long-tailed tits swing and flutter amongst the branches a few feet from the kitchen table. The sitting-room balcony is hung about with honeysuckle, which holds late flowers and scarlet berries; the slender trunk of a crab-apple tree pushes its way between the wrought-iron railings and its rosy ripening fruit arches above our heads.

...ash trees grow just beyond the high stone wall outside the kitchen window .

...honeysuckle, which holds late flowers and scarlet berries.

...crab apple...its rosy ripening fruit...

 A feeder containing nuts hangs near one of its sturdy twigs and, at last, birds are beginning to investigate: a few blue tits, two great tits and a solitary coal tit. 

...a few blue tits...

A robin hops in to snatch some crumbs and a pair of blackbirds are becoming braver. Jackdaws abound here. 

They peer inquisitively into chimneys and strut stiff-legged along the gutters, discussing life between themselves in harsh voices. One balances anxiously on a roof-ridge, silhouetted against the sky, like a stand-up comic who has forgotten his lines.

Leaf-shadows tremble across the balcony and the Virginia creeper, whose tendrils twine from the west wall across the balustrade, is beginning to burst into flames of bright colour. 

From each room we look across the village roof-scape to the high shoulders of the moor – much closer here – and see early sunlight slipping down the steep eastern slopes and a new moon setting in the west. Rain polishes grey slate roofs with a soft sheen, mist drifts and gathers on the hills until they vanish in thick fleecy clouds. Then the west wind races in, shredding and ripping the clouds apart, and sun slants in through the many windows: roof-lights, dormer windows, the big sliding windows to the balcony, so that the house is full of light.

Living upside down. I love it.

Books and ebooks and book titles

Unpacking boxes of books has become a bit of a pastime recently. I had not realised that there were quite a few that I packed before we left this side of the moor which remained unpacked for the whole ten years or so that we were 'up north'.

That meant there were a few pleasant surprises and none more pleasant than coming across a publication in German which featured two novels: Die Mühle am Fluss (Hattie's Mill) by Marcia and Liebesnest mit Ausblick (Every Woman for Herself) by Trisha Ashley. Anyway, I thought you might like to see the cover so here it is.

Another forgotten book was also published in Germany. This was a Willa Marsh book Die dritte Schwestter or Sisters Under the Skin. The cover is, I think, wonderful so here you have three different “takes” on the same book: English, French and German.

* * * * *

Marcia had gone off to enjoy a reunion lunch with some of her old pals and so, after I had unpacked as many boxes as the old back was willing to tackle, I popped over the the pub for some grub. Being constitutionally unable to eat alone without reading, I took my Kindle with me. As he was leaving, a chap who had been sitting at the next table came over and asked, 'Is that a Kindle?'

Anyway, that chat made me realise that a lot of people may not understand how ebooks and Kindles work so I thought I would explain. If you know all about them, skip the rest of this section.

The Kindle is really a very specialised hand held computer designed to enable you to carry hundreds of books with you in a piece of equipment about the size of a paperback book but very thin.

You can buy a Kindle from Amazon or from Waterstones. You can download 'Kindle for PC' onto your computer (PC or laptop) and then register your Kindle to your computer. That way you can order books from Amazon as you usually do but now you would order the Kindle version of the ebook and it is 'delivered' straight to your Kindle. If you want to be able to read it on the computer, you can do that as well. You will find your 'library' (list of books on your Kindle) on the computer and by clicking on a title, the book will download to the computer and (this is quite clever, really) your computer will know how far you have read it on your Kindle and ask you if you want to go to the last page you have read. Then, after reading some on the computer, when you go back to the Kindle you will have the same option: your Kindle and your computer are 'synchronised'.

What does all this cost? The main outlay is buying the Kindle in the first place. There are various options: the basic one is £69. With that you will also find you can download for no charge (or pence at the most) old books which have long since gone out of copyright: all of Dickens, Conan Doyle and so forth. Books still in copyright (such as Marcia's) will cost you almost the same as the paperback and, yes, Marcia will receive royalties on the sales of Kindle books in the same way as she does when you buy a normal book.

There is no regular subscription: once you have bought the Kindle you pay only for the books you download – which are also available from Waterstones if you prefer to deal with them.

So why did I buy a Kindle? The answer is simple: when I was having problems with my eyes I was unable to read books without using a fairly powerful magnifying glass which was, to say the least, a bore. With the Kindle you can choose what size the text is which made reading once again a pleasure. Now, even though things have settled down and I have reasonably good reading glasses, I prefer reading from the Kindle as it is easier than reading a book. The trouble is that I still love books and absolutely need to be surrounded by them but now quite a few of my collection are duplicated on the Kindle so that I have the best of both worlds – at a cost, of course.

The downside to ebooks is that this new technology is making life even harder for the small independent bookshops who are struggling against cheap offers from supermarkets and online stores such as Amazon. We do all we can to support them and we hope that you will too.

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More emails in this week from people very upset – and rightly so – who buy what they thought was a new Marcia Willett only to find that it was one they already had but with a different title.

Poor Marcia gets equally upset but the title is up to the publisher. If two publishers, both publishing in English but in different countries decide to use different titles, there is nothing that can be done about it. We try to make it very clear when this happens but there is another dodge that you might find helpful. Except in the case of an author's primary publisher, you will find that on the copyright page (just inside the front of the book) the name of the primary publisher and, most importantly, the title of the book under which it was first published must be printed.

The same thing applies to sites such as amazon.com in the US where Those Who Serve was published under the title First Friends. If you go to amazon.com and search for Marcia Willett and then click on the cover of First Friends there will be nothing on that page to warn you. BUT, underneath the book illustration will be a link: Search inside another edition of this book. Click on that and to the left you will see another link: Copyright. Click on that and scroll down and there it is: First published in Great Britain by Headline Book Publishing, a division of Hodder Headline plc, as Those Who Serve.

I know it is a bore but if you live in the US and are thinking of buying any book first published in the UK – or the other way round – it is worth checking out as above before you buy. If the first link (Search inside another edition of this book) isn't visible then there isn't a problem.

There is no real reason for this picture except that this is Sea Garden country. It was taken late one evening looking over the River Tamar from the Devon side with the village of Cargreen, in Cornwall, sitting in the shadows. The tide is creeping in and it is as if everything is holding its breath for there is a deep silence: a silence that was broken by the call of a lone gull flying overhead. Seconds later a tractor drove along the road behind us and the moment passed.

Time for a mug of rejuvenating coffee. Marcia has said she will write something for you next week.

Farewell summer

Last day of August. Some might say the last day of summer – and what a summer. It really has been the worst that I can remember: worse than 1947 which was pretty terrible. As you would expect I was at school that year and our sports day would have been cancelled, a wash-out, had the headmaster not been the type to expect things to carry on no matter what the heavens threw at us. He had fought during the war, as had most of the teachers, and considered the slightest suggestion that the boys might be feeling a bit cold or a bit wet as a personal affront – especially if it came from a parent.

Then the summer holiday started. If I remember correctly (and I may not for I was quite young at the time) my father was still in the army travelling daily to his office in the old War Office and so we were unable to go away. I was allowed to do what I wanted and go where I wanted so long as I did not upset the natives (or, in adult speak, our neighbours and particularly the farmers). The parents of the twins who lived next door and who were my particular friends felt the same and so the three of us would meet after we had finished our chores (which, in both cases, revolved around chicken and other matters horticultural) and off we would go armed with some sandwiches to seek adventure where we could. How different life was in those days – I cannot imagine many parents giving their offspring that level of freedom at such a young age.

Anyway, that summer life in the woods , the fields and the lanes was pretty miserable and we spent a great deal of time in the twins’ play room generally bored out of our minds, playing the odd game of table tennis and generally falling out with each other. How important the weather is to us poor human beings!

It has been just as bad for our friends in many other parts of the world. North America seems to be having more than its fair share of ‟weather″ and our thoughts at this time are with all who have suffered thanks to ‛Isaac’.

Having said that, yesterday the sun shone without interruption and it seems we are in for a few more lovely days even though the temperature has dropped quite a bit.

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We had a lovely surprise yesterday when two books arrived from Denmark. These are reprints of books (The Way We Were and The Summerhouse) but what we found rather amusing is the fact that the red star carries the legend, ‛A good read’ not in Danish, as you would expect, but in English.

Another arrival this week was the new publication of The Prodigal Wife from Estonia. Marcia has a very soft spot for the Estonians for whom she formed a huge admiration during the ‛singing revolution’ in 1989. We find it incredible that such a small country (less than two million people live there) can support so many book sales.