How it all started

As I wrote last week’s contribution my mind went back before our marriage to our first contact, I say contact because we were pen pals. Mike was in the RAF in Cyprus in the days of EOKA working as a photographer. I was a dental nurse in Eastbourne. One day a friend asked if I’d like to write to a poor lonely serviceman, I wasn’t particularly interested but she sent my address any way. Sometime later a letter arrived, I was so taken aback that I wasn’t sure what to say in my first letter back to him, so my Mum wrote it on my behalf!!

Mike told me later that he was quite taken by this first letter, liked my sense of humour and personality, it was ages before I could bring myself to tell him it was my mother he had been so impressed with. Things developed and I started to write for myself, before long we were writing everyday sometimes as much as 20 odd pages. Now I can’t think of what we wrote about but it did take most of my non working life. In order to get to know each better we took Vogue and Good House Keeping Magazines which we would discuss so our letters crossed one another. Finally after over nearly two years Mike proposed to me by letter, we still hadn’t met. Naturally I accepted, Mike wrote my Dad who was very suspicious but gave his blessing with certain conditions which we ignored and started to plan our wedding and life together. It was nearly time for Mike to come home so by now we didn’t have long to wait. Virtually all my family pronounced doom for us “It’ll never last, you’ll be divorced in a year” and yet here we are over fifty years later still together without writing a single letter since.

How things change

Back again, while I have been away I went to my Granddaughter wedding arranged in most unusual circumstances. A friend of a friend of theirs had booked a wedding at one of those hotel places where they do weddings as a speciality and paid a hefty non returnable deposit. All was well until his bride to be left him with a non wedding and a loss of £5000. His friend said why don’t you sell it, I know a couple who are always talking of getting married and so it was that my Granddaughter had a very sudden wedding. Naturally we went and were surprised at the grandeur of it all. It seems to me that weddings have increased out of all proportion with the meal alone reputedly costing £60 a head.

I remember when we got married the buffet cost 7/6 a head (37.5p) and we got married in a room above a pub as I remember it we seemed to have a lot more fun. We married in March so that we got maximum benefit from the tax rebate which was available at the time. If you married just before April 6^th you were classed as married for the whole of the previous year and so were paid a rebate, I thinks ours was £25 or something like it. We left our wedding by train for the Midlands and a 22’ caravan in a field near to where my husband worked. We took a taxi to our new home and caused the driver a little concern when we asked him to stop by a hole in a hedge which we passed through to start our new life together. To us it was more important to be together than wait to save for the fripperies of to-days weddings. Still the world has moved on but it’s fun to look back and enjoy our memories both long and short.

Holiday please read the earlier ones!!

      We’re off on holiday for a couple of weeks catch you in August, hope the sun shines!!

Many thanks

Well that was a satisfying start over a 1000 copies of my book out on the free promotion, all we need now is for people to read them, enjoy them and tell folks about them. But most of all thank you for your interest. It’s always a worry when a new book goes out, was it what people wanted and did it fill their expectations. Especially if it’s a new period for the tale, as The Daughter of Sandstone Manor is, delving into the 1700s a period I have always been interested in but never studied until now. I found it fascinating doing the research thank heavens for the web it saved me many trips to the library and of course being able to print the relevant pages out means now I have a huge reference file for my next book also to be about the same period, if this one proves acceptable that is. So we’ll see how it fares by Christmas and take a rain check then. Again thanks to all who have got a free copy I really hope you enjoy it.

Only 2 Free days to go

My seventh book “The Daughter of Sandstone Manor” was launched last Wednesday. I believe it’s my best book since I wrote Inshallah but you can see if you agree as it’s free till Sunday. Here’s the description -

The Daughter of Sandstone Manor is set in the 1700’s where smuggling and lewd behaviour was common practice.

Lady Isobel was witness to her father’s murder and was threatened by the culprit, an event which led her to leave her family home and take a post as a servant in a hostelry under the assumed name of Jess Newman. The story is a tale of events in her young life from when the she arrives at the Inn and her father’s murderer Edward Grant finds her. Edward Grant wants her for his mistress but the information she has gathered on his future plans, he decides to rape and kill her. Her one saviour is Charles Blake a senior figure in the Riding Officers (later to become Coast Guards) a mystery man to all who frequented the Inn. Charles was a handsome young man and at first she held him in suspicion until gradually he proved himself to be a friend.

The book gives some insight to the life, romance, rape, murder and smuggling that went on in the 1700’s.

The people who have read the manuscript seem to be captivated by the story and you can now try it too as it’s FREE on Kindle till 5th July

Link:- amazon.com/dp/B010IC0T2S

The Daughter of Sandstone Manor it's out and it's free on Kindle

Well the blog is early this week, why? To celebrate the launch of the book “The Daughter of Sandstone Manor” here’s the description

'The Daughter of Sandstone Manor is set in the 1700’s where smuggling and lewd behaviour was common practice.

Lady Isobel was witness to her father’s murder and threatened by the culprit, an event which led her to leave her family home and take a post as a servant in a hostelry under the assumed name of Jess Newman. The story is a tale of events in her young life from when the she arrives at the Inn and her father’s murderer Edward Grant finds her. Edward Grant wants her for his mistress but the information she has gathered on his future plans, he decides to rape and kill her. Her one saviour is Charles Blake a senior figure in the Riding Officers (later to become Coast Guards) a mystery man to all who frequented the Inn. Charles was a handsome young man and at first she held him in suspicion until gradually he proved himself to be a friend.

The book gives some insight to the life, romance, rape, murder and smuggling that went on in the 1700’s.'

The people who have read the manuscript seem to be captivated by the story and you can now try it too as it’s FREE on Kindle 1-5 July

You were right, how about this for the cover?

Those people who wrote in to tell me the picture I’d chosen for the cover of my new book “The Daughter of Sandstone Manor” seen on last week’s blog was an American scene. You’re right of course but it just seemed to have the impact I was looking for however I guess for a book about a Lady living in the south of England in the 18^th century it was a bit misleading.

Now hopefully the one heading this week will prove more appropriate and just as appealing, it is certainly in line with the story. So hoping for your approval I intend to use it. Currently the book is in its final proof reading and should be published in the next ten days, because it is set in the 1700s it has taken a little longer than usual as the facts have to be right as well as everything else. It is surprising how much research I’ve had to do into customs, language, dress, life style and manners, I have now amassed so much information on these I’m thinking of writing more books set in the same period.