In my last post before Christmas, I’d like to pay tribute to Iceland’s heartwarming Christmas tradition of Jólabókaflóð – when everyone gives each other books on Christmas Eve, before curling up by the fire to read them.
Continue reading “The Gift That Keeps On Giving: Reading for Pleasure”
As someone who makes their living from writing, I often visit places that will fuel the creative part of my brain, such as an art gallery or a museum. So last month I was pleased to spot road signs for the Crafts Alive craft fair at Rodmarton Manor. Run by the Gloucestershire Guild, this event offered a welcome opportunity to visit the private house reputed to be one of the finest Arts and Crafts Movement homes, and I booked a ticket to visit.
Unfortunately, my outing seemed to coincide with monsoon season. As I parked in a muddy field, I was glad I’d had the foresight to bring my ancient polka-dot Cath Kidston raincoat and my favorite umbrella, bought in a French market a decade ago on a school trip with my daughter, and of sentimental value way beyond its 10 Euro price tag. By the time I arrived at the manor house, my feet were afloat inside my shoes, but the rest of me was relatively dry.
Living in a small Cotswold village with a lively community provides ideas and inspiration for writing my cosy mystery novels. I’ve served on many committees, belonged to different organisations, and taken part in lots of activities since I moved here over thirty years ago.
One of my favourite activities here is ringing the church bells, which were installed in our parish church of St Mary the Virgin, Hawkesbury in 2021. As I soon discovered, in the English tradition of circle-mounted church bells, there’s much more to church bell-ringing than one might think. Full-circle ringing is not just a question of pulling the end of a rope at random.
I soon became hooked, and I’m now evangelical about this ancient craft. In my column for the September issue of the Hawkesbury Parish News, written during a month with a busy ringing schedule, I wrote the following piece to encourage others.
Writing this column in between two weddings and VJ80 Day, all three of which events involved bell ringing at our parish church, I’d like to share some of the surprising benefits of being a bell ringer. You never know, my revelations might persuade you to give it a try yourself.
1. Exercise
The slow, steady pulling of the bell rope (sally) against the resistance of a bell’s weight provides a gentle but significant workout in manageable bursts. Time and again, ringers arrive at the tower saying, ‘Not sure I can ring tonight, I’ve put my back out’ – only to skip down the tower stairs afterwards, fully restored.
2. Teamwork
While each person is responsible for only one bell, we work as a band led by a conductor, just like any other group of musicians – only our instruments are bigger than everyone else’s.
3. Belonging
The mental health benefits of feeling part of a community are well known. Bell ringing creates a great sense of camaraderie, not only in one’s home tower, but at other churches. Travelling beyond the parish, bell ringers are assured of a warm welcome in any other tower.
4. The Best View
Because we ring in an open-sided chamber rather than on an enclosed platform, we have the best view in the house. It’s especially enjoyable at weddings, watching from above as the bridal party processes.
5. Historical Role
We play a part in history, not only on a local level at parishioners’ christenings, weddings and funerals, although that’s also an honour. It has been a memorable privilege to ring to mark the death of Queen Elizabeth, the proclamation of the King, his coronation, VE80 and VJ80. It’s especially exciting when we know we’re ringing simultaneously with ringers nationwide, even though we can neither hear nor see them.
6. Tradition
We’re keeping an ancient craft alive. I learned to ring to honour the memory of my great-grandfather, a distinguished ringer of complex peals of 12 bells long before I was born. I may never be able to ring to his standard, but that feeling of following in his footsteps and passing ringing on to future generations is priceless.
New bell ringers are always welcome at St Mary’s. No experience is necessary, and free training will be given. Most ringers aren’t religious, and you won’t be expected to stay for church services or to commit to specific ringing events. So if you fancy trying your hand at bell ringing this autumn, contact Colin Dixon, St Mary’s Tower Captain, or join us at St Mary’s at practice nights, 6.30-8pm every Wednesday. All ages welcome – you just need to be tall enough to reach the ropes.
PS Just thought of bonus point 7 – as the nights draw in and temperatures dip, it’s worth knowing that ringing church bells will warm you up in winter!
If you’d rather read about bell ringing than ring in real life, try my cosy mystery novel, Death at the Village Chess Club, where the denouement takes place at the bell tower!
PPS Our parish church of St Mary the Virgin, Hawkesbury, will be the setting for the next Hawkesbury Upton Literature Festival event on Saturday 27th September, with a fabulous day of talks, readings and panel discussions on the theme of “Strength of Character“. For more information and to book your tickets now, visit hulitfest.com. I’d love to see you there!
Brideshead Revisited: The Sacred and Profane Memories of Captain Charles Ryder by Evelyn Waugh
Usually, I prefer to read the original book before watching a film or TV series of it, but in the case of Evelyn Waugh’s heartrending Brideshead Revisited, I first experienced it as the very faithful BBC TV dramatisation in the 1980s, starring Jeremy Irons as the narrator, Charles Flyte. Waugh has since become one of my favourite authors, and I’ve read many of his books many times.
Needing something soothing to listen to in the car on long journeys, I downloaded the Audible edition of Brideshead Revisited, narrated by Jeremy irons. It’s a flawless rendition, with Irons rendering the voices of the many characters, male and female, with a multitude of accents.
I was instantly transported into the heady world of the book, and long drives flew by – even though I’m not usually very good at listening to fiction on audio, able to concentrate better on non-fiction.
This audiobook was a hard act to follow, but I’m now revisiting another Waugh favourite, the darkly comic novel Scoop, narrated equally brilliantly by Simon Cadell.
When, as a child, I used to play with my grandma’s button box, I admired each button like a tiny work of art.
Born in 1900, Grandma grew up fastening her button-boots with buttonhooks. As a young woman, she embraced flapper styles. The contents of her tin gave a miniature history of twentieth-century fashion.
My mum (91) still has her own button box from when she used to make clothes for her children. Her 21st birthday present was a hand-cranked Singer sewing machine, on which I later learned to sew.
My grandma and my mum used old toffee and biscuit tins as button boxes. But my buttons live in a smart Cath Kidston tin, labelled The Book of Buttons.
My daughter uses a tartan shortbread tin to house hers.
The contents of every button box are unique. Plunging your hand in is like a lucky dip. You never know which tiny treasure you’ll pull out, nor its provenance.
Last century, every home had a button box. These days, with fewer people making their own clothes, it’s an endangered species. Yet it’s easy to keep the tradition alive. You can buy interesting vintage buttons in any charity shop or thrift store. If you’re lucky, you’ll find something similar to the fancy fastener at the heart of the mystery in my new novel, Death at the Village Christmas Fair.
When Wendy chooses a bear-shaped button from her daughter Alice’s Cotswold Curiosity Shop and sews it onto a hand-knitted scarf, it soon becomes a vital clue in the hunt for a ruthless killer.
The unusual scene of the crime is a Santa Run, in which hundreds of fun-runners race dressed as Father Christmas. What’s so special about Wendy’s little wooden bear? You’ll have to read my novel to find out!
Do you have a button box in your home? What’s your most unusual button? Which is your favourite, and why?
Death at the Village Christmas Fair is now available in ebook, paperback, hardback and audiobook. The third in the Cotswold Curiosity Shop cosy mystery series, it may also be read as a standalone novel.
(This post first appeared on the blog of Boldwood Books, my publisher.)
I’m just recovering after a very wet and windy Hawkesbury Show, where our Hawkesbury Upton Literature Festival tent nearly blew away. I’m sure we had the most windswept spot on the showground – the wind seemed to be coming from all directions at once! However, I had great fun with fellow authors Lucienne Boyce, Sarah Siân Chave, Frances Evesham and Jack (Jackie) Chandler. All except Jackie will be speaking at the next Festival event on Saturday 27th September – and the only reason Jackie’s not coming is that she lives in Germany, otherwise she’d be there like a shot! Thanks to Sarah for the attached photo of us on the stand, dressed for the weather!
I’d just about dried out and warmed up in time to give a short talk at the traditional annual Songs of Praise service held in the Show Marquee next morning (thankfully in sunshine by Sunday morning!) At our Songs of Praise service, six local residents are invited to choose their favourite hymns and tell us why they’ve chosen them. It’s always fascinating to learn more about well-known hymns and heartwarming to learn about the personal connections for the speakers. For this service, I spoke about the power of music to unite communities and bring people to faith.
As a Lay Worship Leader, I occasionally give short talks at services. Lay Worship Leaders aren’t licensed to preach – instead we just talk about something timely or relevant for each service. I thinking of saving them up to turn them into a small book, similar to my collected columns for the Tetbury Advertiser and Hawkesbury Parish News. Let me know if that’s something you’d like to read.
Now that the Show is over, I can concentrate on preparing for the Hawkesbury Upton Literature Festival on Saturday 27th September, which will take “Strength of Character” as its theme. The programme is going to be fascinating. Find out more and book your tickets here.
And with my other hand, I’m still writing my novelisation of The Importance of Being Murdered, due to launch early 2026.
But somehow, I still find time to curl up with a book….
Hafren: The Wisdom of the River Severn by Sarah Siân Chave
A fascinating personal response to the Hafren, aka the River Severn, with something for everyone.
Following the course of the river from its source just outside Aberystwyth, Sarah Chave’s narrative Includes Welsh mythology and Welsh and English social history, as well as geography and natural history, environmentalism, and family history.
Overall it is a thoughtful, philosophical work, acknowledging and mourning the impact of industrialization and climate change, but also an effective cry for positive action going forward. While nostalgic for what we have lost, it is ultimately constructive, as evidenced by the following quote:
Pastoralism can provoke feelings of nostalgia, a yearning for an unchanging utopian idyll, but it can, instead, be a approached in a different way – as a challenge to care for and protect the wider natural world.
The author cites and embraces Rupert Reed’s argument in favour of “thrutopias” to “encourage us to live our dreams in the present where we can, change things where we cannot, and strive together towards building a more caring world for all”.
Illustrated with a route map of the river to give the reader their bearings, and gentle black and white drawings by Rachel Elinor Collis, the book also boasts an evocative, slightly dream-like cover illustration by Andy Ward. All in all it’s a slick and beautiful package, published by the University of Wales’ imprint, Calon Books, which gives it the stamp of authority.
A great gift for anyone who loves any part of the Hafren/Severn, whether Welsh or English – there’s something in there to satisfy all kinds of readers.
All At Sea by Flora McGowan
I downloaded this short story onto my Kindle after having a fun conversationon my Facebook author page about who we name our characters after. She named her central character Carrie after her grandmother. I’ve never yet named one of mine after my beloved grandmothers, Lily and Peggy, but I’m going to think about doing that now.
All at Sea is a gentle tale of a very English day out at the seaside – an outing that sounds as if it should be simple and fun, but in Flora McGowan’s hands, turns into a thoughtful, poignant, memorable and melancholy tale of love, loss and responsibility. I won’t say more for fear of spoiling the plot.
This week’s post is literally about music – but another kind of music to my ears is readers’ early reactions to my new novel, launched last Saturday, and now available in ebook, paperback, hardback and audiobook.
Death at the Village Christmas Fair is the third in the Cotswold Curiosity Shop cosy mystery series, a festive edition launching in midsummer, because that’s the way the publishing industry works – operating a season ahead of reality, just like the fashion industry!
I’m delighted by how many readers are already getting stuck into this story when the weather in the northern hemisphere, where I am, is far from wintry! Some readers have told me they prefer reading wintry books in hot weather to cool them down. So maybe Death at the Village Christmas Fair, with its snowy cover, is really the perfect beach read
Here’s the blurb for the book to whet your appetite:
It’s been a busy year for Alice Carroll, with her Curiosity Shop opening for business, and not one but two murders shaking things up in her quaint Cotswold village. She’s looking forward to her first countryside Christmas, complete with traditional Christmas Fair and Santa Run.
But her hopes for innocent festive fun are thwarted when one of the Santa Runners steals something from her mum’s knitting stall. His festive outfit makes him hard to spot, until he’s found fatally injured outside the village hall with the stolen item.
Despite what the police say, Alice suspects there’s more to his murder than meets the eye. She’s determined to solve the mystery – including why, once more, a stranger thought something from her Curiosity Shop was worth killing for.
With the help of her charming neighbour Robert Praed, can Alice find the killer before the bells ring out this Christmas?
Perfect for fans of Fiona Leitch, Faith Martin and Agatha Christie.
Here is what early reviewers have said about it so far:
To order your copy online now, click here.
Now onto a different kind of music to my ears: Caroline Sanderson’s new memoir, Listen with Father: How I Learned to Love Classical Music…
The photo of the vintage reel-to-reel tape recorder on the cover of Caroline Sanderson’s new memoir, Listen with Father, made me realise how much our access to recorded music has changed during my lifetime.
My first memory of listening to records is via a wind-up record player when I was three years old. I’m not as ancient as that suggests, but the previous owner of the house we moved into had left it behind, and my brother and sister and I were allowed to treat it as a toy.
Then came a reel-to-reel tape player, like the one on Caroline’s book, followed by a fancy radiogram, housing an analogue radio and a turntable in a classic mid-century design, its wide, low cabinet on spindly legs. Its turntable had three speeds: 33rpm for LPs (long-playing records), 45rpm for singles, and 78rpm for any discs left over from the days of wind-up gramophones.
Not long after I started secondary school, compact cassette players were on my friends’ Christmas wish lists. Others favoured 8-track cartridge players, with the figure-of-eight set-up of the tape allowing non-stop music.
By the end of the Seventies, many music buffs aspired to a sleek stacking hi-fi system, with separate layers for records, cassettes and radio tuners. My university friend Tim was proud of his shiny new hi-fi until his confession that he had only two records, one of which was Supertramp, cued merciless teasing.
My stereo at this time was much more modest – a tiny turntable and diminutive speakers encased in bright orange plastic. Well, it was the Seventies.
By the time I was earning my living, the Sony Walkman, first for cassettes, then with newfangled CDs, was every commuter’s must-have accessory. These compact devices look huge and unwieldy compared to their successor: the tiny, lightweight iPods with no moving parts.
Now that we all stream music on our smartphones and smart speakers—and in my husband’s case, to his hearing aids – our family’s old iPods, in seaside-rock pink and vivid lime green, look like museum pieces.
Whatever next? Tiny receiver chips embedded in our heads? Douglas Adams’ Babel fish—a live fish dropped into the ear to act as an instant translator—seems less fantastical now than when it first appeared in The Hitchhiker’s’ Guide to the Galaxy, published in 1978 (the year I bought my orange stereo).
While afficionados argue the case for which recording format produces the better listening experience, to my mind none of them beats hearing music live.
Although a live performance lacks studio edits and polish, no recording can reproduce the excitement of watching a musician physically present, complete with body language, facial expressions, and emotions.
That’s one reason why it’s been such a joy to attend this summer’s Badminton Benefice Music Festival events – three down…
two still to come…
The immediacy adds an extra dimension, as does the glorious setting of our ancient Cotswold parish churches.
Plus, the concerts are free to attend, with free parking and complimentary refreshments, so no-one is priced out of the pleasure.
That includes families with children or grandchildren. The concerts provide the perfect way to enthuse young people about live music. They may even encourage them to take up an instrument or singing lessons themselves—or to do more practice, if they’re already learning. In an age where young people’s opportunities to learn and play music are diminishing, we’re lucky to have access to so many live, free music events on our home turf.
So, let’s turn off the tech for what’s left of the summer, and enjoy the original source of all music: the human being, in real life, in real time.
(This article first appeared in the August 2025 edition of the Hawkesbury Parish News.)
WHAT I’VE READ THIS WEEK
As you may know, I’m a course tutor for Jericho Writers. and I try to read as many of my students books as possible. This one was a real treat-to-self – and the first in Kalyn’s series was a great read too.
For the Love of Mark Twain: A Cozy Academia Friends-to-Lovers Story by Kalyn Gensic
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
What a great read for back-to-school time! I very much enjoyed reading this gentle, slow-burn romance between likeable characters on the staff of a small American university, a setting I wasn’t familiar with, so that added extra interest and enjoyment for me. Well written, witty, and engaging, with a cast of well-drawn and endearing supporting characters, this is a cosy read to linger over and make it last. Highly recommended.
