In my column for the April issue of the Hawkesbury Parish News, I take issue with a local problem that’s also been making national news.
When I tell city-dwelling friends that our village is surrounded by single-track roads, they often react as if that’s idyllic, but confess to a fear of driving on narrow country lanes. They’d be even more frightened if they saw how peppered are lanes are with potholes.
The campaign to save our village bus service has set me reminiscing about Bus Services I Have Known.
In my column for the March issue of the Tetbury Advertiser, I describe a fascinating afternoon researching Corinium – the ancient Roman name for what’s now the Cotswold market of Cirencester.
As part of my research for a new novel (the first in a new series), I finally get round to revisiting the Corinium Museum in Cirencester.
This article originally appeared on Boldwood Books’ blog to mark the publication of my latest novel, Driven to Murder.
In a bizarre incident of life imitating art, as a starting point for the ninth Sophie Sayers Cozy Mystery, I struck upon the idea of the village bus service being cancelled – only to discover shortly afterwards that the bus route passing through my home village of Hawkesbury Upton was also about to be axed.
Although my books are full of comedy, they also subtly gently draw attention to genuine rural issues, such as loneliness and isolation, for added realism.
Public transport is a lifeline to rural communities, especially for the many people who don’t drive or have access to a car. Taxis won’t come out to you as you’re too far from town, and as to take-away services, you might as well be on the Moon!
Only when you lose your public transport do you realise how much you need it.
Children can’t travel to school, teenagers lose their independence, adults can’t get to work, families can’t go shopping or on leisure outings, and no-one can get to medical appointments or banks.
Losing the bus shrinks your world to your own back yard and cuts you off from vital services that everybody should be able to access – and for which you still have to pay your taxes! *climbs down from soapbox*
In Driven to Murder, when Leif Oakham, suave owner of local bus company Highwayman, plans to axe the bus that connects Wendlebury Barrow with the nearest town, the villagers engineer a lively and creative campaign to save the bus. All goes according to plan until one of their number is murdered mid-campaign, in broad daylight, on the number 27!
Ever the amateur sleuth, Sophie pledges to track down the killer before another tragedy can occur – and to save the village bus service along the way.
There’s just one problem: she doesn’t have a driving licence.
A disastrous first lesson with Hector in his precious Land Rover makes her secretly seek an instructor further afield, with hair-raising results.
My husband, who favours action movies, has always told me I ought to add car chases to my books – but I don’t think he meant through single-track country lanes…
Of course, this being Wendlebury Barrow, there’s a happy ending all round, and plenty of surprises along the way.
I just hope we are as successful in winning a reprieve for the Hawkesbury Upton bus.
If you’d like to support the campaign to save the Hawkesbury Upton bus, join here’s a link to its Facebook group:
https://www.facebook.com/groups/685419006919379
But the simplest and most effective thing to do is to travel by bus!
Although I’m lucky enough to be able to drive and have my own car, there will come a time when I’m too frail or poor to so. I want to make sure the bus is still there for when I need it. Don’t you?
In the meantime, I’ve pledged to make a weekly journey on our village bus service for the duration of the campaign.
If everyone who lived along its route made just one trip a month, our bus service would be saved.
It doesn’t matter how long or short the journey – each trip will boost passenger numbers, the key to the route’s survival.
Of course, these thoughts don’t apply only to my local bus service – wherever you live, whether urban or rural, the message about public transport is the same: USE IT OR LOSE IT!
What’s not to love about windmills? From children’s toys to towering turbines, I shared my views in this article for the February issue of the Hawkesbury Parish News.
Summitting a local hill on a clear morning in early January, I am surprised to spot in the distance a wind turbine that seems to have materialised from nowhere. Did a local farmer hang up an extra-large stocking on Christmas Eve, so Santa could leave him one as a present?
These days so many wind turbines seem to spring up overnight that it’s hard to keep track of the new arrivals, especially as they all look the same: soaring white towers topped by three long, narrow blades. Not that I mind, because I find them attractive and soothing to watch.
Only when I plant a child’s toy windmill in my garden do I realise how different its habits are from a wind turbine’s. Although positioned for maximum exposure, a wind turbine’s blades either turn at a steady pace in the same direction, or else they’re stock still. (Apparently too much wind can be dangerous, so in gales they’re turned off for safety reasons.)
Not so my toy windmill. In my relatively sheltered garden, its blue plastic sails whiz round so fast they form a blur. Changing direction every few seconds, they turn just as quickly either way, regardless of the prevailing wind.
As an instrument of meteorological observation, my toy windmill is about as reliable as the rain gauge I’ve sunk into the soil beside it. This calibrated plastic cone often shows negative rain. How can rainfall reduce as the day goes by? Evaporation alone can’t account for such a discrepancy.
Can rain really fall in reverse?
I solve the mystery when I spot our cat Bertie enjoying a long drink from it. He soon designates the rain gauge his favourite al fresco drinking station. It certainly looks more appetising than his previous preferred outdoor water source, our murky garden pond.
Wondering how wind turbines work leads me down a fascinating rabbit-hole online. I learn how gearing and other technical tricks evolved from early wind-powered machines installed by the Ancient Romans in Egypt. I then spin off at a tangent to investigate the use of traditional Dutch windmills for signalling.
Historically in the Netherlands windmill sails were locked into particular positions to convey messages to the local community. + meant the mill was open for business, x that it was closed. The top sail at 1 o’clock denoted a healthy birth, whereas 11 o’clock indicated a death. During World War II, sail settings issued silent warnings to the local population, such as of the arrival of Nazi search parties seeking Jews.
The tradition continues: in July 2014, when 198 Dutch passengers were killed in the attack on Malaysian Airlines Flight MH17, windmills across the Netherlands set their sails in the mourning position to show respect for those who lost their lives.
The only problem with my new-found knowledge is that next time I see an immobile wind turbine, I’ll wonder what it’s trying to tell me.
If you also love windmills, you might like to try my sixth Sophie Sayers cosy mystery, Murder at the Mill (originally published as Murder Your Darlings).
In this story, aspiring writer Sophie Sayers travels in the spring to a tiny Greek island to join a writers’ retreat. It’s to be led by bestselling romantic novelist Marina Milanese – but then she goes missing on a solitary stroll to a derelict clifftop windmill. First on the scene of Marina’s disappearance, Sophie soon finds herself accused of murder, and must work fast to solve the mystery before the local police can arrive from the mainland.
This lighthearted, feel-good mystery introduces a lively group of eccentric authors, plus colourful Greek characters from the holiday hotel. Not to mention the elusive monks in the local monastery…
It’ll also make you feel as if you’ve had a Greek island retreat of your own!
Murder at the Mill is available to order in ebook, paperback, audio and large print, from wherever you prefer to buy your books.
