In the wake of our national preoccupation with platinum, my thoughts have turned to silver and gold.
When I was eight years old, my family moved to the USA for a year to be with my father in his new job. I boarded the plane with Tiny Tears and Teddy in my arms, ready to embrace my new home and school with enthusiasm and an open mind.
While my older brother and sister refused to take part in the classroom flag salute with which every school day began, I got stuck in, hand on heart:
I pledge allegiance to the flag, and the United States of America, and to the Republic for which it stands, one Nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.
A strange substitute for our comfortable daily religious assembly back home, sandwiching a quick prayer between two familiar hymns, but I wanted to fit in.
Before long, I’d made my Girl Scout Promise: “On my honor (sic), I will try to do my duty to God and my country, to help other people at all times, and to obey the Girl Scout laws.” Although I had to recite it only once, I remember the words far better, maybe because they chimed better with the gentle, apolitical hymns I was used to in assembly. Our school birthday hymn ended, “We hope you will be healthy and strong all the way; Strong to do right, slow to do wrong; and helpful to others all the day long.”
Another thing I learned as a Girl Scout was to sing this simple song in a round:
Make new friends, but keep the old;
One is silver and the other gold.
I rated my Girl Scout friends as silver, while my classmates back in England, at the school I rejoined a year later, were very much gold.
Six years later, we moved for four years to Germany, where I attended the Frankfurt International Schoolwith students from over sixty countries. It was time again to make silver friends. I kept in touch with the golden ones at home via numerous twenty-page letters handwritten on lurid stationery. Well, this was the 1970s.
In those days, long-distance friendships relied on such old-fashioned methods of communication. As we progressed through life, it was too easy to lose touch. Then along came the internet. Whatever else you think of social media, it’s a great means of tracing old friends. Thanks to Facebook, around the time of the Platinum Jubilee, I was able to welcome to my home here in the Cotswolds my old Canadian friend Debra, a classmate from Frankfurt International School.
We hadn’t seen each other in real life since the year of the Queen’s SilverJubilee.
With Debra Esau, friends reunited this summer after 45 years
What the Girl Scout song neglects to mention is that the alchemy of time eventually transforms silver friends into gold, and that meanwhile your hair may turn silver. But that’s a price I’m happy to have paid.
This post was originally written for the July/August edition of the Tetbury Advertiser.
This post was first published in the May 2022 issue of the Hawkesbury Parish News, prompted by news headlines about numerous flight cancellations, but sadly a month later chaotic travel is still very much in the news!
Every year at the start of the holiday season, there is a sudden outburst of news reports of chaos at airports and ferry ports and on roads. This year, the disruption seems worse than ever as the travel industry struggles to scale up its operations after two long years in which venturing beyond the village seemed like a major excursion.
These scaremongering reports are enough to put anyone off travelling this spring, especially when so many people are returning from crowded travel hubs with the unwanted souvenir of Covid.
So here’s an alternative approach. This holiday season, why not spend your vacation in a delightful Cotswold location of which I’m very fond?
The natives are pretty friendly too
With a fresh climate nurtured by its relative elevation, it offers stunning views across rolling hills and vales. Situated on a famous national trail and in an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, it provides a range of invigorating or gentle walks to suit all levels of physical fitness. Anyone seeking more strenuous physical activity may hire the local tennis courts at a very reasonable rate or, as a useful alternative in inclement weather, the village hall for badminton.
The section of the Cotswold Way that runs beside the village is affectionately called by locals The Yellow Brick Road
Two local pubs and a well-stocked village shop give you the choice of dining out or self-catering. And what could be more relaxing than a summer afternoon picnicking on local produce at the village cricket ground, to the sound of leather on willow?
For younger visitors, the newly upgraded and expanded playpark, complete with zipwire, provides ample entertainment, while the skatepark and basketball court will please teens.
Those who prefer to relax in a more sedentary manner may pick up as many books as they care to read, completely free of charge, from the Books on the Bus box in the bus shelter, or from the Post Cottage Little Free Library on France Lane. Available to buy from the village shop are new books by the many local authors – it’s a famously creative village. These books make great souvenirs, as do the local crafts, honey, attractively packaged sweets and home-made baked goods on sale there.
Matilda loves my Little Free Library!
All these appealing holiday facilities are available to you right now, without fear of queues or cancellations, and with zero environmental impact. The closest you are likely to find to a traffic jam is having to slow down for tractors or horses.
Welcome to Hawkesbury Upton. Just open your door and you’re there. We wish you a very happy holiday.
The start of a whole new Cotswold adventure…
IN OTHER NEWS…
HULF Talk on Holiday Reads
Whether or not you are travelling abroad yourself this summer, if you live in or near the Cotswolds, you might like to come along to join me at the HULF Talk on Holiday Reads – the occasional series of Hawkesbury Upton Literature Festival talks featuring three guest authors speaking on a particular topic.
This time we’ll be talking about novels set all over the world by:
Carol Cooper, a medical doctor and journalist whose touching family mystery The Girls from Alexandria is set in the Egyptian city in which she grew up
Kate Frost, whose latest romantic escape novel One Greek Summeris currently #25 in the Kindle UK chart, with An Italian Dream launching in July
Helena Halme, a Finnish author of Nordic thrillers and romantic sagas such as TheRed King of Helsinki and her Love on the Islandseries
Chairing the discussion, I will also be flying the flag for the Cotswolds, although I’ll also talk a bit about my sixth Sophie Sayers novel, Murder Your Darlings, set on a tiny fictitious island off the coast of Ithaca.
We’ll talk about what makes a great holiday read, the joy of travelling through the pages of a good book, and the challenges of creating an effective sense of place in fiction. The authors will also share the stories behind their novels, offer glimpses into their writing lives, and give readings.
As always, tickets will cost just £5 each, and for that you get all the tea, coffee and cake you can consume, plus a £2 book voucher redeemable on the day. Refreshments this time will be on a holiday theme – we will have fun!
A few years ago, my husband suggested we download an app* that keeps track of family and friends via their mobile phone signals.
He tends not to listen when I tell him where I’m going, and the most frequent message left on my mobile is from him, saying, “Debbie, where are you?”
He once called me on a Friday afternoon, concerned that our daughter was late home from school. My reply: “That’s because she’s here with me in the car, and we’re on our way to Cornwall for the weekend.” We had of course told him of our plans many times before we left.
While my husband was all in favour of the app, my daughter and I were not keen. It felt intrusive, like being microchipped or electronically tagged.
When the pandemic put paid to travel, we let the matter drop, but when we started to travel again this spring, and with my daughter planning some gap year adventures, we agreed to install the app for reassurance.
Our first chance to test it came in April, when my husband and daughter headed to the south of France for a week. As I’d made all the bookings, I felt personally responsible that everything should go smoothly, so I was glad to use the app to track their progress . With planes, trains and automobiles involved in their journey, there was ample opportunity for trouble – flight delays, cancellations and missed connections – even before we factored in my husband’s propensity to misplace his possessions.
Initially, following their progress on the app made me feel like a spy, but it soon became enjoyable and absorbing, although the intermittent phone signal made it slightly unreliable.
Often they appeared to be in two different places, even when I knew from speaking to them on the phone that they were in the same vehicle or hotel. Part way through their trip, I discovered that if I hit the right button, I could follow their progress at micro level.
When they were in Avignon, for example, I could trace their progress along the ancient bridge, although it didn’t tell me whether they did the famous dance immortalised in the song, “Sur le Pont d’Avignon”, as we did when we visited ten years ago. Fortunately, I remembered the ancient bridge no longer reaches the other side of the river, but stops mid-stream. Otherwise I might have been concerned that they’d dropped off the end and been swept away by the Rhône.
So thanks to the app, I was able to relax while they were away, and on their return, I knew exactly when to put the kettle on to make them a welcome-home cup of tea.
Admittedly, my husband returned minus his glasses (mislaid before they’d boarded the first plane), his jacket (lost, then found, then lost again), and his wallet.
All we need now is an app to keep track of his possessions.
I’ve chosen as the topic of the next HULF Talk – a Hawkesbury Upton Literature Festival event – “Holiday Reads“. On Saturday 25th June, I’ll be chatting with three guest authors to help you find your next books to take on holiday – or to read at home this summer to travel by book. Between them, Carol Cooper, Kate Frost and Helena Halme have written engaging, easy-to-read novels set in holiday destinations all over the world, from Scandinavia to Zanzibar, from Cornwall to the Mediterranean. For more information and to book your tickets, visit the HULF website at www.hulitfest.com.
Cover design by Rachel Lawston inspired by the single-track roads of the Cotswolds in spring
Although I’ve never owned or even driven a Mini car, it seemed the perfect choice for the heroine of my recently-published novella, Mrs Morris Changes Lanes, in which an unusual loan car takes the heroine on a lifechanging journey.
Even prior to publication, as soon as I shared the wonderful cover design by Rachel Lawston, showing a purple Mini driving down a Cotswold lane, friends began to tell me how much they missed their Mini.
I couldn’t resist finding out more about the reason for their brand loyalty to the iconic little car. I was sure it must be different from Mrs Morris’s. I invited them to share their experience in a new series of guest posts, which began just before Christmas, with historical novelist Anita Davison. (Click here to read it if you missed it.)
My second guest is US author Amie McCracken, currently based in Germany. Like me, Amie enjoys a touch of magical realism. She is an editor, designer and author. Her latest novella is Leaning into the Abyss, set in the US and Mexico, which starts with the startling premise of Rhea’s fiancé falling off a cliff to his death on their wedding day.
The story of Amie and her Mini is less dramatic! Over to Amie to tell us all about it.
Hello, Amie! To start with, please tell us why and when you acquired your first Mini.
On Christmas Day 2013 in fact. I had been on the lookout for one and thought I would fly to the UK since they are cheaper there, but a friend found one near me in Germany that was pristine and I couldn’t pass it up.
How much did it cost and how much did you sell it for?
I bought it for 4,000 Euro in Germany and sold it in the US for 8,000 dollars.
They were never manufactured in the US, so they are a huge novelty.
And our buyer happened to be Austrian so she could read the German manuals and receipts!
How long did you keep it and why did you sell it?
I sold it in 2017 because it made sense. The plan had been to restore it, completely decked out in TARDIS style (the US plate we had on it said GALIFRY). I had even used it in a video announcement of my pregnancy and brought my son home from the hospital in it.
But we found an interested buyer and I knew it just wouldn’t work to bring the car back to Germany again. It was the right time, though I still miss her.
Please describe it in as much detail as you can remember.
A 1989 Mini Mark IV, none of that BMW crap. It had been repainted, so it was a glistening black. The interior was gray, and the driver’s seat dug into the middle of your back terribly. The heater never worked, so when it rained we had a sponge on the dash to wipe away the condensation. But the car ran when I needed it most. At least, most of the time.
Many Mini drivers seemed to feel compelled to name their Minis, as if they have a personality of their own. (Do they have a personality of their own?!) What was yours called?
Foxy. My plate in Stuttgart was FX 1989.
What is it about Minis that makes most owners feel so attached to them?
I think it comes down to the history.
They are a classic, and most classics come with the history of their entire model.
A Mustang is more than the metal and rubber it is made of, but is the smell of burning tires and speeding down a straight track.
A Mini is an everyday car that putts along with personality and carries a twinge of cheekiness.
I know mine liked to break down at the most inopportune moments, but when I was really in a pinch she stepped up and did the job.
What did you most love about your Mini?
I loved feeling so tiny yet safe. She handled like a Formula 1 car.
What drove you nuts about it?
But without the heater working rainy days and cold days were the absolute worst.
Where did your longest journey in your Mini take you?
The car moved with us across the ocean from Germany to the US.
But the most memorable trip was from Coburg to Berlin to catch a flight, stuck in European summer traffic, with plenty of time to spare and yet still needing to reach speeds beyond the 140 km/h the speedometer could read. We reached the airport with seconds to spare, but as we watched the plane board from the other side of the empty security line, and had the security officer tell us that digital tickets were not accepted, we gave up and got back in the Mini to drive home.
What was your most exciting trip?
See above…
What most surprised you about your Mini?
How well a car seat fit in the back!
Did you ever have any accidents or any scary trips in your Mini?
No. Even when we drove next to American semis and SUVs, I felt safe.
Who was your favourite/most interesting/most difficult passenger and why?
My son on all counts. He was never a fan of riding in the car when he was a baby, so it was always an adventure! Plus, trying to maneuver him into the back seat with a rear-facing infant car seat while he was asleep and without waking him—that was a true challenge. Part of the restoration plans involved adding a third door.
Was your Mini a one-off buy or did you stay brand loyal and buy more Minis later?
I have not bought more Minis, though I believe I will one day. Always the classic versions. Never a BMW.
What car do you drive now?
Now it’s a 1973 VW Type 2 camper! (Also called a Bulli here in Germany.)
What do you miss about your Mini?
The novelty of owning a fun and classic car.
What would be your dream car if money were no object?
A Koenigsegg. Or maybe a Lamborghini Diablo. I like to go fast. Which, admittedly, the Mini does not satisfy.
In Mrs Morris Changes Lanes, what did you think of her Mini and of her adventure?
I loved it. The Mini is certainly a magical car, and the perfect one to bring someone back to their roots. It is a mischievous car, one that I could see yanking a person out of their intended path to create a little bit of chaos and stir things up.
Thank you, Amie, for sharing your fond memories, anecdotes and photos of your beautiful Mini!
Extract from
Leaning into the Abyss
by Amie McCracken
The world was in chaos around me. I sat in the eye of the storm, glass of water growing heavy in my hand, every now and then feeling a kiss on my cheek or the pat of a hand on my shoulder. Dad sat in his own separate world in the far corner, ensconced in his wingback chair, waiting for the rest of us to leave. His house was the closest to the hotel, and the largest, so we had convened here to understand what was going on.
“Rhea.” The drone of a voice burrowed through my headache and fog. “Rhea.” There was nothing to be done other than to sit here and let the planet circle the sun. “Rhea.” Phoebe’s voice broke through the barrier and clanged in my ear. I turned to face her. “The police are here. They want to speak with you and Andrew’s parents.”
“Please don’t leave me alone,” I whispered. I squeezed her hand with the force of a woman in labor. She still wore her navy bridesmaid’s dress, long and elegant and curving delicately over her hips. Her dark hair had fallen loose and she tucked a wisp behind her ear. I had not noticed before that her face was heart-shaped, giving her a child-like sweetness. My gaze darted in the direction of The Parents. They seemed to be enveloped in a whirlwind of anger and frustration and shame. It was blue and crackling, menacing, terrifying. I didn’t want to be swallowed by that.
To find out more about Amie and her books and services, please visit her website: www.amiemccracken.com
Have you ever owned or driven a Mini? Amie and I would love to hear about yours!
Meet Bjørn Larsson, author of “Storytellers” and more
In a year when there have been so many constraints on travel, I’ve really enjoyed touring the world through the pages of good books and sharing some of my favourites with you on my blog. I’ve saved for my final post in this series, and of 2021, for an author who blew me away with his vivid debut novel set in Iceland, Storytellers. I’m delighted to welcome Bjørn Larssen – who describes himself as “writer, blacksmith, spiritual Icelander” – to tell us why he is so passionate about that country, and how it has inspired his writing.
Bjørn, welcome! Please would you kick off by describing the location of Storytellers.
I set Storytellersin Klettafjörður, a non-existent village on the Icelandic coast in the south-west. Originally I picked an actual village, but as the story continued to develop I realised its inhabitants might not be happy about it… and I’d like to make more friends there before I start on the enemies.
Please give us a brief description of Storytellers.
In Storytellers, a historical suspense novel set in 1920, Gunnar, a hermit blacksmith, finds an unexpected guest on his farm one night… a guest with a broken ankle and a story to tell, one that might change Gunnar’s life by ending it – once the storyteller recovers enough to write the other characters’ final chapters.
I believe there’s also in the pipeline another, quite different book set in Iceland – what will that book be like?
My work-in-progress, currently called Untitled Romance because I’m very creative like that, will be an m/m sweet-with-heat romance (duh) set in Reykjavík and its surroundings.
The book is not just about the love between the characters, it’s my love letter to Iceland as well.
There is more coming. I’m unlikely to stop writing about Iceland.
What makes Iceland such a great setting for your stories?
I needed a location that could be simultaneously claustrophobic and far away from everything, and I specifically wanted some of the characters to be fishermen. As I was writing the first draft I didn’t have any particular place in mind. At the same time I was listening to Ásgeir’s debut album, Dýrð í dauðaþögn (Glory in the Silence) on a loop and suddenly it occurred to me that Iceland was an actual country. Until then I just sort of imagined it as some mythical spot with a Björk in it.
What is your relationship with Iceland and how much of your life have you spent there?
I corresponded with a historian at the Reykjavík City Museum and the Árbæjarsafn open-air museum, who helped me a lot. Still, I had a lot of specific questions and wanted to get a feel for the place, and that open-air museum had buildings from the exact period I was writing about. It was supposed to be a four-day outing with some geysers, waterfalls, or whatever they had there. Instead I fell in love with the strange planet that Iceland is. The year after we went for an entire month, because I was hoping to get over the infatuation. It only got worse.
I intend to live there someday, my heart already does.
What is special about the people native to Iceland?
In the 19th century Iceland had the highest literacy rate in the world – and most of its inhabitants wrote (they still do) diaries and poems. In Halldór Laxness’ novel, Independent People, farmers who meet for a funeral first discuss deworming their sheep, then read the poems they have written since they’d last met. I thought that was dark comedy. It wasn’t.
Since Laxness won a Nobel prize for literature and Iceland only has 350 thousand inhabitants, that means they have the most Nobel prizes per non-existent million inhabitants, too!
Icelandic sitting room from the 1880s
What are your top tips for any readers planning to travel to the setting of your book?
Iceland is one of the most expensive places in the world. The Bónus supermarkets are your friends, but they don’t sell alcohol – no shops do, except for designated liquor stores. If you want to chat over a beer or two either stock up at the airport, or drive to a liquor store, or be prepared to pay one kidney per pint of beer. In the bars you’ll be able to chat with fellow tourists, because Icelanders socialise in the public pools.
For the love of Gods, don’t buy bottled water in a place where the tap water comes straight from the glacier. (That’s cold tap water. The hot water comes from the geothermal springs. You’ll get used to the rotten egg smell, but if you dyed your hair, do not wash it with this water. I found out the hard way.)
Cold tap water comes from glaciers, while the water in the hot tap comes from thermal springs
If you want to see the Northern Lights, go between October and March, in the beginning of April it never gets dark enough anymore. Which means you can go for a drive at 2am and have the normally crowded tourist spots mostly to yourself.
Heidmork
Icelandic national dishes are (whispers) horrible. Kjötsupa, the meat soup, and the baked goods are exceptions. Ethics aside, you really don’t need to try the shark or the whale, just buy any old rotten fish and dip it in vinegar mixed with salt. Instead, find the hot dog booth near the Saga museum, which is by the way incredibly disappointing – they sell the best hot dogs in the world. Literally. Award-winning. They taste like hot dogs.
And do NOT touch the moss. Just don’t.
“Only in Iceland” – name three things that could only exist/happen there.
There is a dating app that allows you to check how close your relationship with the potential partner is – there are simply very few Icelanders and, well, it’s an island that’s been historically isolated for a very long time.
No Icelander is going to say with 100% certainty that elves DEFINITELY do not exist.
If you meet one, an elf, not an Icelander, don’t eat any food they give you. Say thank you, then dispose of it when the elf can’t see you any more.
Are there any other books set in Iceland that you’d like to recommend?
Halldór Laxness, obviously. I haven’t read Ragnar Jónasson’s books, because thriller is not my genre of choice, but I hear he’d murdered half of the country by now and did so rather interestingly. I still need to get to Burial Ritesby Hannah Kent. And you can’t go wrong with Alda Sigmundsdóttir’s Little Book of Icelanders series, although those are technically non-fiction.
Where is your latest book set and where will the next one be set?
Children, a dark-but-funny re-telling of selected Norse myths, is set in the heathen Nine Worlds – and its sequel, Land, will add the tenth world, Earth. Land will be a re-telling of Hrafnaflóki’s discovery of Iceland, but with more Gods, magic… and the Hidden Folk, of course.
EXTRACT FROM
Storytellers by Bjørn Larssen
Available in ebook, paperback and hardback
“Sshh,” Arnar whispered. “Put on your coat and come outside.”
Where are we going, Juana wondered, half-asleep as she crawled through the small door. The cold night air roused her within seconds. It was cool inside the hut, but outside it was freezing, everything covered in a thin layer of ice, lit by moonlight, and, and…
“Look at the sky,” he whispered. Juana obediently raised her eyes, and her mind went blank as her mouth opened in shock.
Something that resembled green fire danced in the sky. The colours moved faster, then slower. They disappeared, then reappeared, regrouping stronger, covering the stars. Their shine was so powerful that the frozen grass appeared greener than during the day, a gleaming colour she had never seen before.
“There,” Arnar pointed, and Juana’s eyes followed. The flames painted the sky, slowing down, stopping as if teasing, then returning to their dance with renewed energy.
“Is this magic?” she whispered. “Is it mountains changing shape? Is the sky burning?”
“When the nights get longer and darker, this is what God sends us to let us know he hasn’t forgotten about us,” he whispered back. “It seems dark, aye, but there is light and always will be. When you think things are going bad, remember they will always turn out fine. This is what þetta reddast means. It will always turn out fine.”
Juana shivered from the cold, but she didn’t care, fascinated by the magical lights. If there was a pattern to their dance, she couldn’t understand it. The green colour was now being licked by a hint of purple, as if the flames themselves were set on fire again. But the fire she had known until now never looked or felt like this, it never obscured the stars or cast a greenish glow. “Are you sure this isn’t dark magic?” she whispered and made a sign of the cross.
“This is the fire that burned in my heart every day that I spent in America,” said Arnar, holding her hands tight and kissing her cheek. Juana didn’t pay him much attention, staring, trying to understand the impossible. Only God or Devil could create something like this, and the beauty convinced her it was God himself. He was giving them their blessing. “This is what happiness looks like,” whispered Arnar, and she believed him.
My guest post series for 2022 will address travel from a completely different angle.
Under the series heading “Me and My Mini”, a diverse range of authors will share their passion for their Mini cars, past and present – a car that started to fascinate me when I was writing my new novella, Mrs Morris Changes Lanes, earlier this year.
Posts in this series will appear on the last Wednesday of each calendar month. Click here to read a test-drive I took with this idea a couple of months ago, when historical novelist Anita Davison took us for a spin.
In the meantime, if you haven’t already read Mrs Morris Changes Lanes, now would be a good time to try it! Order the paperback from your local bookshop quoting ISBN 978-1911223818 or online here, or download the Kindle ebook here. (If you’re a Kindle Unlimited subscriber, you’ll be able to read the book for free!)
And if you have already read and enjoyed it, reviews are always welcome!
In the meantime, wishing you a very happy, healthy and peaceful 2022.
The world was in chaos around me. I sat in the eye of the storm, glass of water growing heavy in my hand, every now and then feeling a kiss on my cheek or the pat of a hand on my shoulder. Dad sat in his own separate world in the far corner, ensconced in his wingback chair, waiting for the rest of us to leave. His house was the closest to the hotel, and the largest, so we had convened here to understand what was going on.
