Haunting Tales and Cats

In Spring

By the end of March we were starting to play with location, geography , alternative history and (oh, heavens!) continuity. Janet Gover (21st century) moved us to Cornwall and our characters pushed us towards the sea and, more specifically, ships.

Our six stories would each be set in a different century. That meant that we needed to take account of lingering ghosts and architectural adjustments to the Inn which preceded our own story. We started a Record.

Image by Arek Socha from Pixabay

Sarah, Louise Allen and Joanna Maitland are, of course, first and foremost historical novelists. So they were very particular about what was and wasn’t acceptable when stretching recorded fact. But Liz Fielding (20th century), Janet Gover and I, although we primarily write contemporary novels, are also inveterate researchers. Just try Janet on Outback firefighters or dinosaurs. And crime writer-Liz’s research history on ways to kill people might give the local constabulary a turn if they ever had reason to look at her laptop.

Halloween ghost in Chelsea photo SW

Our ghosts, however, resisted research like nobody’s business. They all marched to the beat of their own drum. “But consistency,” some of us said, worried. “They don’t follow the same rules”

Which, of course, makes them just like the living. “They each follow their own rules. All great fun,” said Joanna Maitland, firmly; thereby squashing my attempt to hang onto my story for another pass to check ghostly consistencies.

Well, she is the Directeur de Projet and, as such, not only doing double the work of the rest of us, but the Ultimate Arbiter on such things. Her story is set in the eighteenth century, at the more elegant end of the social spectrum, when and where Arbiters knew their stuff.

Enter The Cat.

Image by Mollyroselee from Pixabay

We liked the idea of including a cat because they go very well with spooks.

“I’m a sucker for a good Victorian ghost story like M R James,” emailed Louise Allen somewhat wistfully, I thought. “He makes cats very edgy.”

The White Lion and Black Griffon promptly fell into second place behind the Black Cat, as a name for the Inn. Ah, but was it likely that an inn would be named after a cat in Tudor England?

“Well there was a type of ship called a Catte. Google Whitby Cat,” says Louise. Janet does so and reports that Captain Cook’s Endeavour was one. Indeed, it is possible that Dick Whittington’s “cat”, was effectively the ship(s) that made him rich.

Image by LoggaWiggler from Pixabay

And yes, I’m a research freak too, and I can’t resist working my way through a good old maze.

So I dug a bit and found that Dick, who was Lord Mayor of London four times (1397, 1398 1406 and 1419), wouldn’t have been using a “catte” because they were a type of ship invented by the Dutch in the late 1500s. But they were probably appearing when the association of Whittington and cat became established. So it could have emerged as an anachronism.

Cats and Companions, Ghostly and Otherwise

Pretty fluffy tabby cat sitting in front of a mat with bowls of foot and water and staring hard at the photographer instead.

Companion Cat by Sophie Weston

There’s a nastier version here which shows Whittington up as a crude exploiter of his faithful feline, which really upset me. The cat in my own story ( Victorian, not edgy) sort of compensates for that dreadful betrayal.

There are a couple of black cats in our stories, as well as the one on the handsome inn sign. Also a number of real historical people, at least three of whom you will recognise. They played a significant role in their day and will leave their mark on the Inn and its inhabitants.

Of course there are loads of spooky doings, secrets, misunderstandings and escapes, not to mention those idiosyncratic ghosts all working to their own rules, possibly self-imposed.

Spooky Takes for Darker Nights

africa-studio – stock.adobe.com

So, now our Black Cat Inn collection is ready to go. There are ghosts, adventure, moral dilemmas, along with some laughs, some romance and a dash of other worldly activity. A lot of pub love for the George inspired a cookery book to offer a taste of dishes our characters might have experienced, too.

Above all, a good deal of justice gets delivered to the deserving too.

Ednam House hall fireplace. picture SM

And, because writers like us are notoriously feeble at blowing our own trumpets, I will share a snippet of an email from a previously unknown interlocutor, which surprised us earlier this week.

“What stayed with me was not just the bullet hole in the fireplace or the Spanish Armada survivor or the French medium. It was the quiet truth underneath the project itself… You did not just edit a collection. You curated a shared world.” Wow. Quiet truth. I’ll certainly take that.

So close the curtains, light the fire, pour a mug or glass of your joyful cup of choice and ENJOY!

PRE-ORDER/ BUY

Norway: Bergen, Scotland, waterfalls and green roofs

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Joanna’s trip to Norway is full of memories, of Bergen and more

The panorama above shows the city of Bergen, taken from the top of the Fløien hill which is reached by a funicular railway. Bergen residents will tell you, with some pride, that it rains there every day. But, as you can see from my pic, it wasn’t raining while we were up at Fløien. It did rain later, though, so the Bergen residents were right.

Fløien is a great spot for viewing the city of Bergen. You can see everything. So loads of tourists go up there on the funicular.

My images of it aren’t great, but this is the passing place in the middle, where the up car balances out the down car on the right of my pic. For the rest of the trip, there is only one set of rails. And if you look closely, you can just about make out the cogs between the rails since it’s very steep.

It felt like we were going up and down at an angle of about 45°. There were railings dividing off sections inside the car so that we didn’t topple into other standing passengers. Very practical, these Norwegians.

Troll at Fløien above Bergen

And of course there is an enormous troll at the top.

The tourist in the background gives you an idea of just how big he was. As I said in my last Norway post, many people had selfies with him but I wasn’t one of them.
Spoilsport, eh?

You can also see how verdant the scenery is up there. Full of majestic trees, as is much of Norway. Locals were up there exercising in the forest, often with their dogs.

There are lots of similarities between Norway and my native Scotland. Lots of lochs/fjords. Lots of mountains, though Norway’s are higher than Scotland’s because they’re a fair bit younger.

This image made me smile. I remember just such a signpost at John O’Groats.

You might need to [click to] enlarge it to read the various destinations. But to save you the trouble, the sign says that the South Pole is 16,700 kms from Bergen. The North Pole is a lot closer, at 3,304 kms. And Rome is a mere 2,117 kms. Easy peasy.

Bergen’s links with Scotland

This is Bergenhus, a medieval fortress dating from the 13th century.

Bergenhus was, at one stage, the royal residence when Bergen was the capital of Norway. The grey building on the left is Haakon’s Hall (Håkonshallen) built for the wedding of the King in 1261. Our guide told us that, at the time, there were no skilled stonemasons in Norway, since everything was built of wood. So King Magnus Håkonsson brought in masons from Scotland to build his great stone hall in Bergen, using materials also imported from Scotland. The magnificent interior of the hall is shown below, though the roof is not original.

By Bjørn Christian Tørrissen – Own work by uploader, https://bjornfree.com/travel/, CC BY-SA 4.0, Link

I don’t know if the Scottish story is true. And it’s not what Wikipedia says. But there was certainly plenty of fine grey stone on the east coast of Scotland that could have been used. Aberdeen isn’t called The Granite City for nothing. And it still has strong links to Norway, especially to Stavanger, Norway’s oil capital.

Granite city of Aberdeen by Holger Uwe Schmitt – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, Link

Rosenkrantz not Guildenstern

The grey building on the right of the Bergenhus is the Rosenkrantz Tower. (You’ll remember the name Rosenkrantz, I’m sure, from Hamlet. But this tower isn’t named after the Shakespearean character, I’m sad to say. Nor is there a Guildenstern Tower.)

The tower is later than Haakon’s Hall. It has a 13th century base, but most of it was built in the 16th century for the then Governor of the Fortress whose name was, ahem, Rosenkrantz. Apparently there were a lot of them about among the Danish nobility.

There was originally a royal apartment at the top of the Tower, but it was later used for purely defensive purposes. That’s obvious from the fact that there are almost no windows at the lower levels. It was used as a gunpowder magazine right up until the 1930s.

Nowadays, the Bergenhus is under the command of the Royal Norwegian Navy which still has personnel based there, though the Hall and the Tower are administered by the Bergen City Museum. It is all open to the public and used for large events, like concerts and grand dinners. That interior looks just right for a glittering royal banquet, doesn’t it?

Waterfalls have stories too

Norway has masses of waterfalls, many of them absolutely stunning. I note that, when cruise lines are advertising Norway cruises, it’s usually a waterfall that they feature. In the first episode of this Norway blog, I featured a whisky waterfall. Better than we have in Scotland, I think? At least, I don’t know of one.

This is the glorious Vøringsfossen waterfall. It’s a great tourist attraction, partly because visitors can get above it and have a wonderful view. My picture doesn’t really give a sense of scale but the total drop is 182 metres (just under 600 feet in old money).

It’s quite high up in the mountains and was pretty inaccessible until the 19th century. But then tourists started to visit, travelling on horseback.

An enterprising Norwegian called Ola Garen decided to build a hotel there, the Fossli. Quite an undertaking as there was no road to get there. All the construction materials had to be carried up to the site. Shorter planks could be carried by pack animals but longer ones had to be carried up by men. Along with almost everything else.

But Garen was determined. And he succeeded.

The Fossli hotel opened in 1891 and this is what it looked like then. Doesn’t look like much, does it? But this is how it looks now, as shown on the hotel’s own website. The location is amazing, isn’t it?

Fossli Hotel aerial view from https://fossli-hotel.com/en/

Norway’s national composer, Edvard Grieg, stayed at the Fossli Hotel and composed there, too. The hotel still has the piano he used.

Green roofs at Fossli and elsewhere

Lots of buildings in Norway have green roofs. They are eco-friendly, but they have to be maintained. Usually they are mown. Or animals like goats are put up there to chew on them.

It’s not a good idea to let green roofs get out of hand, we were told, because then you get invasions of trees and the like. I’m afraid the one on the little shed in the grounds of the Fossli Hotel had definitely got out of hand.

Christmas trees on the roof, anyone? (But I think they’re rather endearing.)

Below is a rather more civilised green roof on a building in Ulvik (in another side arm of the Hardanger fjord). Ulvik has a microclimate that’s ideal for growing apples and orchards are everywhere.

What you see is actually built into the side of the hill. It is the “cellar” at the apple and cider farm we visited. The way it’s built keeps the inside temperature constant and ideal for maturing barrels of spirits like cider brandy. The flat-roofed section houses the still; the vaulted-roofed section houses the barrels, as you can see.

The apple brandy was delicious but, sadly, it was not possible to buy any from the farm, nor any of their liqueurs. Those are available to buy only from Government-run liquor stores. In fact, it’s only relatively recently that the farm has been permitted to sell even its cider to tourists like me. I had the impression that Norway is a very law-abiding country in that regard. (Though it wasn’t, apparently, in the days of the whisky waterfall.)

Ulvik’s amazing location

This is the fantastic view from the apple/cider farm, looking down across Ulvik bay. If you look hard, you can see a white cruise ship out there, waiting for the tourists (including me) to return for lunch. Most of us (also including me) were carrying bottles of cider or apple juice or both.

Yet another waterfall?

It was a long bus ride to get to the waterfall of Tvindefossen. At 116 metres high, it’s not one of the highest of Norway’s waterfalls but it is much visited by tourists.

And it is rather splendid, as I hope you’ll agree. The name suggests twin falls and you can see why.

But that’s not why thousands of tourists visit it. Or so we were told.

Sometime in the late 20th century, the waterfall gained a reputation for reviving sexual potency in those who drank its waters. And guess what? Lots of tourists began arriving to fill containers with the rejuvenating water. And they still do, in their hundreds of thousands. There no such thing as bad PR, is there?

Our Norwegian guide was very canny. Since she didn’t want a delay, she didn’t tell us about the supposedly potent waters of Tvindefossen until after we were on the bus and on the way back to our ship. Mind you, ours was a Saga cruise, so everyone was at least 50 years old. Does that make it more or less likely that the passengers would want to sample the waters of Tvindefossen??

I couldn’t possibly comment…

Joanna

PS A request. The cover of our new anthology, Hauntings at the Black Cat Inn, has been listed on the AllAuthor website for Cover of the Month for October.
If you like the cover, could you please go to the AllAuthor website here and register a vote for it? There are three rounds of voting before a winner emerges.
We’d really love it if we could win. And your votes might make all the difference. You can even vote anonymously if you want…

Reader Recoil from AI?

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Image by Stefan Keller from Pixabay

This week I read a book to which I had a very bad reaction. It left me so disturbed that I had to sit down and write notes before I could relax enough to go to sleep. And even now, nearly four days later, I can’t quite rid myself of the creepy feelings.

To be fair, this was never going to be a good week. For all sorts of reasons, I was caught in a net of failure, guilt and poor concentration.

bigstock-Punctuation-Mistake-54325382.jpg

Not propitious circumstances in which to read a new book, I accept, particularly one by an author new to me. So keep that in mind when I say that this author gave me the horrors.

And not for the usual reasons – too violent, nasty porn, terrible apostrophe awareness – you know, the big ones.

Here’s what happened.

Download for the Journey

Black and white photo of woman reading a kindle

Image by Gregory Bradford from Pixabay

Midweek I had to go to a sad occasion. Not wanting to think about what I was leaving undone or going towards, I bought, pretty much at random, a novel to distract me on the journey.

It had a good title, clear and somewhat intriguing. I downloaded a sample. Workmanlike narrative, set in wartime East Anglia. That should do it. I bought it and put the Kindle in my bag for the train.

But almost as soon as I started reading, I began to feel uncomfortable. I mean, literally, physically uncomfortable. I kept shifting in my seat; losing my place; wanting to get up and do something else. It felt almost as if I were being watched. But I wasn’t. (I checked. Several times.)

Each time I looked up, it was an effort to go back and pick up the story again. I just didn’t want to.

235560808/Bigstock.com

Over the course of the day I read most of it. In the evening, though I didn’t really care about the characters or anything that happened to them, I sat and finished it. It felt like homework.

Not that finish is quite the right word. I got to the end of the text and stopped. Which is exactly what the author did. There was no tension or climax. No resolution.

By that time, I was not only creeped out, I was pissed off. Those notes I mentioned? Bit irritable.

Day 2 Thoughts

The characters that should have been sympathetic always seem distant. Sometimes performed feelings for the reader. Everyone sounded the same, regardless of age or class.

The plot was repetitive. One problem, one dimension. Hollow. It didn’t develop, just repeated the same issue.

There was much dialogue, especially between the hero and heroine. Initially clipped and rather attractive, as the book continued their exchanges became not only repetitive but nonsensical and sometimes incomprehensible. It was strangely set out, too, with a line space between what a character did and what he said, which added to the confusion as to who was speaking, since “X said” was used infrequently. Mostly it was impossible to tell from the content which character was speaking. I found myself having to count down from the last time a speaker was definitely identified to work out who said what. This showed all too clearly how they spoke in an identical voice (as did the narrator and all the minor characters). Basically this was monotone.

There were also lots of one-sentence paragraphs which sounded portentous for no reason and got tiresome. Also no humour, except a bit of slapstick.

Conclusion? ROBOTIC

Day 3

Bigstock: 41090128

In the morning, I wasn’t proud of myself. The book seemed to be self-published. Under the auspices of the Romantic Novelists’ Association I used to try to help new writers with their craft. Surely these were habits I had seen before and not freaked out over?

In several novels, Jeffrey Archer had me counting A’s and B’s turns in dialogue. And Barbara Cartland was the mistress of the one-sentence paragraph in her later works.

Ah, but there was that word. Robotic. Neither Archer nor Cartland could ever be called robotic. Mannered, certainly. Eccentric, often. Mad as a box of frogs possibly. Robotic? Nah.

Could it be that the author was not quite human?

That monotone delivery! That lack of humour! I always remember Marilla in Anne of Green Gables thinking that a sense of humour is “another way of saying a sense of the fitness of things.” Yes, that was what was missing.

I started digging.

The Author

Image by Tumisu from Pixabay

The only author bio I could find was on Amazon. It is 3 paragraphs of not very different ways of saying the same thing about their writing. Well, at least they are consistent.

Here is one: “writes emotionally addictive romance about unexpected connections, undeniable chemistry, and the kind of love that rarely arrives according to plan.”

If you click on any word in the bio you are invited to “Ask Rufus”.

Rufus, it turns out, is Amazon’s AI shopping assistant portal. Could Rufus be writing at night, like I used to when I had a day job?

And then there are the statistics.

This pen name published its/their first novel on 21st May 2026, followed by 4 more that same month. The total so far, at least on the day that I looked, was 23. The books seem to be all romance, some WW2, some contemporary small town, some teenage, including just pre-teen in the recommended reading age. Some of the earliest titles look like fantasy.

Even Barbara Cartland, Guinness Book of Records’ most productive author, only managed 29 novels in one 12-month period. 1968 or 69, I think it was. That’s one book every 12.6 days. Our Author seems to have halved Cartland’s days per book.

AI

image by lightkeeper/Bigstock.com

I always tried to steer clear of AI, even when everyone was saying it was magic.

(Anthropic downloaded every single title I ever published with Harlequin Mills and Boom and did it “for training purposes”. Not that I’m bitter. I am SO not alone.)

AI’s main effect, if not purpose, seems to be to deskill the rest of us. This, of course, will further concentrate the world’s resources into fewer and fewer hands.

Image by Rajesh Raj from Pixabay

So I wonder whether my recoil (it is the only word for it) from this book was actually my subconscious broadcasting a Danger warning.

It is true that the only time I have felt this prolonged sense of unease and helplessness was after a highly plausible would-be fraudster tried to convince me he worked for my bank’s security department.

There was a horrible hollowness about him, too. And the same awful sense of being manipulated deliberately and not for my good.

CONCLUSION

But then, again, maybe this is just me making a mountain out of a molehill. What do you think?

Sophie

The Battle of Vittoria. Peninsular War, the final battles

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Another year, another battlefield tour for Sarah

The Battle of Vittoria in 1813 is recognised as decisive in pushing the French back across the border into France. However, several smaller engagements then took place before the end of the war. On this tour we would be looking at these final battles. War plays a large part in British history and it is a privilege to be able to visit some of the battlefields, for inspiration as well learning.

view of clouds at sunset from plane or UFO

Image by Nikhil Kurian from Pixabay

Remember June, before the droughts and the wildfires? We all thought we were in for another typical British summer. I was looking forward to a week of southern sunshine, meandering around Peninsular war battlefields. What I got was wall-to-wall sun – with a heatwave by the end of the week, and information overload.

The tour starts

At Madrid airport we met up with old friends from previous tours and met a few new ones, too. We were a small group, 17 of us plus our driver, Christian, whom we had met on last year’s tour. He is a fearless driver, very happy to follow some of the more, er, challenging tracks to take us to our destinations. An added bonus was that many of the group are avid military history enthusiasts, all of them more than happy to share their expertise.

Battle of Somosierra Nov 1808
Attrib. Horace Vernet, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

We left Madrid and headed northwest through the mountain pass of Somosierra.

It was here, in November 1808, that Napoleon ‘s Polish lancers forced their way past the Spanish infantry and artillery defending the pass. This was the last obstacle on Napoleon’s road to Madrid, and the city fell a few days later.

Napoleon Stopped Here

Our first hotel was in the Spanish Basque country, at the beautiful Argomaniz Parador. Originally a Renaissance palace, Napoleon made this his headquarters before attacking Vittoria. Since this year’s tour would be following Wellington’s army from the Battle of Vittoria to the final battle at Toulouse, this was the perfect place for us to spend our first two nights.

The Tour

archivist – stock.adobe.com

Our intrepid party was again led by military historian Ian Fletcher and covered the lesser-known battles at the end of the Peninsular War. I could not possibly do justice to everything we saw, so this is just my brief explanation and a few interesting snippets I picked up along the way. There are many good history books out there covering the battles.

The Battle of Vittoria 21st June ,1813

Battle of Vitoria, Geo Jones.. Public Domain via Wikimedia Commons

George Jones, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

This was the end of French aspirations in the Peninsula. Wellington (actually the Marquess of Wellington at that time, he did not become Duke until 1814) defeated the French army under the command of Joseph Bonaparte, brother of Napoleon, who had been imposed upon the Spanish people as their king.

Joseph, however, was not a great commander, and in reality it was his chief of staff, Marshall Jean-Baptiste Jourdan who took charge on the day.

The battlefield

The town of Vittoria sits in a shallow basin about 12 miles long and 7 miles wide, surrounded by mountains and with the Zadorra River to the north and west. Several bridges span the Zadorra and some of them were not even defended.

Battle of Vittoria

Around 8 am on the 21st June, the allies advanced, forcing the French left and centre to withdraw to defend Vittoria. To the north west, they crossed the river and after heavy fighting the French right finally gave way. By 7 pm the French army was in full retreat towards Pamplona. We covered a lot of ground – literally – for this battle.

We spent the day exploring the battlefield, starting from the knoll of Arinez where King Joseph and Marshal Jourdan initially established their command post. From there we had an excellent view over much of the battlefield. Then we looked at the bridges where the allies crossed the Zadorra and the villages where fighting was fierce.

Bridge at Trespuentes

One village that saw particularly heavy fighting was Gamarra Mayor which controlled one of the river crossings. John Douglas, a sergeant with The Royal Scots, later wrote of the village “…which we named Gomorrah, as it was a scene of fire and brimstone.” (John Douglas: Douglas’s Tale of the Peninsula & Waterloo: 1808-1815)

Storming of Gamarra Mayor, J P Beadle

The fighting in and around Vittoria lasted most of the day, but by 7 pm the French were in full retreat and Wellington gave orders to pursue the French army but this did not quite go to plan…

The baggage train

Joseph_Bonaparte (by_Wicar)

Earlier in June, King Joseph packed up and left Madrid for good, accompanied by a huge convoy of over 100 wagons filled with loot (estimated value at today’s prices, £100 million). It included money, works of art, jewels, exotic pets and Joseph’s Spanish mistresses. The baggage train was stuck in Vittoria when the allies attacked.

Around 5pm, Joseph ordered the French to retreat and sent a general back to Vittoria to make sure the baggage – oh, and the artillery – went off towards Pamplona. It wasn’t just Joseph’s baggage train setting off. The French army filled thousands of vehicles with plunder from the city. Add to this the civilians also trying to escape Vittoria, plus herds of livestock, and you have some idea of how clogged the roads out of the city, and away from the advancing British army, would become.

What happened to Joseph?

George_Henry_Hall_-_Portrait_of_a_Spanish_Woman_with_a_Lace_Shawl_and_Rose,_1866

George Henry Hall, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

He escaped the city but when his convoy was halted, he fled on horseback, abandoning his coach (filled with priceless paintings, many rolled to take up less space) as well as his Spanish ladies and wagons full of treasure.

The British soldiers, instead of pursuing the French, fell upon the baggage train and, er, “liberated it”.

Joseph’s Chamber Pot

The 14th King’s Hussars discovered King Joseph’s solid silver chamber-pot which they “removed” and kept. According to their museum website, this action gave the 14th the nickname of the Emperor’s Chambermaids. “To this day, it is a tradition that, at formal mess dinners, the Officers of the Regiment toast the Emperor with champagne drunk from the silver chamber-pot.”

The Pursuit

Portrait of Duke of Wellington, painted by Goya, 1812-1814

By Francisco Goya – National Gallery, London – online catalogue., Public Domain, Link

The British Hussars entered the city of Vittoria around 7.30pm that evening. Some regiments were so intent on looting they were no longer “available for combat”.

And they weren’t alone. Wellington sent his men in pursuit of the French army but they soon came upon the wreckage of Joseph’s convoy strewn across the fields. Treasures, paintings, books, silks and rich clothes were scattered everywhere. Wellington’s men saw the fleeing French soldiers plundering their own wagons and they just stopped and joined in, officers and poor soldiers alike.

It was this action that apparently caused Wellington to famously describe those involved as “the scum of the earth.” There were reports of drunken revelling long into the night, the soldiers accopanied by the young Spanish women abandoned by their French protectors.

Battle of Vittoria: the Outcome

The French losses for the Battle of Vittoria (killed, wounded, and captured) were about 8,000. The number would have been far higher if it had not been for the extraordinary amount of treasure discarded. The allies suffered about 5,000 casualties. The French also lost a large amount of artillery, caught up with the wagons that clogged the roads out of Vittoria. Wellington had been hoping to refill his war chest with millions of francs from the royal baggage train. In the end he only recovered about 250,000 francs. The rest disappeared, it was just too tempting for the poorly paid soldiers to resist.

Tsar Alexander, by François Pascal Simon, Baron Gérard, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Tsar Alexander, by Gérard, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

The French forces retreated over the Pyrenees and back into France. The British and their allies now had control of the Basque provinces. On hearing of the victory, the Emperors of Russia and Austria offered Wellington command of their armies, but he declined. It did, however, persuade Britain’s allies not to make peace with Napoleon but to keep fighting.

For Wellington, everything was set for the final push into France.

If you want to learn more about the Battle of Vittoria Ian’s book, Vittoria, 1813 (published by Osprey) is a great place to start – lots of maps and pictures!

To be continued….

Sarah

Norway is more than trolls and oil wells

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Joanna is just back from a trip to Norway where she found trolls and more…

I’m just back from a seven-day cruise to Norway. I’d been before, back in 2016, but this cruise called at different places, mostly. You may remember my pet troll, Olaf, brought back from my previous trip.

And yes, there were trolls this time, but fewer than last time. This one lives at Fløien, overlooking Bergen, at the top of the funicular railway. He’s big enough to embrace tourists for selfies.

And no, there isn’t one of me with him. Selfies are not my bag.

Starting in Stavanger

We started in Stavanger which is a gorgeous little city.

Norway was still in mourning for their late king, Harald V, so all the flags were flying at half-mast. It was a restrained type of mourning, I thought. (And the King’s funeral, a few days ago, confirmed that opinion for me.)

Outside the cathedral in Stavanger, we saw heaps of flowers, laid in honour of him. He was much loved, we were told.

(This pic was taken from a moving bus so isn’t great. Apologies for that.)

Our guide in the bus was a Scot, living permanently with her family in Stavanger, and she had nothing but praise for the city as a place to live. It certainly looked great. If you like waterfront living, preferably with your own boat, this looks ideal, I’d have said.

It is, of course, all very well kept. Norway, these days, is a very rich country. It has a lot of oil which is exported because almost all Norway’s electricity comes from hydropower. Stavanger is Norway’s oil capital.

The revenues from the oil exports go into Norway’s sovereign wealth fund which has grown to an enormous scale, over US$2.2 trillion. To put that in context, it’s over US$390,000 per Norwegian.

Coming from a country and a county with potholes everywhere, I didn’t notice any at all on Norwegian roads. But then, I’d say the UK squandered the revenues from North Sea Oil in a way that Norway did not. You may not agree on that, of course.

Stavanger’s history

Stavanger is an interesting mix of architectural styles. Many of the older houses remind me of the Hanseatic League houses. The ones shown here were on the harbour side, right next to where our ship had docked. The merchants used those big central windows to lift cargoes up into the house/warehouse. If you look at the very narrow house on the left, you can see that the windows are more door-sized than window-sized. And in the image of Stavanger’s harbour, above, you can see a similar Hansa-style building in the middle of the more modern ones.

Stavanger has a lot of quite narrow streets and some of the old wooden houses have been preserved. And there are lots of bicycles too.

I was interested to learn that, for the Hardanger suspension bridge, one of the longest in the world, a special lane was provided for pedestrians and cyclists. You can see the bridge in my pic below, though the cycle lane isn’t obvious. The calm surface of the fjord is amazing, isn’t it? We were blessed with much better weather than I’d expected.

Norway’s Independence

Norwegians are very proud of their heritage and their (relatively late) independence from Sweden and Denmark. There is an impressive monument in the southern part of Stavanger to commemorate this aspect of Norway’s history.

It takes the form of three enormous bronze swords planted in the rock next to the fjord. They’re 10 metres high, over 30 feet in old money. And against a blue sky, Sverd i fjell definitely makes an impact. The three swords commemorate the Battle of Hafrsfjord, in 872, when Harald Fairhair united Norway to become its first king.

I must admit that I love the way Norwegians named their kings. Harald Fairhair has a real ring to it, I think. His successor was his son, Eric Bloodaxe. That name also paints a picture but a slightly less enticing one. Of course, Harald Fairhair won his kingdom through victory in battles so he was probably no better than Eric. He just had a slightly more attractive name.

A trip into Lysefjord

Not far from Stavanger is the long, narrow Lysefjord. Its name means “light fjord”, supposedly because the granite cliffs that line it are light in colour. The cliffs are so steep that there are no roads along the side of the fjord although there is a suspension road bridge across the entrance to the fjord. Like so many bridges we saw in Norway, it was light and airy to the point that it almost disappeared into the landscape.

We took a boat trip to see Lysefjord from the inside, so to speak.

The cliffs are certainly daunting as you can see from these images.

There are tales of people climbing them, some of them fugitives from justice. An incentive, possibly?

The other really interesting thing is how trees and shrubs manage to anchor themselves in sheer rock and somehow survive there, even though there can’t be much soil, if any, to root into.

By way of light relief from all that sheer rock, there are goats in the fjord. Just two of them.

We were told that the farmer puts them onto the small grassy patch alongside the fjord at the start of the tourist season. All the tourist boats come alongside and the crew throw food to the goats. Over the months, they become very tame and also pretty fat. They don’t have a lot of choice. You can see that, behind them, there’s only a sheer rock face so they graze where they are or they swim for it. Better to become tame and fat…

Pulpit Rock, Lysefjord

The most famous part of Lysefjord is Pulpit Rock or Preikestolen. For those of an adventurous nature, it is possible to hike to the top of the rock which towers 604 metres above the fjord. Some of the passengers on our cruise did take on the hike. It’s supposed to take two hours each way but they told us it was more like three and a half. I was glad I’d opted for the boat trip even though I missed out on the amazing views from the top of Pulpit Rock.

But my picture doesn’t do justice to the height and the impressive nature of Pulpit Rock so I’ve imported an image from Wikipedia that shows the rock from above. You can see the enormous (25 metres across) flat top of the rock. There are loads of enterprising tourists on it, looking down onto the fjord. (I suspect they are mostly a lot younger than I am, though.)

By Andreas Tille – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, Link

Lysefjord’s Whisky Waterfall

I cannot vouch for any of this story, but it’s entertaining, so I’m going to share it.

This is an impressive waterfall in Lysefjord. According to our guide, a non-Norwegian came to Lysefjord and partnered with a local lass to farm on top of the cliffs. The man began to distill whisky, even though it wasn’t legal to do so. But people liked his whisky and bought it. However, the local sheriff wasn’t impressed and forced the distilling to close down.

And it did, sort of.

But, apparently, the whisky is still there somewhere, because you can taste it in the water of the waterfall. The locals call it the Whisky Waterfall.

Is that only to please the tourists to Norway? Possibly. But it’s a good story. And I have more to tell you in a future blog. With more waterfalls. There may even be trolls…

Joanna

The return of Abby Finch, in the vineyard, with a murder…

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Maybridge Murder Mystery #4

It’s a golden summer’s day in the Cotswolds. And garden designer Abby Finch is about to uncork the perfect murder!

I am absolutely thrilled to introduce my latest Maybridge Murder Mystery, Murder in the Vineyard, which is available for pre-order now and will be published on 8 September.

This is the fourth outing of garden designer, Abby Finch, who has the unfortunate habit of stumbling over dead bodies and, on a couple of occasions, falling under suspicion as the perpetrator.

It’s a strong motive for doing her best to uncover the truth with the help of her friends, estate agent Megan West and police officer Dee Newcombe.

One of the main differences between writing romance, which I did for thirty years, and crime, is the amount of research involved. If anyone in my own circle died in suspicious circumstances, my search history would certainly raise eyebrows.

Research

My search for poisons – especially the less detectable ones – has been extensive! As is my library…

But before I get to the murder method, I need a victim and a location. In some instances, the one leads to the other.

In the case of Murder in the Vineyard, it was the location that came first.

The Liberta Hive, plus a couple of other author friends and their partners, were on a writing retreat in Dorset which, happily, was located next to the Bride Valley Vineyard.

The Vineyard

A vineyard tour and tasting was booked. Well, it would have been rude not to. And here we are sitting under an awning, with the vineyard in the background and a lot of glasses on the table. The wine was wonderful. Quite a lot of it went home with us.

Group of authors sitting beneath a canopy enjoying a research trip to a vineyard which is in the background.

From l to r – Janet Gover with her husband, Louise Allen with her husband, Joanna Maitland, Liz Fielding and Sarah Mallory with her husband.

So, having my location – and a title – my victim wasn’t hard to find. After that, it’s all about finding who might have wanted them dead. Oh, and what to do about the dog? Did I mention that there’s a dog? There’s a picture of her lower down.

For those of you who have read the previous books, June and Beattie have a bigger role in this story. I love them, but I put them both through the wringer this time.

Lovely Jake is there of course, urging caution, worrying about Abby getting herself into danger but well aware that once she’s got her teeth into a problem, she won’t let go.

And it isn’t only a suspected murder that has Abby worried. She has other responsibilities that are causing her concern. She has a lot on her mind. And then she encounters a dog.

The dog

Scout. Scruffy grey mongrel dog lying in a garden..

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The dog came out of nowhere and Abby Finch, with no time to brake, instinctively swerved.

Her tyres squealed in protest and the hedge rattled against the colourful paintwork of her van before it jerked to a halt and stalled. It wouldn’t have won any prizes as an emergency stop but both she and the dog were in one piece.

But that, of course, is not the end of the problem. Abby can’t leave the dog running loose on a busy road. She’s wearing the collar of an animal rescue centre, close by on land owned by the May Valley Vineyard, and that’s where she takes it.

What happens next?

Searching for the current carer of the dog, Abby and the woman who runs the rescue centre, find Clementine Courtenay.

The elegant, stately lady, a doyenne of the county set and a total legend as a vigneron, is lying beside a stream in the vineyard she had planted fifty years earlier. And it’s clear that she’s celebrated her last prize winning vintage.

The police assume that she must have slipped and drowned. But June, Abby’s neighbour and Clemmie’s close friend, is adamant that something is wrong. Before she knows it, Abby is up to the handle of her border fork in a murder investigation.

Between jilted lovers, greedy offspring and bitter rivals, Clementine kept her friends close and her enemies closer still. What secrets will Abby find fermenting in the darkest corners of the Courtenay family cellar?

And how will Abby handle an affair that comes uncomfortably close to home?

The early reviews from Netgalley are coming in. Here are a few of the comments.

“Great atmosphere, enjoyable plot, and characters who feel like old friends.”
“…wonderfully reminiscent of a classic Agatha Christie-style mystery…”
“I’m sorry, why isn’t this already being made into a brit box/masterpiece mystery episode?”
“Perfect for anyone who loves quintessentially British cosy mysteries.”
“Cannot wait to see what Abby gets up to next.” (I’m busy working on it!)
“And the dog!” (Her name is Scout.)

romolo-tavani – stock.adobe.com

Murder in the Vineyard is available to pre-order here at a launch price of 99p/99c or, if you’re a reviewer, it’s available on Netgalley, here.

And my publisher, Joffe Books, are celebrating the publication of the new Abby Finch mystery with a fabulous prize for one lucky reader – a £50 Virgin Experience Voucher. Sign up for their newsletter – free books every week – or their FB page to get the latest news.

Liz

Dolly and Celebrity RIP

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bouquet of forget me nots tied with a white ribbon on top of a red-covered book diary

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Multi-talented international benefactor, singer songwriter and all round good egg Dolly Parton died last Tuesday. It hit me like a ton of bricks.

It clearly did the same for a load of people round the world. They were all over Facebook and, for once, I followed up some of the links in my feed.

Many were to media-junkies on the shock news bandwagon. But far more, it seemed to me, were just everyday people who don’t post about celebrities, just brought up short by shock at the loss and a complicated sadness.

Lots of them recorded that they wept. More than once, some of us.

Fan of Dolly? Moi?

downwrd shot of man's trouser leg, polished brown shoe and cowboy hat against the bottom of a large guitar

Image by Ruslan Sikunov from Pixabay

Yes, I was a fan, very much so. Though I admit to coming to it in a rather roundabout way.

First a bit of context. I never really encountered Country in the full Nashville sense, until I worked in DC and met an enthusiast in the early 90s. Until then I didn’t understand its conventions at all.

I’d found Dolly long before that, however. To begin with, she was just catchy tunes on the radio (I’m a devoted radio girl, always have been) and a refreshing voice of down-to-earth principles in the occasional interview. She sounded friendly and sensible and I liked that.

girl cyclist sitting on rug on the ground reading a book

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But I really hated the first big song, Jolene. Its lyrics drove a train through my idealistic philosophy of love and marriage.

In my defence, I was a newly published romantic novelist at the time. My heroines didn’t have any time for an unfaithful spouse. He sounded frankly weedy. Not worth keeping, much less negotiating with a (horrible word) rival. Pair bonding, in my romantic world, was NOT a competitive sport. My readers seemed to agree.

woman in a hat , dark shirt and floral skirt dancing and clicking his fingers, absorbed.

Image by Mircea Iancu from Pixabay

But then I got my own Dolly song. Yes, it was still catchy. I could sing along to it in the kitchen. Even dance a bit. Yet the lyrics were pitiless and, to me, all too recognisable.

Here was the detritus of a hopeless relationship, stripped down to the bare bones of very nearly cliché and set out plain. It was telling me something I knew was true in a way that I could not wriggle out of. Suddenly I understood what people heard in Jolene.

It made me wince. And I still danced anyway.

Respecting Dolly

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I have respected Dolly ever since, though I have learned much more in the last few days. There is so much to admire.

She came fourth in a family of twelve, born in the mountains of Tennessee, the first person in her family to finish High School.

Sang on radio and television from a small child, a born performer. Went to Nashville the moment she left school, determined to have a successful music career. There she met her husband of nearly 60 years when she was under 20 and he was only just over it. He was her best friend, the one she came home to and made plans with, until he died in 1982.

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I gathered all of this from strikingly open interviews, interspersed, generally when invited to do so, with home-spun wisdom of a generally encouraging sort.

Be true to yourself. Kindness and generosity are important. You can do anything you really want but you have to work at it. Learn to read. There are books on everything these days, so you can do your research. Don’t let others put you down.

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She followed her own precepts too, donating substantially to causes she believed in, particularly in her home State.

But pride of place has to go to her international charity, Imagination Library. They donate a book to any child under 5. Throughout the English-speaking world, as far as I can see.

Dolly’s Writing Process

psphotography/bigstock.com

Oh, the fellow feeling when I came across an interview where Dolly was asked how she wrote her songs. She did her best to answer helpfully. But it seemed to me it was a question she hadn’t quite prepared for. She was clearly reviewing her practice as she came up with the answers.

Sometimes she’d get an idea for a song but didn’t have time to write it, so just scribbled something down in one of the notebooks she always had to hand. Sometimes she faltered, when the lyric clunked or the tune wouldn’t finish itself. Sometimes, it just flows. How I recognised all of those.

Yup, me too, Miss Dolly. Me too.

That Phenomenal Song

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I Will Always Love You was one that flowed, apparently. She had been trying to break away from Porter Wagner, who had given her that important first break with a regular spot in his popular TV show. They sang duets. Porter took Dolly on the road with his band: five guys and she was the girl singer, terminally subordinate. At the start Dolly promised him five years. But they were into seven now, and he wasn’t letting go. “He was so stubborn,” she said.

So she wrote him the ultimate break up song. He wept and agreed, she says. Then the song, a genuine three hankie job, became possibly her highest earner ever.

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At one point Elvis Presley wanted to sing it, but his voracious manager, Colonel Tom Parker, demanded half the world rights in the song which Dolly had already published. She cried over the decision but refused.

And then, as she told an interviewer at CMT, Witney Houston recorded it for The Bodyguard and took it to Number One on the Billboard Hot 100 for 14 weeks.

“And I made enough money to buy Graceland.”

Love, love, love Dolly’s mischievous sense of humour, occasionally wry, often self-deprecating, always on point.

Dolly and the Best Duet

Red curtain decorated with sparkling stars

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Another story , which I completely love, is how she came to record Islands in the Stream with Kenny Rogers – and gained a lifelong friend into the bargain. Rogers on his third or fourth incarnation in the music business was recording the album Eyes that See in the Dark, produced by Barry Gibb, released August 1983. Gibb and his brothers in the Bee Gees had written IITS and Rogers struggled with it for 4 days. In the end — he must have been desperate and exhausted, poor soul — he told Gibb he didn’t even like the damn thing. (Don’t think he put it like that.)

Gibb said, “What we need is Dolly Parton.”

She took up the challenge. They recorded the duet. And it went to number one on the American pop chart, number one on the Country chart.

Man kissing the back of a woman's houler as she glances back, laughing

Image by Марина Войтик from Pixabay

Dolly and Kenny went on singing it together, in each other’s shows and at awards galas, for the rest of their lives. It seems that it is still the best selling country duet ever.

And I see why. It was a slow burn for me, though, because I think Kenny’s intrinsic reaction was right. The lyric is rubbish, neither coherent, consistent nor sensible. As a solo song it’s a mess, though the music is great.

But turn it into dialogue between the right singers and there’s suddenly a couple of lovers, confident in their relationship but still surprised, telling each other how they feel and falling over their words.

Personally, I think the way Dolly emphasises “The real thing” at the end of her first verse may just be what nailed it.

Happy sigh.

Rationale of Mourning

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But most of this is good stuff , to be treasured and enjoyed. So why am I still tearing up, from time to time, whenever I think about Dolly Parton?

Of course some of it must be the old John Donne thing, “Any man’s death diminishes me,” especially when the person in question was vibrant, funny, kind and a positive ball of fire, who made you feel glad to be alive.

(Aghast at current standards of political integrity worldwide, my dream team for US Government used to be Dolly for President, Taylor Swift for VP. Sigh. Another dream bites the dust.)

spray of lily of the valley lying ona hand-written love letter

Image by beasternchen from Pixabay

But a lot of my sadness is also is for those she has left, and in particular those people I spoke about at the beginning of this blog. I mourn with all those people who only knew her work and her public persona. Now they miss her and have come onto social media to say so and why, with such straightforward simplicity.

Like them, I mourn her because Dolly Parton spoke to me, spoke for me sometimes, stood up to bullies, was fun and approachable, tolerant, hard-working and knew her own worth. Above all I loved her unstuffy dignity and awe-inspiring self respect. (Watch Dolly’s classic response to Barbara Walters telling her she didn’t have to dress so trashy, if you don’t already know what I mean.) And I love some of the music.

A Time to Weep

Image by Søren Nielsen from Pixabay

I wept first when a quiet woman I didn’t recognise, said how touched she was that the Band of the Welsh Guards played 9 to 5, at the Changing of the Guard Ceremony this Wednesday, the day after Dolly’s death was announced. I know what she meant. My father would have said they really put a bit of swank into it. Musicians recognise each other, I think.

So for her, and anyone else who felt the same, please listen LCpl Cally Jones and the Band of HM Royal Marines performing I Will Always Love You at the Royal Albert Hall for the Mountbatten Festival of Music. It’s absolutely beautiful. No instrument does longing like the saxophone.

Sophie

Alternative History can be fun but also a challenge

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Joanna ponders alternative history and the challenges it brings

Queen Victoria, coronation portrait, Sir George Hayter

Queen Victoria by George Hayter – Royal Collection RCIN 401213, Public Domain, Link

I’ve been thinking about alternative history quite often recently, because our forthcoming anthology, Hauntings at the Black Cat Inn, features rather a lot of it.

Or so I thought, until a friend queried my definition.

Have we really written alternative history? Or alternate history as some call it?

If I write a novella or short story featuring a real character from history doing something that they definitely never did, is that alternative history? Or is it just another story?

Some readers would definitely say that my novella does not qualify as alternate history.

How to define alternative (or alternate) history?

Does alternative history have to be a more extended way of writing? Something long-form, with a fully developed alternative world?

One definition of alternate history holds that there are 3 key factors:

A point of divergence (often abbreviated as PoD) from the historical record, occurring at a time before the story is written;
A change that would alter the subsequent course of history; and
An examination of the consequences or ramifications of that divergence.

I still remember reading Len Deighton’s SS-GB, a novel set in the early 1940s based on the assumption that the Nazis had won and Britain had surrendered. Chilling. And with a definite point of divergence and a much-altered course of history.

I also remember a radio programme that asked the question, “What if Alexandrina Victoria, who became Queen Victoria, had been Alexander?” The consequences would have been interesting, to say the least, because a British King Alexander would also have been King of Hanover. What would Britain have done when Bismarck sought to unify Germany under Prussia and incorporate Hanover into the new German empire? And would the First World War ever have started?

I’m not aware that anyone has written that particular alternative history but I may be wrong on that. Please let me know if I am.

Alternate History needn’t be spine-chilling

More happily, I’m reminded of Sophie’s lovely novel To Marry a Prince which is, indeed, set in a fully developed alternative world. In Sophie-world, the Prince Regent’s daughter, Princess Charlotte, did not die in childbirth in 1817. That’s the point of divergence and it changed British history.

In that alternative universe, Charlotte lived to produce children and a line of British monarchs that culminated in the father of Sophie’s hero, Prince Richard. Queen Victoria, and the cultural changes of the Victorian Age, never happened. Quite a lot to get your head round, but it’s a convincing read, nonetheless, and much recommended.

I think, too, of Alison Morton’s Roma Nova series, again set in a fully fleshed-out alternative universe. In Alison-world, some citizens of ancient Rome created a new state, somewhere not too far from Italy, but essentially run by women and extremely clever with modern technology.

Alison has written quite a few novels set there now—the image, right, shows the 10th anniversary hardback reissue of book 1. Her universe is both coherent and totally believable, provided you are the kind of reader who is prepared to suspend disbelief.

And if you’re not, why do you read fiction at all, I ask?

When does creating “new” history not count as alternative history?

All of the examples above would generally be viewed as alternative history, I think. But they’re the easy examples. Incidental use of historical characters in ways that are not true to history? That’s another kettle of fish, possibly.

So when, in His Cavalry Lady, I had my hero appointed to be liaison officer to Tsar Alexander I of Russia (and to spy on him during his visit to England in 1814) it probably would not count as alternative history.

After all, the events I included in that novel did actually happen, even down to the vicious thunderstorm that extinguished all the special lighting when the Regent took his royal guests to Oxford. And, apart from my hero and heroine, the characters in the novel were mostly historically accurate. They included the Tsar, the King of Prussia, Field Marshal Blücher, the British Prince Regent, Lord Castlereagh and other politicians from all sides. And the historical characters did what history records them as doing.

I plead guilty here. There is no real point of divergence. There is no change that would alter the course of history. In fact, the course of history runs on merrily in a way that would be totally familiar to consumers of history books. (I did enough research while writing the novel to ensure that it did. Maybe that was a mistake?)

It’s fun, but it’s not alternate history as we know it…

I love playing with historical characters, but I’ll admit I don’t write alternative history that fits the definition above. Or I haven’t done so yet…

In my latest novella, The Vampire and the Veiled Lady, my vampire hero, Theo, encounters a Veiled Lady in a broken post-chaise in the middle of a storm. It’s 1784, and they’re all en route to Falmouth on the south coast of Cornwall.

My vampire isn’t real. Of course, he isn’t.
Vampires are creatures of myth and fantasy, aren’t they?

But the Veiled Lady is a character from history and Theo thinks he recognises her. Then, being incurably nosey, he decides to find out what the Veiled Lady is doing in Cornwall. His curiosity leads him into all sorts of other encounters (including a brush with the law) that he hadn’t banked on, though. After all, The Black Cat Inn is renowned for its spooky inhabitants as well as its fine food.

girl facing a red question mark on blackboard

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Can you guess who the Veiled Lady might be? I will admit that the historical character probably never travelled to Falmouth in a storm, but she could have done. And most of the rest of my historical background is accurate, even down to the appalling summer of 1784 (caused by a volcanic eruption in Iceland, though no one knew that at the time).

If you want to know who the Veiled Lady turned out to be and what happened to Theo, you can read the novella in Hauntings at the Black Cat Inn. It’s available to preorder now at the special price of 99p/99c/AU$1.99 until after publication on 13th October.

Alternate History that would be fun to read? Or to write?

By Francisco Goya – National Gallery, London – online catalogue., Public Domain, Link

All the books I read about the Battle of Waterloo (1815) tell me that, when the battle is war-gamed these days, Napoleon wins. In real life, Wellington and Blücher won by the skin of their teeth, helped by Napoleon’s mistakes. But what if Napoleon had won? What would Europe have been like afterwards?

I’ve read a number of alternative history books assuming that Germany won the Second World War. Not only SS-GB, but also Fatherland, by Robert Harris. But I haven’t read one that assumes Napoleon won the Battle of Waterloo. Is there one I’ve missed?

Are there other turning points in history where you’d like to read an alternative take? Here are some that occur to me. Feel free to add more.

What if Catherine of Aragon had borne Henry VIII a living son?
What if Bonnie Prince Charlie had been victorious at the Battle of Culloden in 1746?
And, going back much further…
What if William of Normandy had lost the Battle of Hastings in 1066?

Bayeux Tapestry, Death of King Harold, Public Domain via Wikipedia

Over to you…

Joanna

Eclipse Effect

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Sophie Weston revisits her first solar eclipse and is moved all over again.

Image by Peter Schmidt from Pixabay

This week it has been almost impossible to avoid the eclipse effect on broadcast news and social media. I didn’t take much notice at first.

Now, this is odd. I’m normally very hopeful over such things. The moment some friendly stargazer announces a blood moon or a meteor shower, it goes into the diary. Then I get out my binoculars and go out onto my fourth floor balcony at whatever ungodly hour is foretold and follow whatever celestial map and directions I have managed to acquire.

Stuttgart Observatory Image by Donnawetta from Pixabay

With very little success, I have to admit. For the balcony in question is in central London.

The light pollution is pretty much total. And the chances of the skies over this wet northern land being overcast at any time of day are tending towards 90% certainty.

When I’m trying to get in touch with my inner astronomer, anyway. I am therefore used to disappointment. The beautiful image above is pure wish fulfillment. Continue reading →

The blessings of hot weather. Yes, there are some…

Joanna realises the hot weather brings blessings too…

narin – stock.adobe.com

August is a time of blessings and bounty. Mostly.

Yes, I know that the lack of rain—about half of England is officially in drought—has reduced crops dramatically, but the sunshine has helped crops, too.

Hereford, where I live, is very much an agricultural county. As I drive around I can see that the crops have already been harvested. The yield will be lower, I assume, but, on the benefit side, the farmers will not have to spend lots of money to dry the grain as they usually do. It’s already bone dry.

One of this hot summer’s blessings? Continue reading →

In Spring

Enter The Cat.

Cats and Companions, Ghostly and Otherwise

Spooky Takes for Darker Nights

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Joanna’s trip to Norway is full of memories, of Bergen and more

Troll at Fløien above Bergen

Bergen’s links with Scotland

Rosenkrantz not Guildenstern

Waterfalls have stories too

Green roofs at Fossli and elsewhere

Ulvik’s amazing location

Yet another waterfall?

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Download for the Journey

Day 2 Thoughts

Day 3

The Author

AI

CONCLUSION

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Another year, another battlefield tour for Sarah

The tour starts

Napoleon Stopped Here

The Tour

The Battle of Vittoria 21st June ,1813

The battlefield

The baggage train

What happened to Joseph?

Joseph’s Chamber Pot

The Pursuit

Battle of Vittoria: the Outcome

To be continued….

Sarah

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Joanna is just back from a trip to Norway where she found trolls and more…

Starting in Stavanger

Stavanger’s history

Norway’s Independence

A trip into Lysefjord

Pulpit Rock, Lysefjord

Lysefjord’s Whisky Waterfall

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Maybridge Murder Mystery #4

Research

The Vineyard

The dog

What happens next?

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Fan of Dolly? Moi?

Respecting Dolly

Dolly’s Writing Process

That Phenomenal Song

Dolly and the Best Duet

Rationale of Mourning

A Time to Weep

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Joanna ponders alternative history and the challenges it brings

How to define alternative (or alternate) history?

Alternate History needn’t be spine-chilling

When does creating “new” history not count as alternative history?

It’s fun, but it’s not alternate history as we know it…

Alternate History that would be fun to read? Or to write?

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Joanna realises the hot weather brings blessings too…

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