The Pages Anniversary Issue/ Double Issue!
Issue 7
July/Aug.-Sept./Oct. 2009
The Pages is brought to you by www.theapprenticewriter.webs.com 1
The Pages
Contents
CONTRIBUTORS…………………………………………………3 EDITORIAL: …………………………….Marit and Stina……….6 REVIEW of Issue 6:…………………….Myra King…………….7 COMPETITION RESULT:………………………………………..10 POETRY:
Celebrity Rules…………...........Trevor Belshaw………………12 Sweet Little Lies . ………..........Paola Fornari Hanna………… 30 Sincerely Yours…………..........Rosa Johnson ………………...31 The Unwelcome Guest……….. Trevor Belshaw……………….32 Manners Maketh Man………….Rosa Johnson…………………33 Kirkstall Abbey ………………..Marc Latham…………………37 Poetry Competition………..Norfolk Poets and Writers………...47 SHORT STORIES:
Circular Road (Winner)………... Martha Hubbard……………..10 The Table………………….........Julia Cathcart………………... 21 Too Late………………………...Kristina Meredith…………….34 Mother Psychology……………..Rosa Johnson………………....39 ARTICLES:
A Woman’s View……………….Di Rayburn …………………..14 Roman Ramble………………….Paola Fornari Hanna………….16 From Keyboard to Bookshelf…. ..David Robinson……………...19 The Garden at Little Oak 5………Rosa Johnson………………...25 Bangers and Bins………………...Diane Rayburn………….. …..28 Valentino Vibes………………….Paola Fornari Hanna…………43 Out Now…………………………Kudos………………………...45 PRESS RELEASE:
Twaddle by DW………………… .David Robinson……………..35 BOOK REVIEW:
Review of Twaddle by DW………Marit Meredith………………36 BOOK SHELF: ……………………………………………………48 DIARY PAGES:……DWBP……Anna Reiers……………………..50 2
The Pages
Contributors
Marit Meredith (aka Anna Reiers) was born and brought up in Norway, but settled in South Wales,UK, in 1972. Married, with six daughters and eight grandchildren, she’s kept very busy on the family front – and at almost all other times, she writes. She’s had comments, articles, poems, true-life stories and short stories published, as well as having work in anthologies published in aid of charities. She published a collaborative book of poems and prose, Another Haircut? in aid of charity, through Lulu, earlier this year. She has also published Tea Time Morsels: A Collection of Short Stories and has several projects on the go, including her new gluten free blog at www.writingtheglutenfreedietandshortstory.blogspot.com www.annareiers.webs.com www.redroom.com/member/Marit www.thehouseofmeredithpublishing.com http://www.writelink.co.uk/community/blogs/posts/mater Kristina Meredith (Stina) was born and brought up in sunny South Wales, to a Norwegian mother (see above!) and Welsh father. A brief interlude to London to study fashion, didn’t quell the cravings for the green, green grass of… well, Valley’s or Fjords - it just added to her identity crisis. Now a mother to a very lively and curious 2 year old boy, life keeps her very busy. Design has taken firmly to the backseat, leaving her time to pursue her ambition to write. The Apprentice Writer was set up by Kristina and Marit, in order to interact with likeminded souls, and to help Kristina as she pursues her writing ambition. www.theapprenticewriter.webs.com Emma Meredith (Marit’s daughter and Kristina’s sister), our photographer for the cover image, has had her work published in a couple of anthologies, and is also the family’s unofficial photographer. Her camera is always with her. She has an eye for detail and often captures what we might otherwise miss. With an 11 month old baby son, she’s going to have her hands full for the foreseeable future, but hopes to pursue a career in photography later.
Myra King is an Australian writer living in Ballarat Victoria. Between 1980 and 2003 she wrote for several Australian magazines and had a fortnightly advice column in a Tampa Bay (Florida) newspaper. Most recently she was lucky enough to be awarded first prize in the UK-based Global Short Story Competition and shortlisted for the EJ Brady Short Story Award. Her stories, articles and poetry have been published in the UK, Australia, USA and New Zealand. myra1055@gmail.com
David Robinson has been a writer since his teens, and semi-professional since the mid-eighties. He is extensively published both in his local newspaper and across the web and small press magazines. He turned out over 80 pieces for Kwickee, the mobile phone information service. He published his first two novels in 2002, and his third novel, The Haunting of Melmerby Manor was published in 2008 by Virtual Tales (USA). Usually writing either humour or supernatural fact/fiction, he is currently engaged on several projects including the sequel to The Haunting of Melmerby Manor. He lives with his wife and crazy West Highland White called Max, on the edge of the moors northeast of Manchester. http://www.writelink.co.uk/community/blogs/posts/davidr
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After spending his twenties travelling the world, Marc Latham studied history and communications studies at university, and graduated with a PhD in 2005. He has since been building a freelance writing career from the www.greenygrey.co.uk website, and has had several articles published. Booklocker is publishing an eBook memoir about his first travel around Europe and the Middle-East, including time spent amongst the 1980s Worker-Traveller communities that nomadically followed the seasonal work. Contact: marc@greenygrey.co.uk - www.greenygrey.co.uk/blog
At 54 after bringing up two children, caring for her parents and running a successful business buying and selling antiques and collectables, Diane Rayburn had a couple of brushes with the grim reaper. Bored to tears with sitting around, she decided to begin writing and started by jotting down all the memories from her very happy childhood. Encouraged by winning a competition for a story based on her sisters birth, she joined a writers’ circle. The next step was to try her hand at fiction although she is ashamed to admit she’s too lazy once the stories are written, to do anything with them. Now age 65, she is grateful for her still sharp, long term memory, and thanks to Best of British magazine, is having some success with stories about her childhood. Paola Fornari was born on an island in Lake Victoria, and was brought up in Tanzania. Having lived in almost a dozen countries over three continents, she speaks five and half languages, describing herself as an ‘expatriate sin patria’ She explains her itinerant life by saying: ‘Some lead; others follow.’ She recently took up writing, and her articles have featured in diverse publications. Wherever she goes, she makes it her business to get involved in local activities, explore, and learn the language, making each new destination a real home. She lived in Montevideo between 2004 and 2008, but now lives in Belgium. http://www.writelink.co.uk/blogs/Chausiku/ Rosa Johnson was born in Hampshire. She taught agriculture and animal husbandry. She is married to a horticulturist and has two grown up children. Writing has been a hobby since she was in her teens. She wrote (writes) short plays, dialogues and character studies for children. Short stories, articles and several attempts at novels came much later. Keen sportswoman until her spine rebelled; she was forced to adopt a more sedentary way of life when surgery failed in 1986. Rosa must now be content to follow international tennis, rugby and cricket on the radio. She’s a dabbler and will have a go at anything. Sewing, bonzai-ing, decorating, art and crafts, acting, writing. Anything but singing! Her ambition is one day to find that she can excel at something.
Trevor Belshaw has, after years of talking about it, finally taken up the writer’s challenge. He was born in Ilkeston, Derbyshire, in 1953, but moved to Nottinghamshire after he left school in 1970. His working life has, in his own words, seen him ‘change careers with alarming regularity’, although for the last 12 years he has been working for himself, building, repairing and upgrading computers after getting a City and Guilds award in the subject. The urge to write, however, remains. His passions include his dogs (Molly and Maisie; a constant source of inspiration for his writing) and Nottingham Forest Football Club. www.trevorbelshaw.com (Under construction.)
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Julia Cathcart lives in South West Scotland with her husband and two daughters. Since graduating (M.A.) from Glasgow University she has had a succession of boring jobs. She has been writing, on and off, for most of her life.
Martha Hubbard is a retired English teacher living on Saaremaa Island, off the Northwest coast of Estonia. She has had a poem about the Island published in an anthology about homelessness compiled by the University of Central Lancashire and a short story in an e-zine, Minute Mysteries. She is working on a novella about a man who develops a very disturbing relationship with his Sat-Nav device. As well as writing, I translate, edit texts and guide visitors around Estonia’s capital town, Kuressaare.
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The Pages
Editorial
‘Times are a-changing’ I wrote not so long ago, as my status on Facebook. It’s certainly true for our house/household, for our extended family and for some of our friends, and also for The Pages. Even when the news are sad, when we suffer loss of a loved one or a friend, we eventually pick ourselves up out of the ashes, like the Phoenix rising, stronger for having known and loved – and with a store of memories. People move on in life, too. Our friends and neighbours made the move to France recently, and we miss them already. We should be getting used to neighbours emigrating. This is the third lot of close neighbours in recent years, although two of our present neighbours have actually come back to their home country. We are a global community these days, not just through the connections on the Internet, but literally, too. As for our house, well, I’ll be writing an article about The House that Jack Built soon. Or maybe I should leave well alone. Now to The Pages and the changes ahead. We are quite happy with the present format, although slight changes here and there may be necessary now and then. The biggest change is that we are going to go quarterly after this issue. This is our anniversary issue, and a bumper one at that. It’s a good time to look forward. Publishing the magazine every three months will give us more time to source content, as well as to run competitions on a larger scale, with better prizes, as well as more prizes and possible publication for winners and runners up as a ‘chap book’. The new annual competition will be rolled out in the next issue. Meanwhile we have a winner of our last competition. Congratulations to Martha Hubbard on her short story ‘Circular Road’. Enjoy your read! Our anniversary issue should have something for everyone, from poetry to fiction, travel articles to articles on a range of subjects, and pages of books by our contributors etc. A big thank you to Myra King, who kindly reviewed the last issue for us. The review is a new addition to the magazine. Keep the contributions coming. We’re ready for the second year.
Marit and Stina
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The Pages
Review
The Pages Issue 6 - June 2009 A review by Myra King. It was with great pleasure that I read the pages of The Pages issue 6. What a diverse and wonderful collection of insightful writing, with just the right smattering of humour. Excellent layout makes for easy and enjoyable reading. The Pages has certainly come of age and easily equals the best of all those other eco-friendly e-mags. Trevor Belshaw’s ‘At My Own Expense’ proves that the tax office is definitely not quid pro quo. Pardon the pun! Great chuckle over this poem. His other poem, ‘I Held You’, had tears prickling my eyes and a lump forming in my throat. And I am sure many TP readers will empathise with me. Beautifully written. My favourite line: I dream we dance an endless waltz, your head upon my cheek…
Marilyn Sylvester’s poem ‘Clockwise’ I read aloud, and the cadence is superb - I could hear the clock’s heartbeat. Nature’s voiceover in ‘The Soothsayer, Sage, Proclaimed’, works well, and I loved the personification of the mushrooms in ‘Mushroom Sauces’. My favourite line: ...when pouting their soft edible, curly edged lips…
Marc Latham’s ‘Following a Monk’s Life. Kirkstall Abbey, Leeds’. A very well researched and fascinating read. I felt the deprivations of the monks and revelled at the beautiful countryside. The article is enhanced by amazing photos and detailed maps. Lonely Planet, watch out for this writer! Favourite line: Along the walk you pass a wildflower meadow that features plants as colourful as their names….
‘Kisses’ by Linda Daunter. A poem which begs to be read twice, so I did! And loved it even more the second time. It packs a punch in a few lines and its satirical edge works perfectly. My favourite line: His laughter speared my heart.
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Diane Rayburn’s ‘Cider Plots and Camomile Tea’ - great title that delivers. The protagonist’s bad luck intensifies as the story progresses. I thought the dialogue was good in this. It sounded natural and defined the characters. The story also had a satisfying ending. Diane’s ‘To Write’ resonates from the writer’s cathartic journey. So many good lines, it was hard to choose a favourite. Loved: Climbed the ladder of my memories.
Rosa Johnson’s ‘The Displaced Person’ had me opening my eyes wide in semidisbelief. We call them ‘squatters’ here in Australia - as well as in the UK (those who take up residence in someone’s house without permission). Great read! The flora and fauna once again comes to life in Rosa’s delightful regular feature, ‘The Garden at Little Oak’ (part 4.) Her wonderful descriptions are further enhanced by the many photos, good enough to landscape the pages of any gardening book. Favourite line: It is a spectacular plant especially in the half light just before dark.
Kristina Meredith’s ‘Vince Vern’ character leaps with wicked determination from the page and leads us a merry chase until his very well deserved, unfortunate (but extremely satisfying for the reader) conclusion. Amazing metaphors and strong characterisation underpin this story. Vince is a template of the totally unlovable person. Another great read! My favourite line: …and his performance on stage was no better than his performance in the bedroom…
‘Yours Virtually’, by Gillian Brown, felt like a quirky read to start with, which is enticing enough, but it really is much more than this. I especially loved the interplay of the emails, like emotional ping pong. And the reader is taken through time until the story unfolds to its unexpected and poignant ending. Favourite line: It was supposed to be bright orange but it came out like the fur on our new mongrel puppy.
‘Insoles’, by David Robinson, really proves you know your own body the best. A good and understandable rant. As was June Gundlack’s rant, ‘Please Don’t Fill the Gap’, about not having room on the Tube. Talk about invading one’s personal space! Both of these made my head nod in sympathy. Favourite line from David’s: mine are acquired flat feet… Favourite line from June’s: He is now taking up the space of approximately four people breathing out…
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Paola Fornari Hanna’s cycling through the streets of Brussels in ‘A Vélo Mesdames!’ had me taking off my hat to her for such courage. I rolled along with her right from the first line, riding tandem in my mind, and holding my breath as she skimmed the roundabouts and braved the traffic. ‘A Vélo Mesdames!’ indeed! Her travel article, ‘Five go to Abruzzo’, was just as easy to read, with the added glimpse of the journey and the place’s history through her excellent photos. My favourite line: We hurtled down cobbled alleyways…
Last but by no means least, I end this review with Anna Reiers’ very compelling ‘Diary Of A Would Be Protagonist’ - ‘Forever Unnamed.’ Poor WBP, without what he feels is a ‘real’ name, hassles his creator with no luck or a positive outcome. He is still without a name at the end of the diary entry. But this is the very thing that makes him unique, that and the unforgettable interplay between the characters. WBP is more real because of this exclusion. Very innovative writing: bring on the next instalment of WBP! My favourite line: Perhaps she made a visit to that virtual bar.
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The Pages
Competition Winner
Congratulations to Martha Hubbard, the winner of our short story competition. Her excellent short story ‘Circular Road’ is at once poignant and informative, as well as being very well written. The tone reminds us of that of Anne Frank’s in her diaries, and similarly takes the form of diary pages. The voice of the unnamed child in the sanatorium shines through from the very beginning. She doesn’t really know who she is, why should we? Her anonymity adds to the story, this feeling if displacement, of wonder about where she is going – the need to catch a star – and the matter of fact way of dealing with the illness she and Nathalie shares. Circular Road (below) is a touching story, showing insight and empathy - and it fulfills the criteria without being obvious. Well done, Martha!
Circular Road 01 Janvier, 1914, Perharidy, Roscoff, Finistère : Last night the hospital celebrated la Fête de Nouvelle Année. In a cobalt sky, slashed with diamonds, I watched the Milky Way pour its glittering stream of stars strait down onto the earth. I held out my hands – just so, hoping to catch one in my fingers. All I caught was a chill. Sister came out and put me to bed. I didn’t even get to have a piece of cake. Février : I’ve been in bed since the start of the year. That chill produced a fever that caused a flare up. The doctors are very angry with me. They don’t understand about catching stars. They say if I’m not a good girl, they will send me home. Where is that? I’ve been in this Sanatorium for five years, since I was eight. This is the only home I remember. Mars : Still in bed. Outside the sky is a brittle blue. Clouds driven past my window by an angry wind look like stampeding horses. I’m not the only patient being threatened with expulsion. Nathalie’s mother has been here for consultations with Monsieur le Directeur. She will be leaving on Sunday. The journey’s not so bad for her. It’s only 17 hours from Brest to Paris. They will have to stay overnight in Brest, though. The Paris train leaves very early in the morning. Nathalie left yesterday. She looked very frightened and very sick; her face was the colour of skimmed milk with two bight red spots on her cheeks. Her mother’s face was stone. I asked Sister if there would be a bed on the train for her to lie down on. “Of course not.” She was very indignant. “She will sit up like a normal well-behaved girl, just like you will when you go home.” I decide to be as good as I possibly can be – no more running across the lawn barefoot trying to keep up with the clouds. It makes me cough too much any way. Maybe they will let me stay.
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I asked Sister where home was –just in case. “Oh Elenie, you vex me so. Don’t be such a silly girl. You know it’s in London.” “Where is London?” “What a silly question. Let me see. Have you coughed all your brains into your handkerchief? I’ll give you a clean one.” I was still bedridden. With nothing better to do, I persisted. “But where is London? How will I get there?” “It’s over there, across the channel,” waving in the direction of the sea. “Is it north of here? Will it be cold?” “Yes, I think so, a little north. Now, that’s enough questions for one day. You try my patience sometimes.” I lay in my bed, white linen glittering all around me, watching waves slamming onto our rocky shorefront. In summer that was a lovely place. Then we lie on chaises in the sun, bundled up to our necks in wool rugs. Sunlight refracted by moisture in the air stabs our faces with a thousand-million tiny needles. But not today, it is too cold here to recline outside in the sun. I don’t want to go anywhere that is colder. Mai : This disgusting war is imminent, I feel. All that anyone can talk about is the Germans this and the Bosch that. And when – not if. At night I imagine German soldiers marching down the road from Morlaix. They are coming to cut us all into tiny pieces, to make it easier to send us away. I woke up screaming. Sister tried to comfort me. But she can’t – not really. What’s coming is coming. It seems I’m being sent home anyway. More and more people are leaving – not just patients, but staff as well. The Sanatorium is closing so the doctors can go to save the lives of the soldiers. All patients are being transferred. I try to imagine what my journey to London will be like. Will someone come for me, I wonder? My ward sister has already gone and the new one doesn’t answer my questions. I have a picture in my mind of the train as far as Paris. Nathalie sent me a postcard when she got home. ‘The journey was very long and it was very hard to sit up for so many hours but I was very brave and didn’t complain – not even when I spit red stuff into my soup and the waiter had to take it away. Now we are home and Mama says that I will soon be better for sleeping in my own bed. I don’t know. Paris seems so grim after the crystal skies of Brittany. I wish this war would go away and I could be back again with you in Roscoff. Love always, Your friend Nathalie’ Now I won’t be here even if the war ends soon. I will be in London, which I expect is greyer and colder than Paris. Looking in an Atlas, I learned that after Paris, one takes another train to Calais. I guess that will be much like the train from Brest. Then a ship to England. I don’t remember being on a ship, although I know I must have come here on one. Maybe it will get lost and sail right up into the Milky Way, away from the war and the cold and the blood... That’s north too, I understand. I might get my star after all. © Martha Hubbard
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The Pages Pages
Poetry
Celebrity Rules
We need to be rid of the people who rule, they've no self-respect left to sell, And as celebrity now rules the media, let’s let it govern as well. The worm’s turned at last, let's select a new cast, it's time to get rid of the vultures. We’ll kick out the peers, with catcalls and jeers and adopt the celebrity culture And though payment for services would be the norm, we already know that they charge to perform. Already expensive, when they say that they need, expenses, we’ll know it isn’t just greed. We'll all be excited at seeing the glamour, for PMQ's, thousands would queue up and clamour, to hear what they thought of the day’s major issues, we'll listen intently and cry into tissues, as they warn that we need yet more MP’s apartments, since Madonna adopted the children’s department. For armed forces minister, choose Captain Sharpe, he's tall, brave, handsome and steady, and for foreign sec, I'd have both Ant and Dec, as they talk a strange language already. Chris Tarrant would make a great chancellor as, he's tall and blond, clean cut and funny 12
He can easily handle a domestic scandal and he knows when to hand out the money. For culture there’s nice Richard Madeley, he could job share with Judy, his wife Esther could help get the message across, when we moaned she could tell us; that’s life. The Home Secretary’s job goes to Forsythe; he’d clean up the place and the onus, Would be on quick feet, for the plod on the street or they’d forfeit the big Brucie bonus. So who would we choose for the top job? Who’d put an end to the sleaze? Who could take on the mantle of change? There’s just one contender, John Cleese. With JC running the country, we’d no longer need a Guy Fawkes, With Python in power; we’d get happy hours and a ministry of silly walks. © Trevor Belshaw
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The Pages
A Woman’s View Take one with Water.
Some days I manage to wriggle out of cooking even though I find it relaxing, because feeling obliged to prepare a healthy balanced meal every day is the pits. Many women are just too tired coping with a job and or children, and struggling with all the other essential household chores that can’t be left. Healthy eating takes a big chunk of your time if you’re trying to use fresh vegetables and fruit rather than face the shame of being a freezer to microwave speed freak. Or maybe they simply can’t cook, although there’s no shame in that, especially now that schools don’t have regular basic cookery lessons for either girls or boys. Anyway, there is enough pre-prepared and pre-cooked food in a supermarket to tempt a saint. Whose hand wouldn’t stray to a packet of sausage rolls rather than a cauliflower after a hard day at the office? With hungry children waiting to be fed why shouldn’t you decide a quiche and a tub of pasta salad boasting no added colours or flavouring looks far superior to anything you could produce? Never mind that it’s chock full of preservatives to keep it looking so delicious. Every day, there are programmes and articles about eating correctly, and television channels devoted to showing in graphic detail what happens to your insides and your outsides, if you eat nothing but processed foods. Bad skin, fatty livers, diseased toenails and worse are shown in all their glory. And then, the wafer slim presenter clad in disposable gloves that have just been prodding a particularly horrible liver, self righteously glares at us and says, ‘This is what happens if you don’t eat the right food!’ No wonder there are so many problems with comfort eating. It’s enough to drive the saint in the supermarket to chocolate éclairs. We used to have a whole day every week in cookery class when I was at school. We took the raw ingredients in with us in the morning, and in the afternoon carried the cooked after effects proudly home for the family to sample. My dad was very impressed with the loaf I made, and my Christmas cake was so good we ate it for tea when I got home, although I was supposed to take it back to school the following week to learn how to put marzipan and icing on it. Sad to say, a lot of my efforts, especially if they’d had a long bus ride home on a freezing cold day, were pretty horrible. By the time I opened our front door, already unhappy sponges had collapsed to the thickness of a dinner plate, casseroles were a discoloured lump in the bottom of the dish, and even Peg our border collie, who would eat anything and looked forward to my regular Thursday disasters, turned her nose up when I made pancakes. On the other hand, over four years I finally grasped
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the general rules of what to do with a lump of raw meat, or a bag of flour and I haven’t poisoned anyone yet. All those years ago when the moon missions began and we watched open mouthed as Neil Armstrong stepped on the moon, food that was nourishing, but small in bulk, had been formulated for the astronauts. Nowadays half a dozen men and women sit in space for weeks on end, so I assume the same principle of a little in and a little out still applies. That begs the question why after all these years haven’t the scientists moved on from whatever it was they did in the first place, and taken another giant step for mankind and harassed housewives in particular, by finally shrinking a full meal down to tablet size thus earning our eternal gratitude? Imagine walking into a chemist and seeing hundreds of bottles of pills with labels saying for example: Beef stew: one to be taken with water four times a day. Can’t you feel the joy as you check out a wide selection boasting every taste under the sun for when you burp in order not to forget the taste of food entirely. And right on eye level, a complete range of once a day, low sugar, low fat, medium sugar, medium fat, or off the scale but who cares desserts, in pretty coloured bottles. Junk food would be a thing of the past and we’d all be disgustingly healthy unless you had an endless supply of cash and a trusted contact to provide you with illegal containers of McDonalds. The biggest bonus would be loads more leisure time having waved goodbye, not only to cooking, but the washing up and the weekly trek to a supermarket. I can’t wait. © Di Rayburn
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The Pages
Memories Roman Ramble
First published in 'The Oldie', Summer Special 2009
"Today is the 63rd anniversary of the Liberation of Rome," my father says. He has a great memory for dates. Most days mark a historical event for him. It's early June and I'm spending a few days with my parents. "Let's celebrate," says my mother. "I'll show you Rome."
Does Rome feel like home? Not really. When I was growing up in East Africa, Italy was a magical, faraway place we visited every few years. My father is openly ashamed of being Italian. "The English are so polite," he says, "and civically educated. They stand in queues, their buses run on time, you can always find a seat...but Italy? Noise, traffic, indiscipline, inefficiency, corruption, lack of respect..." But today, as we board the bus, nothing gives substance to my father's shame. It's nine on a quiet Sunday morning, and there are plenty of free seats. "Just luck," says my father. Our bus takes us to Piazza Barberini, where Bernini's Triton kneels on a scallop, raising a conch to his lips: from it a jet of water spurts. We are bound for another Bernini masterpiece.
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We enter Piazza Venezia, dominated by the gaudy structure the Romans call "The Wedding Cake", and alight at Largo Argentina. My father, a doctor well into his eighties, works at a nearby hospital four days a week. We board a tram, and our journey ends across the Tiber in Trastevere. My sprightly seventy-eight-year-old mother guides us through deserted streets to the church of San Francesco a Ripa in Piazza San Francesco d'Assisi. This church houses Bernini's statue of the sixteenth-century Blessed Ludovica Albertoni, renowned for her religious ecstasies. The first impression one gets is that she is in full orgasm, but the artist's biographers claim she is "not in ecstasy, but in the act of death". Her head is thrown back, her mouth open, and her hand clasps her breast.
We amble down the cobbled Via San Michele to the Basilica of Santa Cecilia to see a sculpture of the martyred Cecilia by the Renaissance sculptor Stefano Maderno. Another shocking image: a woman lies on her side, her head turned to the ground, a deep gash across her neck. Cecilia's death was by decapitation. "We lived near here," my father says, as we stroll into the Jewish quarter. He is a quiet man, and rarely speaks about the war years. But today he opens up. "We were lucky in some ways. Papรก used to get cheap nails and razor blades from the hardware store where he worked, and three times a week, my brother and I cycled twenty miles into the countryside, our bikes laden. We exchanged them for flour, pasta and beans. So the family managed to survive pretty well. But it was tough. I was exhausted all the time, and had to study too." As medical students, he and his brother, the eldest of seven siblings, were not called up for military service. "I clearly remember the sixteenth of October 1943," he continues. "I was nineteen. We heard that the Germans were rounding up Jews." Our surname is one shared by many Jews in Rome. "We hid in the cupola of Santa Maria in Campitelli for two weeks." He pauses.
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"When the Allies arrived, we were overjoyed. We befriended two British soldiers, a sergeant from Lancashire and a sapper from Kent. We'd studied English at school, but we had trouble understanding their strong accents. We kept in touch for many years after the war. Such gentlemen."
We head homewards. Our bus takes us to Termini station, where we have to catch a tube. A scene unfolds on the platform opposite: a drunk is ranting. "I am an extracomunitario - I am not a European citizen. You Europeans..." he gradually becomes more vociferous. A guard moves in and the drunk settles down. Two policemen appear. They stand calmly in front of the drunk. No one speaks. Our tube arrives. I reflect on our morning. Maybe it was fortuitous that the streets today were clean, there was little traffic, and the police were efficient. But also, the sun was shining - it usually does in Rome - and the warm air was filled with the heady scent of jasmine and oleander. And most importantly, I spent time with my parents, sharing their glorious city. My father may not be proud to be Italian but today I am proud on his behalf.
Š Paola Fornari Hanna
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The Pages
On Writing
From Keyboard to Bookshelf A journey through self-publishing. In today’s tough economic climate, it’s never been so hard for the unestablished writer to get work into print. I’ve published three novels and many short pieces over the last 15 years, but I have no agent and I find it just as hard as everyone else. So I decided to follow the path trodden by Marit, our editor, and self-publish through lulu. Lulu, it has to be said, has the advantage over other POD outfits — many of whom are simply vanity press companies given a makeover — in that they do not charge up front. All preparation is done online and lulu take their cut when the finished article sells. It makes for an attractive proposition for any author following this route. We all know that the hardest part of any work is the writing. Right? Wrong. Well, at least, for me it’s wrong. I find writing fun and easy. It’s the proofreading I hate. With a mainstream publisher, the line edits would be done by a professional, with selfpublishing, you must become that professional. You have to detach yourself from the work and look at it critically, read every single word and ensure that the word is a) spelled correctly, b) used in the correct context and c) has earned its right to be there. My project was simple. Ninety-six pages of blog posts transcribed to book format. It is unbelievable how much work I had to do on these posts for them to make sense in book form. Most of them made perfect sense when on the blog, but since the book lacks the continuity of blog posts and contains none of the comments readers made, much of the wording had to be changed. That took about two weeks of solid work. I then put it out to a few readers, who came back with lists of typos, missing words, gags that went astray, all of which had to be dealt with before I could go to the lulu site. Over and above that, where posts finished too close to the bottom of the page and I had inserted several blank lines to carry me to the next page and the next piece, I had to go through and replace those blank lines with page breaks. At length, however, the job was done. Twaddle was ready for publication. Taking earlier advice, I converted Twaddle to pdf format, but lulu couldn’t handle it. My computer (dual core, Windows Vista,) doesn’t like Adobe Reader v7.0, which was unable to convert the piece to the 9”x6” format I’d selected. Fortunately, I was able to upload the MS Word doc and lulu took care of conversion.
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Upload was simple. It took only a matter of minutes. Preparing a cover, too, was easy, but lulu did not like the cover picture I included, so I went back to the drawing board on that. Then I realised, I hadn’t included title and copyright pages. Back to the word processor and I prepared those. This meant deleting the old file on lulu and uploading the new version. To my dismay I found that when you revise a published item, you have to go through the whole process again, including cover design. I also had to set a price. I figured that £5.99 was about right. I don’t expect to sell millions, and I was making a few bob on the deal. Eventually, it was done. Twaddle was ready to go out to the great reading public of the world … or at least the part that reads my inane nonsense. I took some final advice from Marit and decided I wanted lulu to help with distribution. The basic package is free and includes an ISBN, which I asked for and received. Then I had to include the ISBN on the copyright page. Back to the system, unpublish, make the adjustments and publish again. Finally, it was ready, but I had one last reservation and there was nothing I could do about it. In making the book available through channels like Amazon, Barnes & Noble, etc. the cover price had to include a retail markup, and that inflated the price from my modest £5.99 to £10.50. Would the reading pubic be willing to pay over a tenner for a 100-page paperback? I doubted it. In the end, I cut my margin down and reduced the retail price to £7.50. It means I’m only making a few coppers on the deal, but hell, I can live another year or two without a Rolls Royce. Overall, I learned many lessons on this first outing, the main one being, don’t publish until the book is absolutely ready. But it’s a user-friendly system, one I would recommend to anyone who wants to follow the self-publishing path. Twaddle From DW, ISBN 978-1-4092-8895-4, is published by lulu (www.lulu.com) priced £7.50 or direct from the author, on Dwrob96@gmail.com, available soon from online bookstores. ©David Robinson
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The Pages Pages
Short Story
The Table I smiled and waved at mum's anxious face at the window. She was at the door before I’d taken my weekend case out of the car. 'How was the road? Was it busy? I don't like the look of that rain; I thought it might get icy!' 'The road was fine, mum, don't worry.' I instantly regretted the impatient tone in my voice. The kitchen seemed smaller somehow. I looked around, feeling for some familiarity. Brown cupboards. Too hot. A faint smell of bleach. Though I'd been back to visit mum at least twice a year since dad had died, I saw the house differently now, it felt half-remembered, distant, like a childhood memory. I scanned the kitchen for familiar objects to anchor me. The kettle was new since my last visit. It gave a shrill electronic whistle as the water reached boiling point. 'Hear that? It's just like an old-fashioned whistling kettle, remember those? Your grandmother never used anything else.' Mum grinned like a child. I smiled reluctantly. She took two mugs from the cupboard, mugs I'd bought for her from Mr Grant’s hardware shop the Christmas I was fourteen. They had pictures of brightly coloured cartoon cats on them. I remembered the excitement of saving up the money from my Saturday job and going down to buy them from old Mr Grant, the thrill of handing over the money, watching old Mr Grant wrapping them in newspaper, taking them home in a thrill of triumph, sneaking them up to my room, wrapping them in Christmas paper. They looked childish to me now, bright and gaudy, out of place in mum's sleepy brown kitchen. I wondered that she’d kept them all those years. The coffee was weak, a cheap brand. Mum only buys coffee for visitors, she prefers tea. She doesn’t understand that cheap coffee is just not worth it. There was an ugly green glass vase on the window ledge I hadn't seen before. I imagined wrapping it carefully in newspaper, wrapping countless useless items with care, packing them in boxes. Storing them somewhere. Where? I resented the monstrousness of the task before me. 'Where did you get that vase?' I lifted the hideous vase from the window-ledge. 'Oh, Old Lizzy gave me it'. Mum put some biscuits on a plate. Three plain, three chocolate. The chocolate ones were individually wrapped and I knew she's bought them specially for my visit. 'You remember Old Lizzy, don't you?' said mum. 'Of course, who wouldn't?' I could see Lizzy in her old tweed coat; I could see her soft, wrinkled face, I remembered the way she walked, the slightly jerky gait. Everyone on the estate knew old Lizzy Bottle, she made a daily journey from her house to the row of shops at the end of the block. On Tuesdays she would pick up her pension at the Post Office and, it was rumoured, send letters to her absent daughter. Every day she bought a few groceries, which she stowed in an ancient straw shopping bag. She was a petite, 21
rounded figure, her grey hair short and untidy, her pale blue eyes wide in eager greeting, stopping and talking to anyone and everyone she met. No-one could pass her with a brief hello. She would keep folk talking for as long as she could, her eyes wide, desperate even. Some said she was simple in the head, others that she was just lonely. Her husband had disappeared when their daughter was small, The daughter had followed as soon as she was old enough. The vase was surprisingly heavy. I turned it in my hands as I remembered. It was what Lizzy was best known for on the estate. Giving things away. Useless things. Ornaments, jewellery, old flower-vases, chipped china, worn tablecloths. Junk. She would knock people's doors and present them with a chipped teapot, or an old picture. She would always insist she was throwing the item out and felt the intended recipient might like it. Most people smiled and thanked her, then, I suspect, threw the item away. ‘Old Lizzy gave me it’. It was a town joke. 'Did Old Lizzy give you that?' boys would ask when they wanted to insult each other's bicycles. Or women gossiping on street corners might say 'Honestly, I don’t know where Mary got the coat she was wearing last night, I think Old Lizzy must have given it to her!' ‘I’ve made up the bed in your room.’ My room. ‘Thanks mum, I’ll take my things up, then I’ll make us a bite to eat before we get started sorting through everything.’ ‘OK’. she smiled in eager agreement, glad I was making decisions, orchestrating things. I felt the familiar resentment at how eager she was to accept me as the responsible one. But as she carefully rinsed the mugs at the sink I saw how her jowls sagged and how she seemed to have shrunk, her spine curving, bending her. The bedroom window looked out over the back garden. It was much smaller than I remembered, the flowerbeds now just shallow hollows, ghosts in the untidy grass. I made a mental note to find someone to cut the grass and trim the hedge so it would look better to potential buyers. I could see what had been Old Lizzy’s garden from the window. A patio had been built and there was a child’s plastic tricycle on the lawn. When I was a teenager dreaming of leaving, Old Lizzy must have been at least fifty and her daughter Catherine was an occasional visitor at her door. I remember Catherine’s big, shiny black car and the way she would march, business- like up the path in her heels and tight skirts. I made scrambled eggs for lunch and watched mum eat them awkwardly, using her left hand. The stroke had affected her right side. She could manage most things, but she'd been left with a slight limp and found it difficult to grip anything small with her right hand. I thought of the nurse at the Home, who'd explained that they had special cutlery with large, easy to grip handles, because, she explained earnestly, they liked the residents to be as independent as possible. Mum had smiled throughout the tour and said everything was 'lovely'. This had irritated me, I’d wanted to tell her to stop looking and sounding like an idiot.
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I sighed inwardly when I saw the amount of stuff in the house. I wondered about hiring a skip, how mum would react to the suggestion. There was very little luggage allowance for a single room in a nursing home. 'It'll be a new start!' I said brightly. Mum nodded but didn't look at me. I opened the bottom drawer of the chest in mum’s room. It was full of old woollen blankets. 'I don't think you'll need these, anyway!' I laughed. The temperature in the nursing home had been approaching tropical. 'I won't be needing any of it', mum said in a small voice. Pity and guilt surged through me. I decided I would ask mum to stay with me for a week or two before moving into the Home. I would do it later, I resolved, once we'd sorted the house. We sorted through the rooms one by one. Whenever mum said, 'Old Lizzy gave me that’, I laughed but I didn’t fully understand what it really meant till she told me the story of the table. I watched mum cradle, wrap and pack that clutter of old chipped and broken ornaments, vases, candlesticks and ashtrays with something approaching grief. She labelled the boxes. 'Crockery'. 'Kitchen Utensils'. 'Bedlinen.' She was slow and awkward from the effects of the stroke. I'll definitely ask her to come and stay with me for a week or two, I thought, I'll get some time off work. 'OK!, what a load of stuff!' I tried to sound cheerful, 'I don't think we can take all these things, maybe just one or two, if you take your time and pick out a few...' 'It's OK,' mum interrupted me, 'I don't want any of it, I know it's time to ... to move on.’ She smiled wistfully. 'I never saw beauty in these things, you know'. She was wrapping a battered tin moneybox with some difficulty. I remembered it had sat on my bedroom windowledge when I was small. I struggled to remember whether I'd got it for my birthday or Christmas. 'What might surprise you, and a lot of other people too, is that Lizzy didn’t see beauty in these things either,’ she said quietly, ‘that’s where people misunderstood her, she didn’t see any value in these things themselves, but she did see beauty in giving, she wanted to make people happy and she didn't know any other way'. She put the tin moneybox with the other things. 'Pitiful, really, when you think about it.' I knew how much it had meant to mum when she and dad had moved to this respectable suburban estate. I thought of how much it had cost her, working at cleaning jobs to supplement dad’s wage. Sweat and sacrifice. For what? A twobedroomed semi in a ‘nice’ estate? I thought of how it had never been enough for me, so restless, so eager to fly. 'Did I ever tell you about that table?' mum asked. It was a small, square-topped table, old-fashioned table with turned legs, made of very dark wood. 'After Lizzy died, her daughter Catherine came back to clear the house and sell it. All she really did was park a skip outside and give some local boys a few pounds to empty the house into it. She needed four skips in the end. She started asking questions, too, about that table, trying to track it down. Apparently, she'd discovered it was worth money, designed by some French furniture designer, I forget the name. She had seen an identical table on the internet which had sold for thousands at auction. But, when she came to clear her mother’s house, the table wasn’t there. Well, after a few days she managed to track it down. What had happened was Lizzy had given it to Jack Graham’s wife, the Grahams run the hotel down the coast and it sat in the hotel hallway for years, right up 23
till Jack's son went off to college and he took the table for his student flat, but when he left the flat, he left the table behind. Catherine got in touch with the flat's owner and asked him if she could have it back. I heard she told him that her mother was always giving stuff away and didn’t know what she was doing most of the time, that table was rightfully hers, and it was of great sentimental value to her. It was in a bit of a state, having been in a student flat for years, but she had it professionally cleaned up and took it along to some fancy antique furniture dealer up in the city. Thing is, they told her it wasn’t genuine, just a copy, and not a very good one either. I found it in the skip outside Lizzy’s house after the 'For Sale' sign went up. So you could say, 'Old Lizzy gave me it''. Next morning I made tea, and as we sat in the living room amongst the cardboard boxes, mum gave me a piece of paper. It had the names and numbers of two firms on it. ‘I looked these companies up in the phone book yesterday’, she said, ‘the first one, they take things for charity. Anything they don't want, the other company will take away and dispose of.’ I looked at the scrap of paper with the numbers on it in mum's shaky left hand. I'd definitely ask her to come and stay with me for a while. I'll do it tonight, I resolved. Later. Right now I didn't trust myself to speak. I made the phone calls that afternoon. The charity group would come the next morning, the house clearance company in the afternoon. They would empty the house in an hour or so, leaving just two small suitcases, one mine, one mum's. © Julia Cathcart
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The Pages:
The Garden at Little Oak 5
Fruit and vegetables this year have been and are still terrific. My husband has made them a priority. Raising better-than-ever produce has been his aim, at the expense of the rest of the garden.
Fruit and vegetables can’t all be eaten at once so they need to be preserved in some way. We have large freezer and a small fridge-freezer where much of the fruit goes for jam making or puddings at a later date. Blanching and freezing mange tout, beans, spinach, broccoli, cauliflower, courgettes, sweet corn - if they come to anything - and okra, which is looking very dodgy, will come later. Carrots and beetroot are stored dry, like apples. This has been a lot of hard work but we shall be glad of our own fruit and vegetables in the winter. As a result of this living off the land campaign the rest of the garden has become more than usually overgrown‌ and how! It is now thirty years since I dug the plot diagonally from corner to corner and everything we planted thereafter has grown, multiplied, expanded, matured and on the whole got a lot bigger filling up all the gaps.
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Spaces where we walked are smaller or not there at all, lawn edges are disappearing under overhanging shrubs and perennials and gravel paths are narrower than they once were. Many of the roses are showing signs of age and the hedges are too much for shears or the small hedge trimmer. We have a positive jungle on our hands. The weather hasn’t helped either. Wet and warm conditions make for lush vegetation.
Although the garden is no longer neat and tidy it is still beautiful and on one of the very few evenings when it has been warm enough to sit out this summer, we felt privileged to be living in such a pleasant, secluded place. Everyone knows the old yarn about the vicar looking over the garden wall to talk to the gardener. ‘Your garden is very beautiful,’ he said, ‘I hope you will remember to thank God for it.’ The gardener replied that he would but reminded the vicar ‘The garden gets in a hell of a mess when God is left to his own devices.’ The baby bird season stretched right into July and tatty robins in a moult after their offspring had flown the nest were everywhere. There were a large number of moulting blackbirds around too. Thrushes have been here in abundance but their smart plumage doesn’t seem to deteriorate in the same way. The breeding season for many of our birds may have been extended by the clement weather this year. Wood pigeons take advantage of any quirk of nature to extend the season for their sexual activities and their numbers as always multiply at a tremendous rate. Ants have been busy swarming up into the blue recently and they all chose the same day in August on which to try out their wings. I heard on the radio that ants grow wings just for the purpose of swarming and mating on the wing. When they return to earth the wings are shed. Sea gulls and swallows home in on the ants as they rise above the garden and when all has settled again the green wood peckers join forces on the lawns boring holes with their strong beaks. When they are far enough into the soil to locate ants they stop banging and appear to be sucking up their quarry. The only sign we ever see of our hedgehogs is droppings on the lawns. When we first noticed it we went to the Internet to make sure we were right and found a beautiful coloured illustration of a little pile of pooh, just as we had seen it!
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Last December when David had his birthday, a friend gave him a packet of sun flower seeds taped inside his card. The sunniest spot he could find for these giants was in the middle of the fruit patch. They are flowering now and the first to flower is nine inches across on a plant about five feet tall. There are several more to come. We shall save the seed heads for the birds in winter.
Have you noticed large numbers of butterflies this year? The large and small (cabbage) whites as always are in the majority but there have been clouds of commas and droves of painted ladies skittering around at speed; red admirals and peacocks too have made more frequent visits than in the last few years. We’ve also seen spotted wood butterflies dancing their courtship together, gate keepers, ringlets and skippers have been regular feeders on the buddleias too. I would have liked to have taken butterfly photographs but they are much fleeter of wing than I am fleet of foot, especially when I’m carrying and trying to operate my camera. I’m afraid there are none. Jam making has begun and I have black currant, red currant, blackberry and apple, damson, cherry and plum to date. To avoid stones and seeds in some jams I force much of the cooked fruit through a sieve and at a rate of 3/4lb of sugar to a pint of pulp I make jam-cum which is somewhere between jam and jelly. It is thick and full of flavour but without pips and stones. We aren’t fond of gooseberry jam, so my sister suggested adding limes to it to give more bite. The result is somewhere between jam and marmalade. I have to say it isn’t a great success.
© Rosa Johnson
PS Rosa wrote this for the first part of this issue.
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The Pages
Memories
Bangers and Bins With bonfire night fast approaching and with the National Press debating how childhood is far less adventurous than it used to be, a couple of weeks ago I was fascinated to watch a video of little boys playing with fireworks. And I found myself saying, so what! It was pretty tame compared with what the boys in our neighbourhood used to get up to. Now before I go any further, I’m not denying that some horrific accidents occur due to careless handling of fireworks, but I can only say in my defence that over sixty five years, throughout my childhood, after I married and had children and when I gained a brother-in- law who was an accident waiting to happen when he was around fireworks, no-one ever got hurt; not even slightly singed. So I guess I come out on the side of those who say we’re protecting our children to their detriment. We were a hard up neighbourhood. Pocket money was a rarity for most of the children, but if we were lucky enough to get any, it was usually three pence a week. [A thruppeny joey to those who remember] and we had to begin saving straight after the summer holidays if we wanted fireworks. We could get penny bangers, but being a girl I preferred pretty ones. A Volcanic Eruption lasted for about five seconds, or the smallest Roman Candle cost a whole weeks pocket money, so it was slow going adding to the tin in the cupboard under the stairs where our fireworks were stored. Of course dad could always be relied on to bring home a couple of expensive rockets right on firework night, and mum treated us to a packet a sparklers but it was down to my sister and I to provide the rest of the entertainment. For the boys who came from really hard up families, a Guy Fawkes was the main source of income. Planned weeks before, with trousers and coats scrounged from long suffering relations; carefully stuffed with all sorts of combustibles and sporting a papier mache mask in the likeness of Guy Fawkes, the moment nights began drawing in he was pushed around the town in a rickety pushchair to their cries of, Penny for the Guy. The nearer the day the more competition for the best pitch and on pay day, the boys didn’t wait to have their tea but rushed straight out in order to catch workers hurrying home through the foggy, frosty streets. We were lucky in our street because we had a large plot of waste land, so not only were the boys busy collecting money for fireworks with their guys, but they also organised teams to go on the scrounge for anything that burned. It was a good time to have a turn out, and three piece suites and old sideboards were welcome additions as the weeks passed. Finally the pile was so high that a guard had to be mounted, because we were the only street around to have a fire of that size and jealousy from neighbouring gangs grew in proportion to the bonfire, which meant outbreaks of arson if our boys weren’t on their guard. 28
On the night itself, we fidgeted and fussed waiting for dad to come home from work and always swore he took longer to eat his tea just to be awkward. Then we’d have to wait while he pulled the dustbin into the middle of the garden path and stuffed it full of newspapers and scraps of wood. I suppose memories are made of repeated words and actions, which is why as I look at my plastic bins I’m reminded of our galvanized dustbin, and all the times my dad said,’ That’s killed the germs for another year then Dora.’ Once the bin was well alight, he’d fetch the tin of fireworks and set them off. His big rockets were always the crowning moment, which is when Mum would start to usher us toward the back door as he positioned them in a milk bottle and lit the blue touch paper. It was always a hairy moment, because we were surrounded by houses, so they had to take off almost vertically and she never trusted him to get it right. Our little display always seemed to be over too quickly, but the evening wasn’t over. At seven thirty sharp, up and down the street front doors opened, and people from all around began to stand at their front doors or gather on the waste ground, while the guy was ceremoniously perched on the top of the bonfire and lighted tapers thrust all around the base. Once the flames had taken and the guy was engulfed in flames, it was time for the boys to let rip. Chucking jumping jacks under the feet of people who were standing around the bonfire and earmarking a large galvanised dustbin used to collect food scraps for pigs that stood halfway down the street, they would tie half a dozen bangers together, light one of the fuses, chuck the bundle in the bin, quickly ram the lid down and run. The blast used to shoot the lid way into the air, along with whatever food was in it at the time. As the lid crashed to the ground, it would bring out the old lady who lived in the nearest house. But even she’d be laughing while she shook her fists at them and swore she’d tell their parents. As we grew older and were allowed to stay out later, my friends and I would scream and run as the boys let off rockets horizontally on the road. My fondest memory though, is the whole street roaring with laughter when someone stood too near the bonfire and the bottom of his trousers began to smoulder and then burst into flames. We thought it was screamingly funny as he jumped around and beat the flames out. And he must have thought so too, because once he’d put the flames out, he stood further back and carried on watching. Later, after I was reluctantly tucked up in bed, I’d listen to the bangs and whooshes still coming from outside, and wait with baited breath for the final triumphant clang as the pig bin lid took its final journey of the year. © Diane Rayburn
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The Pages
Poetry
Sweet Little Lies
She vowed never to lie again. They healed, moved on. But sometimes a song, a scent, a flash pierced the scar, and he wished for one last lie: that it meant nothing.
Š Paola Fornari Hanna
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The Pages
Poetry
Sincerely Yours… A man of experience; he’s had a good time, living life to the full and he’s still in his prime. His time on this earth has never been dull, when dicing with death there is rarely a lull. He’s worked and he’s striven, ahead of the game, he’s glad that he did, he’s upheld his good name. Work hard and play harder, yes, that was his rule and nobody ever dared call him a fool. The arms that he carried, the pride tinged with fear, concern for his men with the enemy near. Respect for his rivals, and trust for his own; he loved them, they loved him, with gallantry shown. He is a tough bloke, he trained hard and he fought in a war against terror; alas, he was caught up in an ambush, they blew up his tank — he lost both his legs in that God-awful prank. His driver was injured, he didn’t complain but carried his chief back to safety again. Transferred to his homeland and hospitalised a plan for his future already devised. He got his new legs, an inch gained in height, went back to the front line, his job was to fight. And there in the vanguard he led with panache, Who’d know he was legless, there, cutting a dash? When battles were over, the conflict, the war, there was only one man whose feet were not sore. Courageous; a warrior defending the cause, with never a thought for a break or a pause. Back in the barracks that veteran saw the stumps of his legs were bruised, bloody and raw. It was over and done with, his spirit had shone, but he’d blown it; and now was the time to move on.
© Rosa Johnson
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The Pages
Poetry
The Unwelcome Guest I saw this man in dreams of old long before the war. I know his face as well as mine, I know his mind, what's more. I dread those dreams. His dreadful stare, his glaring eyes, his bloodied hair. I try to bring your face to mind, bring beauty to this place. But all I see is my enemy, wrapped in deaths embrace. I tell myself I can keep true to values, held before. I tell myself there is a place for mercy, in a war. I tell myself we could be friends, if circumstance allowed. Our differences, just uniform, two faces in a crowd. But when at last we come to meet for battlefield debate, survival instincts take the fore and all I feel is hate. I do not feel compassion as I stand on the abyss, I steel myself to feel contempt for him and all he is. And later on when, battle done I close my eyes to rest. those staring eyes return to me, my old, unwelcome guest. Š Trevor Belshaw
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The Pages
Poetry
MANNERS MAKETH MAN. Who says? When life went along at an ambling pace, Women were ladies of beauty and grace. Gentlemen then were so gentlemanly, they cared about manners and courtesy. Men offered their seats and they opened the doors for maidens and mistresses, ladies and whores. Tipping the chambermaids, housemaids beside, men's manners were always a matter of pride. Today's not the same with things moving so fast, for most men are blokes who leave women till last. Courtesy's dated and manners old hat, time is the god of the rat-racing rat. Time is the god and possessions are all, who cares about pride, it precedes a fall? Who cares about etiquette? Tread on whom you can! Manners will never make modern-day man.
Š Rosa Johnson
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The Pages
Short Story
Too Late ‘Your feet have a certain webbed quality don’t they?’ He raised his eyebrows, nothing but vaguely unimpressed. ‘Makes me glad we’ve never had children really.’ He sat bolt upright in the chair, ‘Quite, and I’m sure the inheritance of your piggy, ice glazed eyes would have done them no favours either.’ She slumped sulkily into her seat. Then when he wasn’t looking, she lifted herself up to look in the mirror examining her eyes carefully. She was reasonably certain that they weren’t piggy. She looked over at her husband, his head shone like a polished apple. ‘Doubtlessly, they would have inherited your hairline,’ she gestured toward his head, ‘... and you said yourself it was a curse. A lucky escape for the poor little mites I’d say.’ ‘Mites?’ – How many little mites do you suppose?’ he teased, ‘... and which ones would have inherited your cankles I wonder?’ He didn’t even lift his head from above the paper, so he didn’t see her mouth gaped open like a fish in suspended animation. She snapped her mouth shut quickly. The paper lowered just a little as he turned the page. She ground her teeth, and sunk her fingernails deep into her palm. You didn’t get this far into a marriage without knowing how to stick the knife in. ‘I imagined 3 actually!’ The polished apple bobbed solemnly. ‘Two girls and a boy...’ she sucked in a sharp breath, ‘... but it’s been so long since I imagined or hoped at all – it could have been a 5 a-side football team that I had longed for!’ He snorted. ‘Not likely!’ ‘Well I didn’t know you would be bald, with a beer belly, man boobs and a penis shrunk to the size of a cooked standard sausage – did I! I didn’t have the first idea what shortcomings they might inherit.’ He sighed deeply and lowered his glasses, ‘age comes to us all Gracie, eventually. Just imagine the additional damage three pregnancies would have done. I mean fat knees and pear drop boobs would have been the least of your worries.’ She bit her lip, and tried to blink away the tears - that one stung. He felt it immediately, leaping up from his seat, he knelt at her feet, held her hands - and kissed them, over and over and over. She looked down at her perfectly pert bosom and wept. © Kristina Meredith
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The Pages
Press Release
Twaddle from DW Through a collection of blog posts from the years 2006-2009, nothing is spared from DW’s vitriol … not even DW himself. From health to wealth, sex to snobbery, childhood to second childhood, if it happened, DW turned his curmudgeonly, third age eye upon it. Over 98 pages, with a savagery that is as hilarious as it is cringingly accurate, DW lampoons all sections of the modern world; medicine, politics, young people, the law, the politically correct: No area of society is safe from his arrows of absurdity. Divided into broad categories DW subverts and tramples all the things we value in life, beginning with lifestyle, working his way through middle and old age, the crazy antics of people (which includes the riotously funny piece of fiction The Toaster) and on through sex, TV, money, before sharpening his executioner’s pen for a look at our nanny state, and finishing with what he describes as Random Twaddle, a collection of posts which in his own words, “didn’t seem to fit anywhere else.” Twaddle from DW is a book of bits and pieces designed to be read in bits and pieces. You need a breather to settle your laughter. Twaddle from DW is available as a paperback or can be downloaded as an e-book from lulu.com on the following url. http://stores.lulu.com/store.php?fAcctID=707173 Give your chuckle muscles a bit of exercise. You deserve it.
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The The Pages
Book Review
£7.49 Be prepared to engage every facial muscle, in smiling, laughing, and the odd frown or two as you start reading Twaddle by DW. My chuckle muscles ached! Not that it’s all humour, but somehow the cynicism of DW in his views on everything from fighting with contemporary packaging to current events becomes caricatures of things that happen every day, as he draws out the negative sides and pokes fun at them, ranting his way through life . The absurdities of life as seen through DW’s cynical, jaundiced eyes (his own words), makes excellent entertainment. A must read! I can see him now – on stage – presenting his monologues. It would go down a treat! If you have a Third Ager, or someone approaching that stage in life, in your family or amongst friends, this book would make the ideal gift. I’ll wager a bet that the younger generations will find it a hoot, too. The book first started as a series of blog posts, and it’s a great example on how a quality blog can become a quality book – as well as being an excellent example of self publishing (see also the article on self publishing under On Writing). *** See the Press Release for Twaddle (previous article), or The Book Shelf for purchasing details.
Marit
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The Pages
Poetry
Creating a Folding Mirror Poem ( see also travel article in Issue 6) God and Society: Thomas Girtin’s Kirkstall Abbey Clouds up high with God casting a shadow beyond the blue sky. The sun falls on Kirkstall Abbey illuminated and shining light bright, in reverent glory framed by a living olive green horseshoe. Aire divides God and society like farmhouses interrupt a line of green trees built by people passing through, on their passage to God beyond the flowing sway. Two people and a horse walk away. Casting a shadow towards society
Created from the image at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Thomas_Girtin_003.jpg Saw the Aire in the middle, and used it as the dividing line. Seemed to be more nature on top half, along with the abbey, and more humanity and society in bottom half, so did the mirror along those lines. Tried to get the two halves grammatically and metrically reflective, and just about did it. Capital letter on top half third line but not on bottom half, but a capital letter in second word on bottom half, so kind of a mirror effect: and it also swaps between Sun and God, which are the same thing for some people. Kind of took a religious/enlightenment angle, as that was prevalent at the time, although I don’t know what Girtin’s actual views were. © Marc Latham
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For more on Marc’s special poetry form, including guest poets showcasing their poems, take a look at:
Folding Mirror Poetry A Site for Reading and Publishing Folding Mirror and Related Poetry http://fmpoetry.wordpress.com/ It’s well worth a visit!
If you are interested in Haiku, you might also like to check out www.geantree.com Lorin Ford is the Haiku editor, and if she has the time, we hope to hear from her at a later date. ‘Notes from the Gean’ is the online journal of Gean Tree Press, specialising in haiku, tanka and haiga. ‘Gean’ is an old word for wild cherry.
***
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The Pages
Short Story
Mother Psychology I look up at the ceiling in despair. If she does that once more, I'll go up there and wring her scraggy old neck! My mother in law has been living with us for a month. She sold her house and we sold ours and together we've bought a larger property so that James and I can look after her as she gets older. We have never had serious disagreements but since we moved here she has taken to her bed… no, correction, she has taken to our bed. Her bed is in the granny flat which wasn't ready when we arrived but which is now more ready than the house because I have spent all my time following her instructions and sorting everything out. 'Molly, have you done this? Molly, have you done that? Have you found the box with my ornaments in it? Is anything broken? Will you try to find this? Put the best china in the cabinet and the rest in the kitchen. On and on she goes and she expects me to feed her, do the laundry and clean the house as well. James and I are sleeping in the spare room on single beds and I am nearly at the end of my tether. Bang, bang, bang! This time, I clench my teeth and say very quietly, 'Can't you shut up, you miserable old bag? I am tired, don't you realise that? Tired, tired, tired. Do you hear me?' What can she possibly want now? Oh there's James's key in the lock. Thank God. He can go up to see her. I stand in the hall waiting for him to open the door. When he comes in he looks at me in amazement. 'Darling, what is the matter? Are you all right?' I'm near to tears. I manage to say, 'Hello,' then, 'I'm all right but I'm tired. Would you mind going up to see your mother? I have to get dinner.' James kisses me and sits me in the chair by the window in the partly arranged sitting room. 'Don't move until I come down,' he says. 'But dinner…' 'We'll have a take-away.' He goes upstairs. He's gone some time and when he returns I'm still sitting in the chair gazing blankly out of the window. 'Cup of tea?' he says cheerfully. He goes into the kitchen to put on the kettle and I follow, beginning to lay a tray with a cup and saucer. 'No tray, she'll be down in a minute.' James says. 'I saw John Parry on the way home. He said she was to get up or we'd never get her out of bed. There is positively nothing wrong with her.' 'I know that, but when I suggested she should get up as the doctor advised…' 'Lesson one, Molly. When dealing with my mother, tell, don't ask. If you ask she'll always choose what you don't want her to do. Lesson two, she can drink out of a mug just as we can.' He takes another mug from the cupboard and replaces the cup and saucer. 'She doesn't like drinking out of mugs, James.' 'He who makes the tea, pours it into mugs. 'Okay?' We laugh and he kisses me again. 'What's all this levity, then?' she says as she comes into the kitchen. 'Rose, I'm so glad you are feeling well enough to come downstairs again.' I say.
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'We're having a take-away tonight Mum, would you like pizza, curry or fish and chips?' James says. 'I'll just have a cup of tea then I'll make myself some scrambled egg dear and potter back upstairs, I'm not feeling…' 'Doctor Parry says you'll feel much better if you stay up. It does you no good to lie in bed.' The old lady puts on a sulky face, pouting and getting up to take a cup and saucer out of the cupboard. James says, 'I've poured your tea,' and passes her a mug. She frowns at it but manages to say, ‘thank you, dear.' James raises his eyebrows at me and grins. We decide there is no time like the present for Rose to move into the Granny flat. She has been into the flat before but failed to enthuse about it despite the fact that everything has been done just as she asked. There are two small bedrooms, a galley kitchen, bathroom and a little sitting room. We leave the dirty mugs on the draining board and go into the flat. 'I've put all your things away where you asked, so you'll be able to find everything,' I say. She opens the fridge door and gazes at the empty shelves. 'What am I expected to live on, fresh air?' she asks, attempting a smile. 'I thought you'd like to do your own shopping,' I say cheerfully, knowing if I'd attempted to do it for her it would have been all wrong. 'When would you like to go to the supermarket?' 'You can eat with us any time you like,' James says, 'But if you want to have friends in or you aren't happy with what we're eating you have the facilities to cook for yourself.' 'After all, you are a much better cook than I am, Rose.' I'm learning how to deal with the old witch and I surprise myself. James smiles his approval at my touch of genius. Rose frowns, smiles, glares at me and concentrates on the washing machine in the corner. 'Entirely self contained,' James says. 'Your own back and front doors, exactly as you asked. You said you wanted to remain independent for as long as possible.' James follows her into the sitting room where she sits at the table in the window. 'I haven't been used to eating in the sitting room, I'm not sure I'll like it,' she says. 'There's room to eat on the breakfast bar in the kitchen if that’s what you prefer, just as you asked Mother, it was your idea.' He pauses, turns his back on her and whispers 'Thirty, love. To me.' He turns back and continues. 'I'll go and fetch your suitcases and the clothes you put in our wardrobes. You could be sorting those out while we go to fetch dinner from the Pizza Place. We could eat it down here with you if you like.' 'Oh no, dear, I'll come up and eat with you, I don't want the smell of fish and chips or pizza in the flat, it's so vulgar.' James has had enough and we leave her sitting by the window wondering what to say next. Ten minutes later James and I are in the car heading for the Pizza Place having taken all of Rose's paraphernalia from our bedroom and dumped it in her bedroom so that she can sort it out and find homes for everything while we're gone. When we return she waves to us from her bedroom window in an unexpectedly affable way. We beckon to her to come and join us and after a few minutes we hear her open the connecting door between her flat and the house. We've brought two pizzas between the three of us and I'm busily cutting it up while James lays the table, as she enters the kitchen. 'Ooh, that smells very nice,' she says. 40
'A better smell than fish and chips,' says. James. 'We decided you were right about the smell. It hangs around so. How did the unpacking go?' 'Very well, dear. Thank you Molly, that looks very good.' She takes the plate from me. It was the one with rather more on it than the other two. I had meant it for James and thinking she wouldn't be too keen on a take-away pizza I had put rather less on the plate meant for her and now after a hard day's work I find it in front of me, but at least Rose isn't complaining. She is tucking in as though she hasn't eaten for a week. Then I realise she's been having invalid meals because she's been in bed and saying she was poorly and I've probably nearly starved her. The thought amuses me, and I want to giggle, or laugh out loud. I allow myself an inward smile hoping nobody will notice. It's getting on towards bed time. We've got rid of the dishes and made decaffeinated coffee. 'Shall we come down with you and help you make your bed, Rose?' I ask. Before she can answer James says he'll help her while I go and strip our bed and remake it so that we can be together for a change. Rose says nothing. We don't give her a chance. James tells his mother he'll drop her off at the super-market when he goes to work next day. She can get a taxi back. Lots of ladies do that and anyway she can afford it. Rose rises early as he tells her she must and before he leaves he tells me his plans are intact. I notice him smiling to himself. ' Don't over-do it today,' he says, 'We'll shop after dinner tonight. Mum can put the dishes in the dish washer for us, it'll give her something to do.' A car arrives at Rose's front door at about eleven. It's not a taxi, someone else is helping her to carry numerous carrier bags to the door. Then they both disappear inside. I expect her to arrive in my kitchen looking hungry at half past midday, but she doesn't. I call out to her through the adjoining door. 'I'm about to make some lunch, Rose will you be joining me?' 'Come in Molly, come and see Peggy.' I wonder who Peggy is but realise they knew each other before we moved. Peggy drives and they went everywhere together. This could be just what Rose needs. We greet each other warmly and I ask where they'd come across each other again. 'In the supermarket coffee shop,' Rose says, 'Peggy was resting her legs from looking round flats and I was resting my feet from doing my shopping. We haven't stopped talking since.' Rose is full of the success of her expedition and tells me she's going to cook dinner tonight. I can't believe what I'm hearing. 'Would you like to stay to lunch now, dear, we're having packet soup.' 'I have actually started to make some cheese on toast, thank you Rose, I think I'd better get back to it. You know where I am if you want anything.' 'Why should I need you for anything?' Rose is quite indignant and I don't remind her I've been waiting on her for the last month. When James comes home I tell him we're eating out. He smiles and doesn't sound surprised. I wonder what he's been up to. 'It smells good doesn't it? Steak and kidney pudding. I told her you couldn't make them. So she's going to show you how good hers are.' 41
‘Oh that's it, is it? A conspiracy to get me to make steak and kidney puddings.' 'No it's not. It's Rose psychology and it's working already isn't it? When did she last cook a meal for us? I thought it was time you let Mum lend a hand. She likes to be waited on, but she'll also enjoy doing something you can't do.' I was beginning to see James's plan. He knew his mother so well. I promised not to learn how to make steak and kidney and when he suggested I should have a head ache or a hair appointment at least once a week so she can get her hand in again I felt like a conspirator. We enjoyed her steak and kidney's. One little pudding each. I congratulated her on her expertise and she told me it wasn't that difficult. Until I saw steak and kidney pudding tins from the supermarket in the dustbin I didn't know just how easy, but I can keep a secret. Š Rosa Johnson
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The Pages
Article
Valentino Vibes The Uruguayans like partying – and they hook their parties onto Días – special days. El Día de la Mama, el Día del Papá… Okay, those are pretty ordinary. But then you get Child’s Day, Grandparents’ Day, No Smoking Day, Holy Innocents’ Day – even the Light of the Nights in December, when the sky is ablaze with fireworks for the official opening of the beaches. And in the middle of winter, on 24 August, there is Nostalgia Night. I first heard about it from my friend Raquel. “Everyone goes out. You dress up, you dance, you have fun.” ‘Why on 24 August?’ Her reply: “Claro. Because it’s la noche de la nostalgia.’ I ask a few Uruguayan friends about the history of the revelry. No-one knows. Nothing on the Internet. But for weeks coming up to the event the national newspapers are filled with advertisements for dinners and dances. We receive three invitations. One to a flower power party at an English friend’s house, another from a Dutch neighbor to a karaoke and dance party. The third invites us to take a steam train to a wine bodega and drink the night away. This last one sounds like even more fun than the others, but a freak storm hits Uruguay the night before and Invitation Three is cancelled. We plump for the flower power party. What shall I wear? I don’t have flares, or even “flairs”, as specified in the invitation, nor do I have long hair to braid and decorate with flowers. I decide I’ll be an anachronistic punk. I start with Gloria, my hairdresser. And yes! She has the answer to my question! “Thirty years ago,” she says, as she shampoos my hair and the water trickles into my ears, “a night club owner decided to have a retro party on 24 August, and the idea caught on. Now there isn’t a night club or restaurant in Montevideo that doesn’t mark la noche de la nostalgia.” She chops, hennas, gels, tweaks and tugs. The result is attractive – black and spiky. Okay, I’ll build on this. I never was very punky, but I have a black slinky top. And a jangly Zanzibar chain. And a mean-looking heavy silver bangle. I can add some black eye makeup. And my black ankle boots. “I’ll lend you my black leather jacket”, says Gloria. But I need black jeans, and it’s already 6 p.m.
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“Juan Perez”, I decide. Since my extremely elegant friend Eugenia let me into her secret, I have become a regular at Juan Perez, a poky little second-hand shop in my neighbourhood, where you can uncover real treasures. “Black jeans?” I ask. The two pairs they have don’t fit. (In Europe I’m considered ‘medium’ – here, among the sleek South American beauties, I’ve become ‘Extra Large’) “What about these?” The salesgirl hands me a pair of stretch black pants with pseudoleather strips down the sides. Not really my taste, but I try them on. Perfect fit. And definitely punky. And somehow, they look familiar. “How much?” “300 pesos, señora.” 300 pesos? That’s $12! You can hardly go wrong with $12. I buy them.
At home I take them out of the bag and suddenly realize where I saw them last. I tried them on last week in a smart shop in the glitzy resort of Punta del Este… they were priced at over $250. I read the label. Valentino’s… VALENTINO’S!
© Paola Fornari Hanna
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The Pages
Out Now
Kudos 78 SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2009 Runs mostly from the end of September right up to mid November, and beyond Write? Right – write away for all kinds of prizes (and the prestige of course): poems, prose and plays: Writelink, Write Now, Writeplace, Writevoice. And Sefton.
From Haiku Presence, Irish Haiku Society and haibun, to blogging (Loros) and scary stuff (Dark Tales). Or even sagas: prose wanted for the UK’s Virginia and Harry Bowling Prizes; Caketrain and Fresh Blood in the US of A Make a good first impression with poems for Second Light, Newark Poetry Society, Academi, the Bard of Armagh, and the Poetry Business And there’s more: possums, the Frouds, Elmet, Island Voices, Blidworth, Rosenberg, Sentinel, The Yellow Room and the Big Scribble. All here – only in this issue of Kudos. Many congratulations to our subscribers and contributors (Orbis and Kudos) Jane Routh, 1st, Academi (and Marianne Burton, one of the runners up) Margaret Eddershaw: 1st, Pulsar Poetry Competition Over 50 % of the runners up, Nottingham Poetry Society Sam Smith, finalist: Erbacce (who have published his chapbook) Barbara Daniels: 1st, Writer’s Bureau Poetry & Short Story Competition (poetry) 45
Julia Painter: 1st, Writeonsite Jeremy Woman, 1st, Cinnamon Press Short Story Competition Derek Taylor, 1st, Carillon Minisaga Competiton Gol McAdam, 1st, Sussex Playwrights Club 2008 Television Screenplay Competition Annette Keen, Winner of The Yeovil Literary Prize (novel category) Oz Hardwick, Winner of the Dawntreader Poetry Award;
Alan Spencer, Joint Winner of the Indigo Dreams Booklet Competition
Kudos Competition: 1st prize: year’s subs to either Kudos or Orbis; runner-up: free copy of one of the magazines for a 50 word (maximum) short, short story, or a prose poem, which incorporates the words ‘North’ OR ‘East’, AND ‘gawky’. You just have to email me by October 15 (no attachments) baldock.carole@googlemail.com Winner of our Manga Jiman competition is a haiku from Helen Buckingham (Bristol).
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The Pages
Poetry Competition
Tips (October) is out now. There is a Christmas special of Tips and submissions are now open for sonnets and seasonal short poems, including haiku. Below are two comps for pamphlet publication; previous winners: Peter Davies; James Knox Whittet (pamphlets £2.50 each):-
Norfolk Poets and Writers TIPS PAMPHLET COMP a) blank verse, b) tetractys (max 2 verses), c) simple rhyming quatrains (e.g: xaxa, abab, abba, or abcd) only Adj: Geoff Stevens (Editor, Purple Patch) Deadline: 31 October 2009 Entry fee: £10 for 12 poems, posted together OR: £5 for 5 poems, posted together; £2 for 1 poem 1st Prize: £10 or: pamphlet publication for any outstanding poet (at publisher’s discretion) with sufficient poems short-listed for publication. Other book prizes. RULES (to avoid disqualification) 1) Entry fee + SAE (A5, size of Tips) or 2 stamps. UK only. 2) Your entry denotes acceptance of publication without payment, in Tips or a competition anthology. 3) Please use clear typefaces, no personal details on entry. 4) Follow all form rules, no variations. See Tips for more info. 5) Adjudicator will select 1st Prize, other book prizes, and all suitable for publication. 6) To win pamphlet publication, the best short-listed candidate will be selected, provided (s)he has sufficient quality poems on the shortlist, at editor’s discretion. 7) No-one may enter more than £20 total entry value. Pamphlet: 24 pages, 20 pages of poems, liaising with editor, 20 copies to poet of min print run 50, publisher sales fund Tips. Wendy Webb Books (TIPS/P/1009), 9 Walnut Close, Norwich, NR8 6YN. Cheques: WENDY WEBB BOOKS. tips4writers@yahoo.co.uk
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The Pages Pages
The Book Shelf
The Haunting of Melmerby Manor by David Robinson Available from: http://www.virtualtales.com/vmchk/Mystery/Crime/Haunting-ofMelmerby-Manor http://www.amazon.co.uk http://www.amazon.com
Twaddle by DW Bits and pieces designed to be read in bits and pieces. You need a breather to settle your laughter. Available as a paperback or can be downloaded as an e-book from lulu.com on the following url. http://stores.lulu.com/store.php?fAcctID=707173
Birthrights by Su Laws Baccino (Susan Baccino) Available from: http://www.amazon.co.uk/ http://www.waterstones.com http://www.amazon.com/ http://www.barnesandnoble.com/
GUILT by Caroline Brazier Available from: http://www.amazon.co.uk http://www.amazon.com
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Tea Time Morsels: A Collection of Short Stories by Marit Meredith Available from: http://www.amazon.co.uk http://www.amazon.com http://www.lulu.com/uk
The Letters by Fiona Robins Available from: http://www.amazon.co.uk http://www.snowbooks.com/shop
The Blue Handbag by Fiona Robyn Available from: http://www.amazon.co.uk
Tangled Roots by Sue Guiney Avalable from: http://www.amazon.co.uk
Another HairCut? A collaboration by various writers, written in aid of The Children’s Chronic Arthritis Association Available from: http://www.lulu.com/uk 49
The Pages
DWBP
DIARY OF A WOULD-BE-PROTAGONIST Belting Up I’m like the cat that got the cream - smiling from one non-existent ear to the other. Something seems to be happening at long last, and as you might expect, I’m excited. Anna has made a start on my manuscript. I know, unbelievable, isn’t it? I couldn’t quite believe it myself, despite the strong vibes, so I took a peek over her shoulder and sure enough - it was definitely my mouth she was putting words into. It’s a pity she has yet to name me. But I’ll deal with that again. Give her time to think. I have to admit that I was a bit confused at first. What she was writing didn’t reflect my immaturity at the beginning of the story - not the story as I know it anyway. But I think I get it now. I think she is writing my character as I am now, allowing me to speak as an introduction to my story. Well, it’s better than nothing, isn’t it? Not quite page one of chapter one, but still a beginning. And it does show that she hasn’t dismissed me completely, that I still have some worth in her eyes. It looks as though she is willing to move forward and I hope that it’s not just a token page to keep me quiet. It takes quite a bit to keep me quiet, as you may have noticed (blame Anna; she gave me a voice). This isn’t my first round of trying to harass Anna into finishing what she started, but I hope it will be the last. She’s scribbling now, as I speak. Never keeps her mind on one thing at a time and gets into a knot when too much happens at once even though it’s of her own making. Sometimes I just don’t understand her. Actually, that would be most of the time. Perhaps that’s what stopped her in her tracks - too much information at once. Too many topics covered, too much to take in. She did quite a lot of research, you know, at the time. Probably mostly obsolete now, so she’ll have to start again - and make sure that whatever she makes me say or go through, counts. I don’t want to be one of those chatterboxes who talks a lot but says nothing. You get my drift. Now that she has resumed my story, I’m getting a bit worried in case she starts using the delete button too often. What if she deletes what it is that makes me who I am? How can I stop her? I can hardly whisper in her ear, can I? Somehow I will have to make my mind one with hers so that I can keep a tab on what she’s doing - and stop her doing it! Easier said than done, I can tell you. I have tried it before and it didn’t work then. What if it doesn’t work this time? What if I fail? I have a feeling there won’t be any more chances. This time it will have to work. I don’t envy her all that research ahead though, but I’ll do my best to help (I will!). She’s got to finish what she’s started. But there might just be a rough ride ahead, so I’m belting up. In more ways than one! © Anna Reiers (aka Marit Meredith) 50