The Tailor of Gloucester | Beatrix Potter #ALiteraryChristmas

 

Feeling very grateful, right now, that Tarissa @In the Bookcase is hosting A Literary Christmas this year. It made me search my shelves for something Christmassy that I hadn't read yet. It led me straight into the delightful and utterly charming arms of Beatrix Potter.

I confess that I did not read any of the Peter Rabbit stories when I was a child. I had to wait until my early childhood teaching years to discover them. The first time I tried to read one aloud, I stumbled with the phrasing and pacing of Potter's writing. The story has plenty of drama and suspense, but it isn't immediately apparent. You have to read it several times to find the most dramatic way to read it out loud, in a way to keep the attention of twenty, very modern, 4 year olds.

It is twelve years since I taught my last class (I was reminded just yesterday of how that final class has grown, when one of them popped into the bookshop to buy books for her mum for Christmas. She is now in her final year of school, and has matured into a thoughtful, gracious young woman). Which is my long way of saying that it is also twelve years since I last read The Tale of Peter Rabbit (1902). 

I now have a beautiful hardcover copy of Beatrix Potter's Complete Tales. It contains a lovely map of Hawkshead and Sawrey, showing where many of the stories take place, including the Tailor of Gloucester sitting next to the road to Gloucester and South Coast, with Pig Robinson. This collection then lists all the stories in chronological order. The Tailor of Gloucester is the third story. To get to it, one has to go past the original Peter Rabbit and The Tale of Squirrel Nutkin (1903).

However, I couldn't skip past so glibly. 

I settled down, with the memories of classes past arrayed in front of me, and read Peter Rabbit, then Squirrel Nutkin out loud. All the old phrasing and pacing came back to me. I knew where to pause for dramatic effect and how to milk the tension. I was transported to another time and place. These two mischievous characters are drawn so sympathetically, it's hard not to love them and their naughty ways. However, Potter was writing these stories for the children of her former governess, so she was careful to give both Peter & Nutkin a proper comeuppance, for after all, bad behaviour should come with natural consequences.

The Tailor of Gloucester is a longer story and was considered by Potter to be her favourite from amongst all her books. It is based on the true story of a tailor in Gloucester, John Prichard, who was commissioned to make a waistcoat for the local Mayor. He had to leave it unfinished on Saturday evening, but when he turned up to work again on Monday, it was finished, except for one buttonhole for which there was 'no more twist'. In real life, it was his two assistants who secretly helped out. In Potter's imagination the helpers turned into little brown mice and the setting became Christmas Eve. 

Our hard working tailor becomes stricken with a fever. In his delirium he keeps muttering about needing 'one more twist', and 'where is my twist'? He is ill for three days, until it was Christmas Eve. Everyone else was buying geese and turkeys and baking Christmas pies, but not our poor tailor. His only company was his mean old cat, Simpkin.

But it is in the old story that all the beasts can talk, in the night between Christmas Eve and Christmas Day in the morning (though there are very few folk that can hear them, or know what it is that they say).

Rather like the Grimm's Brothers fairy story, the Elves and the Shoemaker, the tailor's hard work and dedication is rewarded when he needs it most. Even Simpkin, sees the errors of his ways, and does his bit to help out too.

A review appeared in the trade journal, The Tailor and Cutter, on Christmas Eve 1903. One hundred and seventeen years later, it is hard to top!

we think it is by far the prettiest story connected with tailoring we have ever read, and as it is full of that spirit of Peace on Earth, Goodwill to Men, we are not ashamed to confess that it brought the moisture to our eyes, as well as the smile to our face. It is got up in choicest style and illustrated by twenty-seven of the prettiest pictures it is possible to imagine.

Epigraph:

• I'll be at charges for a looking-glass; and entertain a score or two of tailors. Richard III

Christmas Eve at Coogee Beach - even the tree is in quarantine this year!

The Salt Path | Raynor Winn #UKNonFiction

 

It has taken me a while to finish The Salt Path by Raynor Winn, not because I wasn't enjoying it, but simply because it became my walking backpack book. It was the perfect choice. It was a slim paperback (i.e. lightweight). It was about going for a very long walk. It was non-fiction and therefore easy to pick up and put down without needing to remember complicated plot points or narrative arcs. And the gorgeous cover design by Angela Harding was a thing of beauty to savour as a drank my coffee, in my favourite coffee shop. at the end of my walk.

The early pages are a tale of woe and misfortune. Winn and her husband, Moth, are in the 50's and suffer a serious of life-changing blows. From financial ruin, losing their home and discovering that Moth as a life-threatening illness, corticobasal degeneration or CBD. I occasionally felt frustration at their level of trust in the goodness of others (and institutions) and their lack of proper planning and forethought, but there was no denying their deep love and commitment to each other. 

After being made homeless, their young adult children were unable to take them in or support them, as they will still at the university/study phase of life. Some friends helped out for a while, but they did not want to be a burden to anyone. Moth's terminal diagnosis hung over them and memories of the life together in Wales on their farm, were too painful to face every day. So they packed up the few things they still owned, stored some, converted others into walking gear and backpacks, and decided to walk the south-west coast path around Cornwall. A mere 630 miles!

They used Paddy Dillon's little brown book, The South West Coast Path: From Minehead to South Haven Point as their guide. Which meant they had to start their walk, at what is considered, the hardest end first so that they could read the book front to back rather then back to front.

Raynor & Moth quickly discovered that they would not be walking as quickly as Paddy and that his idea of a slight incline was very different to theirs!

Sharing their story with other walkers, was also an eye-opening experience. If they mentioned they were homeless and basically penniless, they were treated as hobos to be avoided and looked down upon. But if they tweeked their story a little they could be seen as heroic, adventurous types to be admired or envied. 

The scenery along this walk is obviously amazing, and I do wish they had included some photos so that those of us on the other side of the world could picture it as we read. Of course, google provides the same service these days. 

The walk was also a lot harder than they thought it was going to be. From blisters, to extreme cold (even in the middle of summer), storms in a barely waterproof tent, and the price of food in many of these scenic, touristy seaside villages. Moth's illness slowed them down as well...for a while. Several weeks into the walk, they both realised that he was moving better, experiencing less pain and seemed to be improving. 

In the end, they had to do the walk in two stages, thanks to the onset of winter. 

Many things were left unsaid.

Did they discover a possible cure or at least, a way to slow down the onset of CBD, by doing this hike? Were they able to find work at the end of the walk? And somewhere to live?

I have to assume that many of these queries will be addressed in her latest book, The Wild Silence, or in the Conversation she had with Sarah Kanowski on ABC radio.

• Shortlisted Costa Book Awards 2018

Maisie Dobbs #15 An American Agent | Jacqueline Winspear #CosyCrime

Maisie and I go way back.

We've weathered the good times and the bad, and we've survived the time we nearly went our separate ways. But we've made it to book 15 and I now suspect I'm in it for the long haul. Below is our journey.

• Maisie Dobbs #1
• Back in the day when I wrote very brief book responses, this is what I had to say about the very first Maisie: 

Light and easy, but with enough going on to keep it a cut above the rest. Set after WW1 in London, Winspear is obviously concerned about the way war affects people long after the fighting is over. Her characters are all shell-shocked in one way or another and the fall-out continues to impact years later.
Maisie is a detective who uses the new ideas of psychology & intuition to help solve crimes. The first book gives lots of fascinating WW1 back story.

• Maisie Dobbs #2 Birds of a Feather
• I love the Maisie stories. They quickly became my cosy, comfort read but I didn't always feel the need to write about them. Book 2 showed us Maisie getting stuck into her new role as a private investigation, utilising her skills of intuition and psychology.

• Maisie Dobbs #3 Pardonable Lies
• By book 3, I considered Maisie to be a friend.

Pardonable Lies sees Maisie return to France to help solve 2 cases of missing presumed dead soldiers. The case becomes dangerous as she uinknowingly gets too close to matters that the secret service would rather nobody knows about.

In some ways the mystery is the cover story in all the Maisie Dobbs books. They're simply a way of getting to know Maisie, her world and her times much better.

• Maisie Dobbs #4 Messenger of Truth
• A story about murder in the art world of London 1931 that brings up some dark WWI memories for Maisie. The gradual reveal about Maisie's past life is what draws me into these stories each and every time. She's a character I want to get to know.

• Maisie Dobbs #5 An Incomplete Revenge
• A trip to rural Kent to solve a set of mysterious crimes, once again brings ups WWI secrets, for Maisie and her clients.

• Maisie Dobbs #6 Among the Mad

Many of her adventures centre around the after effects of WW1 on returning soldiers and nurses. This story is no different as it mixes personal issues with political issues.

The government has received threats against public safety from a wounded soldier bent on being heard. This leads Maisie and her colleagues on a search through the various factions forming in England expressing discontent with the establishment.

There is nothing difficult or alarming in this story. A vague melancholy hangs over most of the Maisie books despite Maisie's charms and abilities.

For me this makes the perfect winter read.

• Maisie Dobbs #7 The Mapping of Love and Death
• This was another story that takes us all back to stuff that happened in WWI, when the remains of a soldier are discovered and his family are convinced that his death was not a usual war death.

• Maisie Dobbs #8 A Lesson in Secrets

Maisie's strong, no nonsense approach to life was the perfect antidote for winter blues.

My only concern for this book was that even with the change of career, a move to Cambridge & the flush of new romance, Maisie, herself somehow felt a little stale.

For the first time, I felt the intrusion of Winspear in these books. I could almost see the author stalking the pages trying to work out what direction she would like take Maisie next. She's aware something needs to change, but she wasn't quite ready to tackle it in this book. It felt like she was the laying the groundwork for what comes next....at least I hope that's what she was doing!

Because as much as I love Maisie, I want to see he grow and mature and move onto new things if that's what she needs to do. I'd hate to see her stagnate.

• Maisie Dobbs #9 Elegy for Eddie

Maisie Dobbs is smart, thoughtful & reserved. She's a flawed character with a tragic past. She's strong, determined and above all, honest. Integrity, honour and justice are traits that she tries to live by and work with. Which can be challenging when you're a private investigator asked to check into the suspicious death of a childhood chum.

Each of Maisie's cases reveals a little more about her past and how this impacts on the way she manages her life and relationships now.

Maisie's war time experiences have had a huge impact on her. Her psychological training not only coming in handy to solve the crime, but to give her insight into her own actions and behaviours.

Part of the pleasure is the setting - between wars London. This book is full of visits to Covent Garden in all its working class grittiness. Tea shops, costermongers, stables, factories, fog and the River Thames all feature regularly. Winspear helps to bring it to life though thanks to the memories and stories told to her by her father.

• Maisie Dobbs #10 Leaving Everything Most Loved

It is now 1933 and Winspear deftly weaves a modern day issue into her historical fiction. Scotland Yard requires Maisie's help to solve the problem of two murdered Indian women. The impact of racism, colonialism and the class system (in both England and India) all come under scrutiny via Winspear's more familiar themes of belonging, self-reflection and the lingering after effects of trauma and prejudice.

Maisie spends a lot of time analysing her own thoughts and behaviours as well as employing this skill to help her solve each case. Up until the past couple of books, Maisie was making progress. Her use of psychology, intuition and meditation was interesting.

However, I do feel that Winspear has now got bogged down with the romance between Maisie and James Compton. We all want Maisie to be happy in love, but at the same time, getting married and settling down with a family wont work for future story lines. Curiously part of the success of these stories is Maisie's continuing misery. What will happen to the series if Maisie finally finds happiness?

How can Winspear solve this dilemma?

• Maisie Dobbs #11 A Dangerous Place

Suddenly it is 1937 and Maisie is in Gibraltar.

Four years have gone by and she is still being referred to as Miss Dobbs.

A quick flashback via some letters and newspaper articles fill us in on the continuing misery of Maisie. I confess I nearly cried.

Unlike many of Maisie's loyal followers, though, I wasn't disappointed by this great leap forward.

Winspear had to do something dramatic to change the direction of the series. Maisie had reached an emotional stalemate at the end of the previous book. Whatever came next had to propel the series onto a new level or wrap things up for good.

I never bought the whole James and Maisie romance - it felt too convenient. And I was still holding a torch for Detective Richard Statton who rode off into the sunset with his young son and the end of book 8.

Bringing us closer to WWII politicking and the double-dealing of spies, was a smart move by Winspear. It may have been a bit clunky in execution, but it's what the series needed.

A Dangerous Place refers to the Spanish Civil War and the fate of refugees. I like how Winspear is gently drawing a line between historical events and current world affairs.

Obviously a new war will give Maisie plenty of opportunity to reflect on and confront her experiences as a WWI nurse. However, her ongoing angst is getting a little tired (although more than understandable), so I do hope that Winspear allows Maisie some psychological and emotional peace soon.

• Maisie Dobbs #12 Journey to Munich

During my recent blogging malaise, Maisie Dobbs kept me sane and calm. She is familiar, comfortable and cosy. Although some of the crimes are getting a little nasty now that Hitler is involved, Winspear still avoids gory details and gruesome forensic descriptions, for which I am eternally grateful!

Journey to Munich sees Maisie being recruited by the secret service to do some spying in 1938 Germany. You do have to suspend a little belief whilst reading these later books in the Maisie Dobbs series, but the goodwill engendered in the earlier books has been enough to keep me going. I've never been a spy myself, so I'm happy to accept that Maisie's approach to undercover work could, well, work (despite the doubts of other reviewers on Goodreads).

To be honest, I don't care that much. I don't read the Maisie Dobbs books for an accurate how-to on spying or detective work. I read them for the relationships, the personal journey of Maisie herself and for the feel-good effect they have on me.

I also read them for the historical fiction element. The books are set between the two world wars in England - a period of time that has fascinated me forever.

With Maisie's trip to 1938 Munich and her brush with Hitler's henchmen, Winspear is preparing the way for a change in direction. I'm feeling a growing sense of trepidation for Maisie's best friend, Priscilla and her family of boys. Boys who will be coming of age as WWII starts.

• Maisie Dobbs #13 In This Grave Hour

As the title suggests, WWII has just been declared. And as with any long running series, some books are better than others. In the early stages of this one, I thought we had one of the lesser Maisie's on our hands. It felt a little clunky, like it was trying too hard to find the Maisie magic of old. But as we went along, the pace picked up and Winspear found her groove. The regular, much-loved cast of characters add the heart and soul to this story and they all got a chance to shine in this story, especially Maisie's dad, who I just adore.

The crime centred around the revenge-styled murders of Belgium refugees from WWI, but the emotional heart of the story involved the children evacuated from London during the early days of the wars announcement. Maisie also got to revisit an old flame in the guise of Richard Stratton, recalled to London to help with the war effort.

After feeling so fearful for Priscilla's young adults sons in the previous book, In This Grave Hour brings the sense of tension back a few notches. This reflected the anti-climax that occurred in England after the initial announcement when nothing actually happened, leading the early stages of WWII to be called the phoney war or the bore war. 

Her happy mix of empathy and rational thought is a combination that I find endearing and admirable. Spending time with such kind hearted, well-meaning people will always feel like a good thing to do.

• Maisie Dobbs #14 To Die But Once

Definitely one of the better Maisie's - after waiting around for the war to start, the boys are now seeing some action and we're all extremely concerned and worried for Billy's young men and Pricillia's family of boys.

A far bit of the action occurs around the Dunkirk retreat with the death of a young painter working for the government, painting airfields as the raison d'être for Maisie being in the area.

Easy to read, like spending time with an old friend.

• Maisie Dobbs #15 An American Agent

Now that WWII is in full swing, the Maisie stories have returned to form. An interesting mystery/crime for Maisie to sink her teeth into and oodles of relationship drama with her family and friends and their young men now fighting in this new war. 

Maisie and her friend, Priscilla have resumed their WWI nursing duties, this time driving ambulances around London to assist with the after effects of the Blitz. Maisie is in the process of adopting an orphaned refugee girl from Book 13 and Priscilla is trying to help her eldest son come to terms with being an amputee. And a romantic interest from Book 11 returns to tempt Maisie to think about something other than war and crime and adoption paperwork.

It's nice to see Maisie less absorbed by her own angst these days. She has grown and matured and has finally moved away from the ghosts of WWI. She still bears the scars, but is now strengthened by her previous experiences, not traumatised.

 A real P.I could no doubt drive a bus through the flaws in Maisie's criminal reasoning, but her empathy and personal commitment to each case is what makes these cosy crime stories, so cosy and so comforting for this particular reader.

A quick, easy read that is perfect for a cold winter's day.

Book 11 of 20 Books of Summer Winter

Book Stop

Photo by Paolo Chiabrando on Unsplash

Given that we cannot travel outside our home state, let alone the country, at the moment, I thought I might indulge my bookish instincts with my itchy feet and explore the world via bookshops.

I have a number of bookshops on my to-visit wish list, if I am ever in that country, state or neighbourhood. I thought this might be the perfect time to share some of them and why I want to visit (beside the obvious reason, of course!)

Book Stop will be an occasional meme that lets me travel and indulge in a good bookshop browse at the same time. A library or two may also make it onto the list.

My first Book Stop is in Bath - glorious, historic, literary Bath!

The city of Bath is one of the few places in the UK that I've managed to visit both times I have been. A big part of that is thanks to Jane Austen. The second part is well, the baths. I'm a history buff as well as a book nerd, and the thought of treading ground (or is that water?) where the Romans have once been, was something I couldn't resist, twice.

When I first visited in 1991, I stayed in the local YMCA with a friend. We trekked up to Alexandra Park to admire the view back into Bath. We strolled around the Abbey, the Pump Room and the Roman Baths, marvelling at how green the water was and how old it all was.We also walked around the Royal Crescent and the Gravel Walk and tried to imagine what it was like in Jane Austen's time. We ended up climbing trees in Royal Victoria Park!

My second visit to Bath in 2007, was a day trip. I re-walked the Royal Crescent and spent the morning in the Jane Austen Centre. Mr Books and I then had a wonderful afternoon relaxing and reviving in the the new Thermae Bath Spa. If you ever find yourself in beautiful Bath, do yourself a favour and book a session at the Spa. It's worth it.

Little did I know at the time, that a new bookshop had recently sprung up in Bath, in the little street just behind the Jane Austen Centre. 

John St, Bath, has been home to Mr B's Emporium since 2006. It's online presence has all the quirky, creative and passionate reasons why I love independent bookshops. The story of it's genesis is inspiring and quite romantic. The staff are obviously committed and engaged bibliophiles and the space has evolved and grown over time to include a number of bespoke, inviting rooms. I can't wait to explore it in real life.

The intimate reading nooks, the fabulous reading suggestions from their staff and the amazing author events & live music combo's (that I would love to see for myself one day), make this an Indie bookshop after my own heart. I can almost smell the books and spa minerals from here!

Have you ever been to Mr B's Emporium, where books reign supreme?

Are there any other book shops in Somerset I should explore next time I venture to the UK?