Lilt of the Fairground
My shopping trolley is humming its merry tune as its wheels roll over the paving slabs. Wednesday is when I do my big shop, few cars hurtling goodness knows where, so crossing by the roundabout is made easy. The Forest…
Scarborough Heights
Mark was going over his plans. It was something to concentrate on, it calmed him down and diluted that feeling of worthlessness, and the guilt that followed. What right did he have to feel depressed or even sad? He had…
What if?
The inspiration behind this essay came from notes in the Cambridge Introduction to Creative Writing: it suggests the use of data collected via field study techniques: for example – observing the behaviour of fellow townsfolk whilst they go about their normal business.…
The Publicity Stunt
It was a kind of experiment. A scheme set up by an advertising company to promote a new line of site-cabins for the building industry. The promotion was portrayed as a golden opportunity to turn your dreams into fortunes; instead…
Carols by Candlelight
The church* is hard to spot even in daylight. There’s no spire, just what looks like a fat chimney housing a single bell. I love it for its lack of pretension. Far from perching on a hill, looking down on…
The Garden Seat
A few dwellings still nestle below Pickering castle and in one of these cottages lived a young girl with her widowed mother. To make ends meet she was expected to do a most dreadful thing. This is her story. Lizzie…
🔉Just for one day
Beginnings begin with courage. These words came from my radio mere seconds before I switched it off. They stayed with me as I prepared to enter my den where I could psyche myself up to start a new year of…
Cornerstones
All that is left are the basic foundations – four gigantic slabs of stone embedded in the earth. They remain to testify that once, long ago a property of substance stood on this very plot of land. According to parish…
Breathless
Zoe ended her call. She shivered and gave the street another quick glance. Her eyes rested on something dark – a crow, she thought, that crept along the ridge of a cottage roof. Her breath hung in the cold air…
The Fabled Origin of Pickering Town
(When the Folksinger David Swann asked us to write lyrics for a new song depicting the origins of Pickering’s name – the idea lingered. So later, when we began to dabble with writing Fairy Tales, this popped into my head.) …