Since the market garden was sanctioned and even promoted by Miss Kirkwood, Broon feels he will not be expected to make a major contribution on the Flower Show committee but Miss Kirkwood is determined he will do his duty and continue to be a leading figure in the community. It was he who talked to the other villages about having a premier league competition between the best from each village and they, especially the snobby Cluggie people will not allow him to let things just drift and melt away. Nor is Cluggie, in their opinion an appropriate name. One of the houses is called Dalriada and with several new mansions being built beside it, they feel it reflects the character of the village more appropriately. The locals still remember it being little more than a blacksmith's house and smiddy, or, as the Cluggies refer to it, a smithy.

www.sullatoberdalton.com

I've been taking my books to a local market and was asked if I'd be prepared to be a committee member. I agreed but it seems there are some reservations. One of the present committee read Best in Show and, while they enjoyed it, after reading the Flower Show Committee scenes, is worried the Market Committee will appear in another volume. Despite a firm resolve to avoid using friends and acquaintances as characters, traits and little idiosyncrasies are what make a character believable and the only knowledge I have of those comes from watching people. Broon, for example, is a conglomeration of many people and his attitudes and reactions come from memories of a mixture of people in the circumstances he finds himself in. I suppose it is the amalgamation of several people's personalities that gives each character complexity and depth. Jinks isn't always a joker, nor is Gillespie without some saving graces, he is married to Betty after all.

www.sullatoberdalton.com/books

I thought it was time to make a start, so the first 500 words of the sequel are written and, of course, Broon is being rushed into something with his usual, Dalmighty, what does she want now? They've gone to look at the bramble patch and found the brambles are ripe and the young ones will be organised to pick them.

www.sullatoberdalton.com/books/best-in-show

In the woods

IN Cairndhu, Broon will still be reluctant to go and dig over the bramble patch in the sleet but Spring is on the way and the snowdrops are out, reminding me of days in the Cairndhu area courting my wife.
The spring is coming,
I see it in the morning,
Snowdrops white among the trees,
Yellow tips on daffodil spears,
They'll soon bloom,
I see them from my room,
But still I long,
For the blackbird's morning song,
Memories of woodland walks and dreams,
And everything love means.

I love pictures like the one below. What is in that hole? A mouse or a hedgehog?

www.sullatoberdalton.com

I had a nice complement about Best in Show the other day. An acquaintance told me he was enjoying the book, he doesn't read much these days but the short episodes with something always happening is ideal for him. Not only that, the names are easy and he doesn't have to turn back to fins what Solzetchovic did, or who his uncle was. I prefer that kind of comment to being nominated for some high literary reward. Literary novelists write caviar, I write porridge, porridge is for everyday. I'd still like to get a literary agent, though, as a salesman I am a good gardener. I tried to get a local picture to add to this but with this snow - and it's just powder puffs, but cold I've put in one of a King Protea from Pniel, near Cape Town.

www.sullatoberdalton.com

Bronze age relic

The first indication that there might be a sign of Archaeological interest is discovered  during the ploughing match on Broon's field. One of the competitors ploughs up a copper bangle. Who will recover it? Jinks, maybe, and he gives it to Miss Wailey, who will show it off to some amateur archaeologist, or the reporter girl, Wendy, who sees a strange design she remembers from an article in a Sunday paper. That will start the metal detector search and lead to Broon's field becoming an archaeological dig. The question is, How long can they delay Broon? That needs research.

www.sullatoberdalton.com/books

There are no mining villages in Scotland these days, sorry, there is one at Dalmally, where they are opening a gold mine but Cairndhu is a coal mining village that has a long history. That will come out as the archaeologists dig and they can set up a kind of museum. It won't be anything elaborate but it will give me the opportunity to add background to the various characters. We know Miss Kirkwood had a fiance killed in the last days of WW1 as it forms the basis of A Land Fit for Heroes, but what about the others and what was going on in the past? What happened in 1820 when the workers revolt spread from Peterloo and people took up arms? A story within a story and room for all kinds of drama.

www.sullatoberdalton.com/books/land-fit-heroes

These are just notes and not necessarily in the sequence they will be used in the sequel to Best in Show. They make up the incidents that will might be used in the book. The latest is that someone has seen a man, using a metal detector has found a cache of old coins. Just the thing Jinks would want to try on Broon's field. There are two options, Jinks finds nothing but old cans and knives lost on picnics or he finds 'something' that could be ancient and the archaeologists insist on digging. Will it help Broon by turning the earth over, or hinder him because he can't plant tatties. It could be that Jinks found nothing but didn't want people to know and boasted a bit. Wendy, the journalist will get involved, so it had better not be a hoax. Would Jinks care?

www.sullatoberdalton.com/books/best-in-show

During the winter months Broon and Andrew will be digging over a bit of the acre, Lindsay has ploughed over for them to start their market garden project. Frank Scott will be doing the same in the manse. Under pressure from the minister Frank might even have grown some flowers for Christmas in the greenhouse. Chrysanthemums would be the obvious choice but some spring bulbs might also work. There are several relationships that need to develop, or die. Ger and Calum Gillespie is obvious but Ger's friend Unis deserves to get involved. I have an episode I want to include (it is in the website under Short Stories as Tea and Disaster) and that needs a new teacher, or a teaching assistant, a young female, to be involved as well as a lad who is a builder. I can change the builder but the teaching assistant needs to stay. Broon and Maisie will be going round the other villages with the bramble jam. Maybe some of the young ones will help.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1535417188

Remembrance day

I said there was nothing in November but I was so wrong. There is first of all Remembrance Day and all the church parades.. At the time Best in Show is taking place in, there were still many WW2 veterans and the Scouts and Guides paraded as well, bare knees, of course, even if it was a blizzard. One year at the Auld Kirk and the next at the Free Kirk. The fictional village of Cairndhu has only one kirk and it is a bit late to introduce another but there is the Plymouth Brethren. The Roman Catholic chapel is in one of the other villages as the Auld Kirk took over that building at the reformation. Some of it was vandalised by fanatics but they were stopped by local people before they had done too much damage. I suppose St Andrew's Day on the 30th suffered the same fate as the Covenanters eschewed any hint of Catholicism.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1535417188