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Times of My Life: A Forest Gate Girl
Times and lives can be ordinary yet still fascinating and touching to others.Times of My Life: A Forest Gate Girl is the story of an ordinary girl born into an ordinary family and how historic and global events affect the family and her life.
For this writer’s family, it’s a harsh contrast between the luxury of generations of colonial life in India to the privations of post-war London. For the writer however, it’s a fantastic ride from fairy tales, comics and Children’s Encyclopaedia to The Times newspaper; from skipping ropes, Saturday morning pictures and toy pianos to appearing on TV’s ground-breaking show Ready, Steady, Go!
The timeline for Part One covers 1950 to 1971, with references to the rich legacy of family history. It spans revolutions and innovations in science, technology and the arts. London in the sixties was an amazing and exciting place to be. Everything was changing so fast and for the first time, young people were successfully challenging the status quo. Fashion, art and music led the youth movement. For a convent schoolgirl from a relatively sheltered background, it was the centre of her world and the beginning of her adult life. The adventures continue, each moment to be relished and cherished, creating memories for a lifetime and future generations.
£8.99 -
Times of My Life – Part Two
A sequel to Times of My Life: A Forest Gate Girl, this book carries the reader from a wedding in 1971, to the present day in Wiltshire, spanning 50 years of events that have punctuated the writer’s life up to now. It’s been a whole adventure and education for a girl from a fairly sheltered and strict family background, embarking on married life as a young wife which would soon take her away from the London she had known and loved to following her husband’s career all over the country.
She would eventually achieve all the things she had dreamed of as a child. She would travel the world, meet fascinating people in far-flung places and make lifelong friends. She would have a successful career of her own. She would teach. Her love of music, theatre and performance would lead to one of her most thrilling and satisfying endeavours, running her own musical theatre group with amazing young people and watching them grow in skills and confidence. This memoir revisits those hectic days which tend to get lost in the fullness of time. Treasured old photos bring it all back.
Most of all, she would have a long and happy married life, and be blessed with wonderful children and grandchildren. There were many adventures and so many reasons to celebrate along the way. But there were also trials and challenges, tragedies and sadness, as there are and have been for everyone, particularly during the Covid years. The best of times always outweighed the bad, however, and the happiest memories will be cherished forever.
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Tiffins & Chanawallahs
Oonagh’s story takes us on a vivid journey through her post-colonial childhood in India, full of color, vitality, and unforgettable memories. However, as she leaves her birth country in 1962 to move to England with her family, Oonagh’s cherished childhood recollections take on a surreal quality. Determined to rediscover her roots and emotional identity, she embarks on a poignant quest.
From the roots of her maternal family, where ‘Staying On’ was in her grandmother’s blood, to the adrenaline-fueled excitement of gleaming gun barrels counted and stacked in pillars by the light of hurricane lamps, Oonagh’s journey uncovers both the beauty and harsh realities of her homeland.
Through her Ayah Ruth’s captivating stories, she experiences the intoxicating fragrance of jasmine on the day of Rinqu’s marriage, and the deep bonds of love and loyalty that define family life in India. With rich detail and compelling prose, Oonagh’s tale takes readers on a breathtaking journey of self-discovery and a celebration of the cultural richness of India.
£15.99 -
Thursday’s Child Had Far to Go
Training Indian village children to look after buffaloes, instructing girls to use a sewing machine, running adult literacy classes for rural women – Did Betty Robinson in her Youth Employment Office in Dunfermline in the 1950s and 1960s realise where her application for missionary training with the London Missionary Society would take her? Three years of missionary training did not prepare her for that. A buffalo and a sewing machine can literally save a village and give its children a future.
Then romance and marriage to a fellow Scot, Leslie Robinson, General Surgeon and Medical Superintendent at the Church of South India’s hospital in Chickballapur, Karnataka.
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Through the Eyes of a Security Operative
The author, T Mogford, after working within the security sector for over 25 years wanted to write this book to give the public an insight into the work and things that they see on a day-to-day basis within this industry. From his time working as a doorman to eventually working as a Crown Court Security Supervisor, it is filled with insights of the author’s years working in this environment and in his opinion how two days are never the same, where one quiet day could turn very volatile on the turn of a sixpence. ‘You just never know who is going to come through the front doors’ is just one of his sayings. How he works on the front line with his staff so they are the first point of contact. The author explains the qualities you need to be able to do this work to the best of your ability. Terry has written this from extracts from his diaries that he has kept over the years as well as from memories.
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Three Times Lucky in Love
Brigit, an Irish colleen, was orphaned at birth. This was a difficult and mysterious way to start life. But thanks to the kindness of her adoptive parents Brigit learnt that love conquers all. The family risked their lives sailing on the high seas to begin a new life in New Zealand. It was 1815. Life was hard for the settlers. Brigit learnt to become a teacher, wife, and mother. Life dealt her cruel blows. Brigit was widowed. Grief is married to joy as Brigit was brave. Walking on in life, Brigit was lucky. She was blessed with more children. The husbands in Brigit’s life adored her. They made her heart sing the secret of real happiness.
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Thread of Fate
A friendship first made on a 1950s holiday, a document unsigned at the last moment, the suggestion made by a stranger, a photograph taken in Spain, all elements in a chain of events leading to a totally unexpected romantic encounter quite late in life.
This is the story of a childhood in the 1930s, taking us through carefree days at the seaside, when it is never too young to fall in love. An account of wartime on the east coast and day-to-day work behind a pharmacy counter in those long, dark years, is interlaced with notes on severe winters from a daily 80-year record kept by a dedicated amateur weatherman.
Along the way there are accounts of incidents of a supernatural nature, how a smoking habit may have saved a life which it took away in later years, encounters with fire, in one case a little too close for comfort.
Readers can form their own opinion as to whether the happenings set down in these pages are just a matter of random chance, or is there indeed a guiding thread of predestination leading to a totally unexpected change of lifestyle.
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This Is Qatar: Anecdotes from an Amateur Expat
Ever wonder what it’s like to live in Qatar? Well M hadn’t. He couldn’t have even found it on a map... then found himself there.
When M arrived in Qatar from London on his newly-minted expat assignment, he didn’t expect to be confronted with life’s most existential choices...so immediately.
And he dragged his girlfriend-cum-wife too.
“But I wanted to go to Singapore,” she said.
“We got at least half-way there!”
From job offer, to eloping in Las Vegas (because living together out of wedlock is haram), to having a kid - and back again, “TIQ” is a humorous, if not slightly exaggerated, acerbic account of an amateur expat’s trials and tribulations waaaay out of his depth in a country, frankly, he had never heard of.
If you’re about to move to Qatar, or if you ever thought you wanted to visit (you KNOW you want to), TIQ will help you frame (and perhaps even answer) some non-trivial questions such as:
- What would you choose with your marginal dollar - beer, or bacon?
- Is it OK to eat your lunch on the toilet?
- Who’s that scary voice on the radio every morning? and
- Are traffic signs really just...guidelines?
If you weren’t planning on moving to Qatar, or even visiting - the shock, laughs and jaw-droppingly ridiculous happenstances might just even move the needle (albeit slightly).
Way back when M got his Hebrew tattoo, his mom, like any good Jewish-American, said, “Well, now you’ll never be able to go to the Middle East.”
M just scoffed and said, “Middle East? Me? Never.”
Who’s laughing now?
(And by the way: the answer is definitely never bacon.)
£9.99 -
Thirteen Months of Sunshine
Ethiopians have not completely put that historical famine – of ‘Live Aid’ times – behind them and they struggle to understand or to keep up with the Western world, including their ever-advancing technology. Education there is seen as a key to success but balancing developments alongside embedded tribal and superstitious beliefs is not easy. At least now schools have moved from drawing in the dust under a shady tree, into purpose-built structures – with or without resources.
It was into this environment Valerie was placed when, following the dramatic changes in her circumstances, she made her momentous decision to put her comfortable English life on hold and to replace it with a year in that developing country. At 58, not only did she use her life skills and teaching experience in the northern town of Mekelle, but she lived through a potentially dangerous political time. Valerie used in-country transport to visit some amazing places which included her medal-winning run in Addis Ababa! Partly to record every little detail but also to maintain some sort of sanity, she kept a detailed diary throughout that roller coaster year. This book gives the reader a combination of an entertaining personal read of diaried key events, alongside her own Ethiopian life with its water conservation, frugal diet, wind, dust and much more. Valerie records an honest and sometimes harrowing insight into the little-known everyday existence of Ethiopians.
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Things will Get Better
Normal is as normal does – right? Well, my version of normal seemed to be quite unique. Compared to friends I’d always be the one with the hilarious stories. My friends would flock to hear them, tall tales about my misadventures and awkward encounters with men.
However, at university, these shenanigans began to take their toll. Euphoric highs and dramatic lows were exhausting and had nearly taken my life.
I’m sharing some of these stories which will definitely make you laugh out loud as well as cringe so you can better appreciate that mental health (good or not so good) is normal.
Hold on in there – things do get better.
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The Red Thread
The Red Thread is the true story of an expat woman’s struggle to complete her family while living in India.
After shunning infertility treatment and adopting her first child, Sarah knows that family is created from love not DNA, so she sets out to replicate the fairy-tale experience of her daughter’s adoption from Cambodia. But things are not as straightforward this time.
After choosing a baby to adopt, Sarah comes up against the risks of child trafficking and an imminent Cambodian law change that will shut down all adoptions and potentially subject her baby to life in an orphanage for the years to come. As Sarah battles government bureaucracy to free her child, the only thing that binds them together is the Buddhist red threads tied to both their wrists that symbolise courage and bravery.
The Red Thread is an emotional journey of a mother’s battle to get to her child. It is a tale about one woman’s commitment and perseverance to overcome hurdles, and her blind hope to help a child. It is a story of love.
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The Last of the Lucky Childhoods
This is the story of my childhood recollections while growing up in Glasgow. The streets were still for kids and we knew how to make our own fun, though some of the mischiefs we got up to may not be classed as fun nowadays.
If we were poor, we didn’t realise it; if we were ill-treated, we thought of it as normal. Kids didn’t complain in those days (or they got a ‘slap across the lug’). Kids knew their place, we just got on with life and enjoyed it to the fullest.
As Billy Connolly would say: “What I’m about to tell you is true…well mostly.”
If any of my old pals, relatives, or friends recognise themselves on these pages, you’re most likely right…but I have changed the names (in some instances) to protect the guilty!
£7.99