Silver Sound 4 November 2016: Village People

Today’s guest was author Debbie Young. Debbie has written a number of author guidebooks, including Sell Your Books (SilverWood Books) and Opening Up to Indie Authors for the Alliance of Independent Authors (jointly with Dan Holloway). She has also published two collections of essays, both inspired by life in the Cotswold village of Hawkesbury Upton – All Part of the Charm: A Modern Memoir of Village Life and Young By Name.

In addition Debbie has published a number of short story collections, including the Christmas themed Stocking Fillers. She is now working on the first in a series of murder mystery novels set in an English village not unlike Hawkesbury Upton – except, of course, for the murders!

Debbie has also written the book Coming to Terms With Type 1 Diabetes to raise funds and awareness for the JDRF. JDRF is the largest charitable funder of research into a cure for the disease, which affects both her husband and her daughter.

Amongst her many activities, Debbie is the founder of the Hawkesbury Upton Literary Festival. All events are free and it’s a wonderful chance to enjoy a day in the village and listen to readings and talks. The next festival is on 22 April 2017. For more details see the HULF website.

You can find out more about Debbie’s work and her books on her website.

Author Debbie Young at the BCfm Studio

National Memory Day Writing Competition - Debbie’s work is very much based in her local community, and it’s an excellent example of the advice often given to writers to “write what you know”. So if you feel inspired to have a go, or if you are already writing, you might be interested in the National Memory Day writing competition. National Memory Day is an annual celebration of poetry and creative writing for people affected by memory loss, and the first National Memory Day is 18 May 2017. The competition is for poems and short stories, and includes a Best Young Writer Award and Best Primary Carer Voice Award. For details see the National Memory Day website.

Diabetes - If you would like more information or advice about diabetes you might find the following links useful:-

The InternationalDiabetes Federation

JDRF

DiabetesUK

You can listen to the show here (10 to 11 am)

http://bcfmradio.com/silversound

Silver Sound is broadcast by BCfm 93.2 fm between 10 am and mid day on Thursdays and Fridays. I’ll be back on the show between 10 and 11 am on 2 December 2016 with another fabulous guest!

Comments

Dickens and Chickens

On 17 April 1860, in fields near Farnborough, Charles Dickens joined an audience amongst whom were the Prince of Wales and the Prime Minister, Lord Palmerston, as well as a number of MPs and clergymen, to watch the American John Carmel Heenan and England’s Tom Sayers (the Brighton Titch) beat one another blind and bloody in a bare-knuckle fight that lasted nearly two and a half hours. The fight ended in a draw when Aldershot police stormed the ring, forcing the fighters and their illustrious spectators to flee the scene. It was the brutality of this match that signalled an end to the bare-knuckle era and prompted the development of the Marquess of Queensberry’s rules. Dickens’s interest in pugilism was of long standing. In 1848 Dombey and Son , which had been published in serial form over the preceding two years, came out in book form. One of many of his novels that draws on the world of the prize fighter, it introduces the unforgettable Mr Toots, a would-be man about town, an

The Bristol Boys: The Bare Knuckle Champions and The Hatchet Inn

The Hatchet Inn on Frogmore Street in Bristol is all that remains of a row of seventeenth-century timbered houses dating back to 1606 – making it one of the city’s oldest pubs. It was substantially altered in the 1960s, and these days it stands on a traffic island. But at one time it boasted extensive grounds – and amongst the facilities on offer was a bare-knuckle boxing ring. Plaque at The Hatchet Inn, Bristol The pub’s connection with Bristol’s boxing heroes is commemorated in a plaque illustrating five of Bristol’s champions – one of whom, Hen Pearce, features in Bloodie Bones: A Dan Foster Mystery. Hen Pearce (Detail) Bristol born Hen Pearce, The Game Chicken (1777 – 1809), a former butcher’s boy, became champion of England in 1805. He was a hero inside and outside the ring. In 1807 he climbed onto the roof of a building in Thomas Street, Bristol to rescue a servant girl from a fire. Always a popular figure, this courageous act inspired many eulogies in pr

'We will have a fire': arson during eighteenth-century enclosures

Join our Winter Solstice Blog Hop! Thirty writers throw light on a dazzling range of topics . Follow the links at the end of this article to be enlightened and brightened by our blogs... “Inclosure came and trampled on the grave Of labours rights and left the poor a slave And memorys pride ere want to wealth did bow Is both the shadow and the substance now.” John Clare, The Mores On 1 May 1794, the writer Hester (Thrale) Piozzi of Streatham Park recorded in her diary that the furze on the common had been set on fire in protest at the enclosure of land “which really & of just Right belonged to the poor of the Parish”. Yet even while she acknowledged that the protesters had justice on their side, she criticised them for not “going to Law like wise fellows” and concluded: “So senseless are Le Peuple , & so unfitted to be souverain”. The senseless poor of Streatham were not unique. During the eighteenth century, enclosure resisters throughout the

Search This Blog