Arts
The Swaling, Episode Sixty Two
I’m in the lobby of an Islington apartment block. Natasha has directed me and my ward, a wet and dripping pushchair containing a toddler called Jakey, to the lift. Too small for the three of [more…]
Mystery
Book Review
Book Review: Imagining A Murder
Once Upon a Moonlit Provence Night . . . author David Sedgwick reveals why he just had to write the story of a brutal, unsolved 1973 murder. Hands up who remembers the name Jeremy Cartland? [more…]
Arts
The Swaling, Part Sixty-One
We are in Battishill Street Gardens, Islington. It is raining. Myself, Natasha Williams and Jakey the borrowed toddler are sat on a bench, sheltered by a tree, next to bushes over-growing a monument. Natasha had [more…]
Arts
The Swaling, Part Sixty
It is nineteen eighty-four. If Big Brother is watching he will observe myself, my colleague Natasha Williams and a disguise enhancing borrowed toddler (called Jakey) in a pushchair hunkered on a bench beneath a tree. [more…]
Arts
The Swaling, Part Fifty Nine
Myself, Natasha Williams and a borrowed pushchair bound toddler called Jakey are on a bench in a rain-soaked Battishill Road Gardens in London’s Islington. We are disguised as a young family while having a secret [more…]
Arts
The Swaling, Part Fifty Eight
Back in London, I struggled to touch base with my colleague, Miss Natasha Williams, the other half of my nascent Operation Swaling, neglected by myself as I was sent north to play my part in [more…]
Arts
The Avila Gold
The Avila Gold is a novel by David Westheimer, who also wrote, amongst other things, “Von Ryan’s Express”, later made into a very good film, with Frank Sinatra in the eponymous role. The Avila Gold [more…]
Arts
The Swaling, Part Fifty Seven
In the Sleescale constituency office of Major Sir Fergus McDee MP, I have read out from my Royal and Industrial Insurance Company notebook a list of names inscribed on a nearby mining tragedy memorial. I [more…]
Arts
The Swaling, Part Fifty Six
My colleague Captain Davies and I are in the constituency office of wet Tory grandee Major Sir Fergus McDee MC MP. Three hundred miles to the south, former Prime Minister Maurice Harold Macmillan, 1st Earl [more…]