High Heels & Beetle Crushers by Jackie Skingley

She was a mother who always heard the birds singing. She remembered how Peggy let them stay up on a cloudless night to look at the stars and showed them how to look for bears in the sky. Violet remembered her sitting with her own children in the back field, showing them how to pierce daisy stalks with a fingernail and thread a chain. Peggy read from the Mother Goose, while the children dipped sticks of rhubarb into little bowls of sugar set between them. She remembered a tiny house filled with children who came to see her mother. All the men worked there, her father among them.

She remembered the row of cottages on each side of the lane which wound up towards the mine. But always with the sun shining in an intensely blue sky.

She remembered it lush and green in summer and white with thick snow in winter. Violet would like to go back to Thorndale, her memories of it were vague. If you haven’t read it yet, here’s a short extract to whet your appetite… Set in 1938 The Peacemaker tells the moving story of young woman’s struggle to make peace with her father on the eve of the Second World War. We will be at Explore York Library at 2pm on Monday 23rd March. In 2020 I’m already looking forward to being at York Literature Festival again, this time in a collaborative presentation called Family History: Fact or Fiction with my fellow writers Jane Austin and Yvie Holder. This photograph is of my daughter’s yoga group’s book club! I think it is my favourite thing to do, so if you would like me to talk to your group about any aspect of my book or the writing process, please do ask. I’ve had a fantastic time meeting readers and other writers at literary festivals, conferences and events in 2019 and have particularly enjoyed talking to small reading groups. For me, 2019 was a momentous year, having my first book published at the age of 63 was a great personal achievement – it really is never too late.

Happy New Year! My resolution for 2020 is to connect more with readers and this is my first of what I hope will be monthly communications this year.

High Heels & Beetle Crushers by Jackie Skingley