The Real Garden of Eden

-
The road to Dufton Ghyll
Carpets of bluebells in Dufton Ghyll.
Descending into the forest


Imagine a walk through a fairytale wood - carpets of bluebells, crystal clear trickling streams,  ancient trees clinging to a mossy rock face, sunlight filtered through lush greenery and centuries-old bridges covered in velvety moss.  This is a typical scene from the Eden Valley in Eastern Cumbria, a gorgeous area of Northern England near to the Pennines, the Lake District and the Yorkshire Dales.
I had the pleasure of staying in the tiny village of Dufton, for a long weekend while researching locations for my new novel, A Proper Lady.  
Rediscovering my middle name.



I also made a kind of personal pilgrimage to another small village that shares the same name as me.  Puzzled?  Well - I've long hated my middle name, Milburn (which sometimes auto-corrects on my Mac as Milbum and is right now underlined in red as I write), but near the village of Dufton is the small community of Milburn, a sleepy little place though the day we passed through everyone was making their their way to the village green for races and refreshments.  I stopped for awhile to take pictures and left feeling a little better about my name though it still reminds me of that stuffy banker in The Beverley Hillbillies!  I'll try harder to think about its real meaning - the mill by the stream!!


This horse was tied up at a fork in the road as if he was there to give driving directions.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

THE ANGEL AT THE HEARTH

-
Image
While doing research for my last two books ( The Savage Instinct and A Proper Lady ) I kept coming across a term that was used to define the role of women during the Victorian era. The term Angel at the Hearth or Angel in the House defined the ideal image and essence of womanhood. It was widely portrayed in the art and literature of the time and was used as a standard to define the perfect woman, mother and wife. This idea actually gave rise to a whole genre of painting known as domestic pictures in which the ideal wife was portrayed as an earthly though angelic Madonna, soothing, comforting and submitting to her husband. Selflessly encouraging, watching over and nurturing her children while presiding over a well ordered, highly moral household. A poet named Coventry Patmore actually coined the term in his narrative poem The Angel in the House, first published in 1854 and   dedicated his first wife, Emily, whom he considered the ideal woman. Emily Patmore, painted by J...
Read more

DOGS and DATING

-
Image
I've recently changed writing gears to work on a more lighthearted project, inspired by a chance moment in my life when I went out with a friend to walk her dog, a cute, woolly little mutt. As we strode down the leafy path, I was amazed at the number of people who stopped to chat and generally fawn over my friend's dog. In that short walk we met more new people in half an hour than I had in several years, and some of them were hunks! My friend and I are both married, but it didn't take much of to stretch our imagination and ponder the question: C ould walking a dog help you meet the man or woman of your dreams? And that's how THE DOG WALKERS' DATING CLUB was born. The main character, LILY, is a self-professed dog hater after some traumatic dog-bite incidents in her childhood, which lends the book a more interesting dynamic when she decides to take on a puppy in the hopes of improving her chances of meeting someone to love. She wrestles with her n...
Read more

RAT CATCHERS AND OTHER STRANGE CHARACTERS

-
Image
When you're writing historical fiction, a great deal of time is spent doing research, and in the course of this reading and viewing, you come across some weird and wonderful characters. Some of them find their way into your stories, while some remain as fascinating discoveries. Here are a few I found while researching my novel, A Proper Lady. JACK BLACK, rat catcher : Yes, you read it correctly! Jack Black! Official rat-catcher and mole-destroyer to Her Majesty Queen Victoria. The heroic Mr. Black used trained dogs and ferrets to exterminate rats by the thousands in the heavily infested filth of Victorian London. He also had quite a taste for cooked rats and professed them to be, "Moist as rabbits and quite as nice," and also that,"Sewer rats were just as good as barn rats if you gave them a few days' chase before killing them." Rat exterminations were done on a cash-only basis, and were a profitable enterprise for those who'd grown up in poverty. ...
Read more