Janet Gogerty's Blog: Sandscript - Posts Tagged "bournemouth"
Sandscript
Tomorrow Bournemouth in Dorset plays host to its first ever Marathon. Most locals are still confused about the route, which roads will be closed, grumbling they will be imprisoned in their homes. Non drivers like myself are thrilled to see 'Road Closed' signs parked ready to be erected at midnight.
Why a marathon? So the runners can enjoy the beautiful local scenery, to bring money to the town or to raise money for charity? Probably all those reasons. It used to be a great achievement to run A Marathon, now those achievements are swept aside as marvelous or mad - I won't say athletes, because the runners are often celebrities, grandparents, brave survivors of illness or injury - set out to complete 7 marathons in a week or be the first to run across the world's hottest dessert.There seems to be no end to the variety of suffering and endurance that people can think up to put themselves through.
Yesterday a group of us did our annual 'Pink Promenade' estimated at 14 miles there and back along the flat seafront of Poole Bay - our only suffering and endurance came from a strong headwind and rain and then the discovery at the turning point that our favourite lunch break cafe was closed for a private function.
Why a marathon? So the runners can enjoy the beautiful local scenery, to bring money to the town or to raise money for charity? Probably all those reasons. It used to be a great achievement to run A Marathon, now those achievements are swept aside as marvelous or mad - I won't say athletes, because the runners are often celebrities, grandparents, brave survivors of illness or injury - set out to complete 7 marathons in a week or be the first to run across the world's hottest dessert.There seems to be no end to the variety of suffering and endurance that people can think up to put themselves through.
Yesterday a group of us did our annual 'Pink Promenade' estimated at 14 miles there and back along the flat seafront of Poole Bay - our only suffering and endurance came from a strong headwind and rain and then the discovery at the turning point that our favourite lunch break cafe was closed for a private function.
Sandscript in place.
What’s in a name? Unless an author writes science fiction set on another planet, or fantasy in a fantasy world, he has to set his story on earth. I once read a novel by a well known writer; unlike his other books it was a tale of wanderings in vaguely European lands, in an unspecified century. I felt no attachment to the characters at all and did not enjoy reading it.
But a crime thriller or romance can be set in a village with an invented name, helpful to avoid a libel case; you only have to look at the map book or drive around Britain to know real villages and towns have names stranger than a writer could create.
I recently read ‘The Cornish Coast Murder’ by John Bude, written in the 1930’s. His pen name is derived from a real Cornish place, the name of the village in the story is invented, but Boscawen sounds genuine. You can read my review of his book here on Goodreads.
Authors are safe in big cities, they are sprawling and anonymous. London has a well know centre surrounded by an endless variety of suburbs. In ‘Brief Encounters of the Third Kind’ the story starts in the back garden of an ordinary house, in the large suburb of Ashley. You won’t find Ashley on the map, but like many other outer London suburbs it has a common popular with walkers, several underground stations, a busy bus service, a hospital, a town centre and local shops. The residents of Ashley think nothing much ever happens there, but they are wrong.
When the characters hop on ‘the tube’ to go into central London well known landmarks feature in the plot. In ‘Three Ages of Man’ the stranger who appears at the beginning of the novel is overwhelmed by sprawling Ashley and the city centre, luckily he has an author to look after him. Waterloo Station is Britain’s busiest station, characters can slip through unnoticed. Here you catch the train to an obscure part of Wiltshire; a good walk from the station, near a little known village, is Holly Tree Farm; an ideal place for people who need to keep a low profile.
Perhaps one day I will set a novel in my current home town. It is big and busy, with students and holiday makers and occasionally, bizarre real life murders; plenty of scope for a novelist. Its real name is Bournemouth, but Thomas Hardy called it Sandbourne in his Wessex novels.
In the meantime it is June at Holly Tree Farm and I am busy writing the third novel in the trilogy.
In my two anthologies ‘Dark and Milk’ and ‘Hallows and Heretics’ you will find stories set in London and the Bournemouth area. In ‘Hallows and Heretics’ you can read the Hambourne Chronicles. Google Hambourne to see if it is a real place.
But a crime thriller or romance can be set in a village with an invented name, helpful to avoid a libel case; you only have to look at the map book or drive around Britain to know real villages and towns have names stranger than a writer could create.
I recently read ‘The Cornish Coast Murder’ by John Bude, written in the 1930’s. His pen name is derived from a real Cornish place, the name of the village in the story is invented, but Boscawen sounds genuine. You can read my review of his book here on Goodreads.
Authors are safe in big cities, they are sprawling and anonymous. London has a well know centre surrounded by an endless variety of suburbs. In ‘Brief Encounters of the Third Kind’ the story starts in the back garden of an ordinary house, in the large suburb of Ashley. You won’t find Ashley on the map, but like many other outer London suburbs it has a common popular with walkers, several underground stations, a busy bus service, a hospital, a town centre and local shops. The residents of Ashley think nothing much ever happens there, but they are wrong.
When the characters hop on ‘the tube’ to go into central London well known landmarks feature in the plot. In ‘Three Ages of Man’ the stranger who appears at the beginning of the novel is overwhelmed by sprawling Ashley and the city centre, luckily he has an author to look after him. Waterloo Station is Britain’s busiest station, characters can slip through unnoticed. Here you catch the train to an obscure part of Wiltshire; a good walk from the station, near a little known village, is Holly Tree Farm; an ideal place for people who need to keep a low profile.
Perhaps one day I will set a novel in my current home town. It is big and busy, with students and holiday makers and occasionally, bizarre real life murders; plenty of scope for a novelist. Its real name is Bournemouth, but Thomas Hardy called it Sandbourne in his Wessex novels.
In the meantime it is June at Holly Tree Farm and I am busy writing the third novel in the trilogy.
In my two anthologies ‘Dark and Milk’ and ‘Hallows and Heretics’ you will find stories set in London and the Bournemouth area. In ‘Hallows and Heretics’ you can read the Hambourne Chronicles. Google Hambourne to see if it is a real place.
Sandscript On Air
Grand Prix, everyday traffic - noise and pollution, I hate it, bring back the horse.
…but put big fuel guzzling engines up in the skies and I love them, carbon footprints forgotten.
A trip abroad begins the moment the cabin floor slopes upwards and the engines blast on full power. A window seat and clear sky provide the fascination of identifying landmarks, but if the plane ascends through heavy cloud cover there is the delight of a fluffy heaven.
My first ever flight was across the world, when our family emigrated to Australia. My novel ‘Quarter Acre Block’ was inspired by our experiences. I have flown across the world a few times since then, but perhaps most exciting was my shortest ever trip, flying in a light aircraft from Jandakot, Perth, Western Australia across twelve miles of Indian Ocean to Rottnest Island – real flying.
But mostly I have been on the ground looking up. At Farnborough Air Show, as children, we would marvel as jets flew silently by, followed several moments later by their sound.
Years later, living by Heathrow Airport, we would spot four planes in the sky at a time coming into land, at night like ‘UFO’ lights. But the aeroplane we never tired of watching or hearing was Concorde. If many Concordes had been built and flown the noise would have been unbearable, but the two flights a day were an event; teachers in local schools would stop talking at eleven a.m., working in an airside passenger lounge with a great view of the runway, we watched her take off like a graceful bird. At home in the evening I would abandon the cooking and dash outside to see her glowing afterburners soaring up into the night sky. Alas poor Concorde…
The end of August brings the Bournemouth Air Festival, now in its ‘bigger than ever’ seventh year. If you don’t like the noise, are not interested in aeroplanes and live near the cliff top, there is no opting out, unless you go on holiday. Roads are closed, there are diversions and daily routine is disrupted as over a million visitors come over the four days. But this did not affect me. With visitors coming I had no intention of going anywhere except the kitchen, local shops and the sea front.
If your visitors have made a long journey and it is their first visit to the Air Festival, then rain is guaranteed. On Thursday we struggled along the promenade against lashing rain blown by the prevailing South Westerly; miraculously the weather blew over and we stood on the beach looking up at the Battle of Britain Memorial Flight, three iconic planes, Lancaster Bomber, Spitfire and Hurricane.
Predictably we had blazing sunshine on Sunday – after the visitors had left, but we had all seen our favourites, The Red Arrows, the unique Vulcan Bomber and the RAF Typhoon ( Eurofighter ).
Visit my website to see pictures of the Air Festival.
http://www.ccsidewriter.co.uk/chapter...
…but put big fuel guzzling engines up in the skies and I love them, carbon footprints forgotten.
A trip abroad begins the moment the cabin floor slopes upwards and the engines blast on full power. A window seat and clear sky provide the fascination of identifying landmarks, but if the plane ascends through heavy cloud cover there is the delight of a fluffy heaven.
My first ever flight was across the world, when our family emigrated to Australia. My novel ‘Quarter Acre Block’ was inspired by our experiences. I have flown across the world a few times since then, but perhaps most exciting was my shortest ever trip, flying in a light aircraft from Jandakot, Perth, Western Australia across twelve miles of Indian Ocean to Rottnest Island – real flying.
But mostly I have been on the ground looking up. At Farnborough Air Show, as children, we would marvel as jets flew silently by, followed several moments later by their sound.
Years later, living by Heathrow Airport, we would spot four planes in the sky at a time coming into land, at night like ‘UFO’ lights. But the aeroplane we never tired of watching or hearing was Concorde. If many Concordes had been built and flown the noise would have been unbearable, but the two flights a day were an event; teachers in local schools would stop talking at eleven a.m., working in an airside passenger lounge with a great view of the runway, we watched her take off like a graceful bird. At home in the evening I would abandon the cooking and dash outside to see her glowing afterburners soaring up into the night sky. Alas poor Concorde…
The end of August brings the Bournemouth Air Festival, now in its ‘bigger than ever’ seventh year. If you don’t like the noise, are not interested in aeroplanes and live near the cliff top, there is no opting out, unless you go on holiday. Roads are closed, there are diversions and daily routine is disrupted as over a million visitors come over the four days. But this did not affect me. With visitors coming I had no intention of going anywhere except the kitchen, local shops and the sea front.
If your visitors have made a long journey and it is their first visit to the Air Festival, then rain is guaranteed. On Thursday we struggled along the promenade against lashing rain blown by the prevailing South Westerly; miraculously the weather blew over and we stood on the beach looking up at the Battle of Britain Memorial Flight, three iconic planes, Lancaster Bomber, Spitfire and Hurricane.
Predictably we had blazing sunshine on Sunday – after the visitors had left, but we had all seen our favourites, The Red Arrows, the unique Vulcan Bomber and the RAF Typhoon ( Eurofighter ).
Visit my website to see pictures of the Air Festival.
http://www.ccsidewriter.co.uk/chapter...
Sandscript
I like to write first drafts with pen and paper; at home, in busy cafes, in the garden, at our beach hut... even sitting in a sea front car park waiting for the rain to stop I get my note book out. We
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