April | 2020 | jenjsilver

This year marks the 50^th anniversary of the Vindolanda Trust. However, they’ve had to suspend their excavation season that would have started a few weeks ago as well as closing the site and the two museums. Like many other businesses, they are holding some online events. A good way to help them survive through these uncertain times, would be to donate and/or buy something from their shop. Visit the wesite here.

I enjoyed my times digging there, from 2014 to 2018. As well as the thrill of seeing what comes out of the ground from nearly 2000 years ago, there was the interaction with the other volunteers and the on-site archaeologists. I was lucky enough to be able to book into the Hedley Centre, which generally housed up to 8 people per session. I could look out of my bedroom window and see the ramparts of the barracks on the top of the hill.

So, these photos are just a few of my fond memories of being there. It’s a magical place and I hope they will be able to reopen some time this year so many more visitors (and excavators) can enjoy the experience of walking through history.

My first view of Vindolanda from the road, approaching from the east.

View from the Hedley Centre

First close up view of the excavations in 2014

On my knees in 2014

Into the wet stuff in the vicus…2017

Coin found on the last day of the 2017 dig – as it came out of the ground

Visiting in 2019

As I’ve said a number of times before, just being there is magical.

When I first went there to do research for my debut novel, Starting Over, I didn’t know if I would enjoy two weeks of scrabbling around in the dirt wondering if my knees and back would hold up. I thought it would be a one-off experience. Not a chance…I could hardly wait to book again for the following year…and the year after that…!

The Starting Over audio book narrated by Nicola Victoria Vincent is in the ACX system, awaiting approval. I’m hoping it will be available on Audible, Amazon, and iTunes very soon.

StartingOver

Books by Jen Silver…available from Affinity Rainbow Publications, Amazon, Bella Books, Barnes & Noble, Smashwords, Apple iTunes

Books I’ve been re-reading over the last three weeks:

I started with Swallows and Amazons, a regular source of comfort reads. Coot Club and The Big Six are gentle stories about sailing on the Norfolk Broads. I’ve never sailed in my life and never quite mastered rowing or paddling a canoe either. But I love these stories and marvel at how self-sufficient these children are. However, when Arthur Ransome wrote the stories in the 1930s, it was a very different world.

coot_six

After messing about in boats, I moved on to more adult fare with Jasper Fforde. I read books 1 to 5 of the Thursday Next series. They’re all good fun but I think my favourite is the third one – The Well of Lost Plots when Thursday has to hide out in an unpublished novel and continues with her training as a Jurisfiction agent under Miss Havisham.

fforde_five

Time then for a complete change of scene and on to some lesfic. My first stop here was an old favourite, which I discovered on the Mooch café’s Books for sale shelf five years ago. (I got it signed by the wonderful Karin K when I attended my first GCLS Conference in New Orleans in 2015.) Just Like That, for anyone who doesn’t know, is a delightful lesbian take on Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice. (And the glass of wine is relevant!)

Karin_that

After that, I needed more Kallmaker and found I had her very first published novel on my Kindle. In Every Port is a great coming out story with historical overtones, set at the time of Harvey Milk’s assassination and the Jonestown massacre.

Sticking with old favourites, I then moved on to detective stories starting with Murder at the Nightwood Bar and The Beverley Malibu by Katherine V Forrest. KVF never disappoints.

malibu_mine

That brings me up to date as I’ve just started on the first of the Lauren Laurano series – Everything You Have is Mine by Sandra Scoppettone.

So, why all the reading? Apart from the obvious – only going out when necessary. The writing is just not happening. Making notes for this blog is the most I’ve been able to do. I’m at the halfway point in my next WIP – but it’s not progressed past there in the last month.

For something else to do, I’ve recorded myself reading Chapter One of Country Living. No need for any professional audio book narrators to be worried. I’m no good at character voices and don’t have the skill to edit out the occasional bleep or stumble. And I certainly can’t compete with the lovely Clare Ashton who is reading her book Poppy Jenkins chapter by chapter (available on YouTube). But here is the audio file, if you want to listen.

CL_Jen

Reviews for Country Living

There haven’t been many, but I am very grateful for the reviews I’ve received so far for Country Living. (All five stars!) This one appeared on the Amazon UK site on 27 March:

Heart warming, fast moving and so true to life!

After 20 years of living together, marriage and comfortable ‘rubbing along’, you think you know someone – but maybe you don’t! This cracking story so well written. I became fully immersed in the sadness of middle aged Peri who suddenly realises her wife has been cheating on her and has to start rebuilding her life. Set in Yorkshire, England, the vivid writing transports you to the hills, dales and farm life of this beautiful countryside. And as always with Jen Silver’s books the plot is multi layered delivering a cool and sparkling look at contemporary life and adding real ‘edge’ to the story. Balancing out the romances, there are secrets, intrigues and surprise twists. Young and middle aged characters have experiences so recognisable – I felt I truly reading about people I know. There are always high expectations of Jen Silver’s books and ‘Country Living’ is one of her best.

Thanks for reading, if you got this far. Hope you’re staying safe and maybe enjoying rereading some of your own comfort reads.

Country Living – published 1 March 2020 – availabe from: Affinity Rainbow Publications / Amazon UK / Amazon US / Amazon CA / Amazon AU / Amazon DE / Amazon FR / Bella Books / Smashwords / Apple iTunes