Soundings S.
3 primary works
Book 1687
It is summer, 1941, and the country is still at war. In the Devon village of Ashleigh, however, evacuees from the London blitz are living in an atmosphere of rural peacefulness, although Daisy Ricketts of Bermondsey isn't sure if she'll ever get on with carping Mrs Mumford, the subject of whispers because of her husband's mysterious disappearance.
David, the elder son of Tommy and Vi Adams, meets Kate Trimble, a cockney girl from Camberwell who has just arrived in Ashleigh with her aunt. Kate is imaginative and precocious, while David is happy-go-lucky , and as the war is directly affecting the lives of so many other members of the Adams family, Kate and David establish a friendship in the summer sunshine of Devon. But as their friendship develops some exciting undercurrents, an incident occurs which brings home to them the darker intrigues of wartime and provides a devastating shock to everyone.
Book 1752
From autumn 1941 to the first months of 1942, the war continued to affect the lives of the Adams and Somers families.
It was not so much the war, however, as a succession of tragic domestic events that brought a sad and lonely little girl called Phoebe into the care of Susie and Sammy Adams, reminding them of the entry of Rosie as a child into the lives of Boots and Emily. Much needed to be done to cure little Phoebe of her sadness, and it proved a difficult time for Susie and Sammy.
Further shadows fell when news came that Tim was a prisoner of war, and that Japan had attacked the American fleet in Pearl Harbour and British bases in the Far East.
But Boots's French-born daughter Eloise had her dearest wish come true when she married Colonel Lucas of the Commandos in Alexandria.
Book 1879