Library Van Cancelled

 I was hoping to pick up at least 7 books from the mobile library today but Rachel rang yesterday to say the van was off the road and wouldn't be round. She's put my reservations ready to go on the delivery van to Stowmarket Library where I'll pick them up next week.

I'd already run out of library books so had been reading from my shelves anyway - and had already finished this very old (1947) small book that had been on my shelves a while - but where from and why?

I answered the first question by looking at my accounts on Amazon and Abebooks and found I'd bought it from the latter last August. But Why? and How did I know or find out about it? Because it isn't even listed in Josephine Bell's list of publications on Fantastic Fiction.

Josephine Bell was a well known author of crime fiction from the 1930's to the 1970s and BLCC reprinted one of her books in 2020 but that doesn't explain how I knew about this book in 2025... it isn't even one of her crime fiction.

After a bit of googling I came across a mention of it on Scott's Furrowed Middlebrow blog  (much missed since he moved to Portugal) about his favourite books of 2024

This is part of what he said then..............

This is the first of Bell's non-mysteries I've read and I enjoyed it tremendously. Tracing the fictional mid-sized town of Haverington through the war, beginning to end, it offers a fascinating glimpse, á la Winifred Holtby's South Riding, of the practical logistics of wartime—accommodation of refugees, rationing, bombs, and all. Its flaw for me, probably introduced by a publisher who felt the logistics themselves wouldn't sell books, is a melodramatic romance element that's rather drab, but it's nevertheless a fascinating read.

That must be where I found out about it.

I enjoyed it too as the details about village life through the war and the machinations of the women in the WRVS is interesting. The in-fighting and back biting reminded me of the much more well known book 'Nella Last's War, The Diaries of Housewife 49'.

Now to pick another from my shelves to read....................

Thank you everyone for comments yesterday on the Art Exhibition. There were over 400 pieces on show so I only photographed a few.

Another hot one day - hope you are all managing to stay cool enough. I had the front door propped open for a through draught yesterday and couldn't believe the amount of traffic going by - I think everyone who would normally walk to school, shop, doctors etc was driving with air-con on to keep cool! Or maybe I don't notice it when doors and windows are shut.