Ripening lemons

STEP ONE BUY YOUR ORANGES! No one could say my mother-in-law was easy to get on with. “Mum can be rather rude even though she calls it ‘plain-speaking’,” warned Jeremy when we became serious. “Dad cou

THE toll of church bells was stifled by the winds. Sleet clawed my face as I pushed through the flurry. The orangery’s windows had shattered. Whichever way I turned, rattling, shaking trees bore down.

I’m the same age as my mum and dad were when our family moved in next door to Mrs. Dolan. They seemed old to me back then, but I know now that they weren’t. They were a young couple at the beginning o

WOULD you look at the man!” Maggie said. She wasn’t much to look at herself, being as black as sin from the coal dust. She’d just finished a shift at the colliery screens, picking lumps of coal out of

THE bell above the door jingled as Freya screwed the top on a big glass jar. “Be right with you!” she called, efficiently using the wooden steps to reach the top shelf and stow the aniseed twists wher

THE Janus Inn’s sign swung ominously in the gathering wind as Mairi and her bundle stood outside. Waiting for the coachman to appear, she looked towards the stout, ancient building, glad of the carous