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Sister Giles

REVIEWS

http://www.midhurstandpetworth.co.uk

http://www.theargus.co.uk

The End and The Beginning now available in eBook format: To buy click on the link. 
Amazon Kindle

The End and The Beginning is a fascinating memoir of the later part of Sister Giles life. It relates the unexpected, often humorous, journey from an enclosed community to the secular world, without in any way jeopardising Sister Giles sense of vocation.In the early chapters the author touches briefly on her life as a nun in an enclosed order and the reader is given an insight into the austere regime of such a vocation. She is later given leave of absence when a friend asks her help to set up a retreat and Sister Giles is surprised to discover that she is called upon to offer succour in a much wider circle than she could have foreseen.

The author discovers a whole new way of life outside the order; she learns to drive, visits the hairdressers and discovers supermarkets. But there comes a time when she has to make a painful decision: should she leave her order permanently? Fortunately there had been a change in Canon Law some years previously which meant that she could ‘remain consecrated, yet released from community life.’ After three days she decided to remain in the secular world.

This is a story of courage, of the power of prayer and of a nun’s devotion to what she perceived as her duty to others in need of help. A combination of direct conversation, humour and eloquent descriptive passages means that the reader is taken with Sister Giles through her life story.

This is a unique story of an unusual person whose life is lived for other people.

REVIEW

The End and the Beginning
An Amazing Woman- Having trained at the Webber School of acting then became a Nun. After 20 years in a contemplative community she came into the outside world to look after those who needed affection, nursing. This account is written with humour with understanding & one is never felt to be in any way a lesser mortal for failing in ones own way of life. Strongly recommended to be read - not just once but again & again.
Elspeth (Hampshire, UK)

Price £14.95  P & P £3.00 UK £4.50.20 Europe £7.50  ROW

Available on   http://www.thememoirclub.co.uk/   email: memoirclub@msn.com   or tel 01913735660 with card details and address

Circle Completed now available in eBook format: To buy click on the link.
Amazon Kindle

When she left the convent she had called home for almost a quarter of a century, Sister Giles faced many challenges as she readjusted to life in the secular world. Constantly surprised and moved by acts of kindness, she was able to make a new life for herself, all the while preserving strong bonds with her order and never losing her sense of vocation.
In her follow-up to The End and The Beginning, Sister Giles celebrates the simple pleasures of the day to day and reminds us to value and appreciate the things that we all too often take for granted. A constant theme of Circle Completed is love - love of God, love of each other, love of life. Sister Giles’ love for others leaps from the page as she eloquently creates portraits of some of the people that have been important to her. Their stories are valued and shared.
Written with compassion and a warm sense of humour, this is an elegant, thoughtful and at times poignant book. It is also a reminder of the richness and fullness that life has to offer, if only we take the time to look for it.

Price £9.99  P & P £3.00 UK £4.50 Europe £7.50  ROW

Available on   http://www.thememoirclub.co.uk/   email: memoirclub@msn.com   or tel 01913735660 with card details and address

Roger Owen

Roger. A Owen being interviewed by Carl Gresham
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CTSorMuslec

The Improbable Bishop Ian Ramsey of Durham - John S Peart-Binns

The Improbable Bishop Ian Ramsey of Durham - John S Peart-Binns

A succession of masterful figures had the honour of serving as Bishop of Durham; saints and sages, prince-bishops, warriors and statesmen, builders and governors, reformers and controversialists. In 1966 a most unlikely candidate stepped into this mix. Born and bred in Lancashire, Ian Thomas Ramsey’s background gave few clues as to his future calling.

A brilliant and original thinker, his works on philosophy, theology and science developed and popularised new concepts in each discipline. Ordained in 1940, he served a curacy at Headington Quarry, Oxford and spent twenty three years as an academic: a lecturer and chaplain at Cambridge followed by a professorship at Oxford. Ramsey was an unexpected but inspired choice for appointment as Bishop of Durham. Ian Ramsey was immediately embraced by the people of Durham and soon the Church of England had an irrepressible and popular bishop in their midst. Focusing on Ramsey’s years in Durham The Improbable Bishop depicts a man whose compassion and work ethic made him ‘Everybody’s Bishop’ in pit villages, rural communities and secular institutions across the county. The book is a sensitive but rigorous assessment of the virtues, strengths, vulnerabilities and limitations of a man who left a lasting legacy in Durham and whose ideas influenced thinking across the country.

The author, John S. Peart-Binns, is a critically acclaimed episcopographer of fifteen prominent twentieth century subjects. In 2008 he received an M.Phil. with distinction from the University of Leeds for his thesis on Establishment and Disesstablishment in the life, thought and work of Herbert Hensley Henson, Bishop of Durham. Born and brought up in Bradford, he now lives with his wife Annis in the hub of the universe, Hebden Bridge in the South Pennines.

Reviews

An affectionate and critical assessment of Ian Ramsey’s time as Bishop of Durham … one of the many good things about this book is the affectionate but shrewd memoirs by those who knew  Ramsey and worked with him.                                                                                                              CHURCH TIMES

Well researched and informative. It contains some very amusing and attractive photographs. Well worth a read.                                                                                                                                                                                                  Christ College Oxford

In his latest biography Peart-Binns has done a great service. He has reminded us of a great scholar and churchman whose work on a number of moral and ethical issues influenced the thought of a nation. 

                                                                                                                                                                               Canon Malcolm Grundy Teal Trust

Dr Jean Watkins (McMillan)

Jean McMillan has had a rich and varied life. Born in North Wales; she lived a happy childhood before going on to study medicine at the Royal Free Hospital. She worked as a GP in several practices around the country and currently enjoys lecturing about her foreign travels to local groups and is also active in village life in Burley in the New Forest, Hampshire.

Jean Watkins has had a rich and varied life. Born in North Wales; her happy childhood in Blackheath, South East London was interrupted by forced evacuation to Cumbria during the Second World War. She studied medicine at the Royal Free Hospital where she developed a keen interest in sport becoming British Junior Squash Champion in 1951. She worked as a GP in several practices around the country and currently enjoys lecturing about her foreign travels to local groups and is also active in village life in Burley in the New Forest, Hampshire. 

When Jean first visited China in 1978 she had no idea on the impact it would have on her life and the enthusiasm for other cultures that would be inspired in her, going so far as to return to twenty years later to observe the changes the culture had undergone. in between those trips she thoroughly explored areas of Africa, America and Asia; all of which she would return to again later in the interest of learning more from the people there, and eventually travelling on to Europe and the Middle East. An enthralling and enlightening read, Itchy Feet will leave you with a thirst for experience around the globe. 

We all hope Jean will carry on with her captivating travels and continue to inform us of these fascinating ways of life.

Foreword

Jean McMillan has travelled with me regularly since 1995. I am a tour operator and ran many of the trips featured in Itchy Feet. Having organised many tours over many years you learn that the variety in destinations and cultures is matched by the variety of those travelling.

There are many types of traveller. Many are looking for adventure or to escape from their less exciting day to day lives, for others it is to fulfil a life-long dream to visit a particular place or see a particular site.   But for some it is to broaden their horizons and to learn and absorb from other cultures. Jean with her insatiable curiosity, enquiring mind and wide range of interests definitely falls into the latter camp.

A regular traveller, there is no bias or preference to where or how Jean travels. It could be by bus through rural Bulgaria, a light plane to southern Venezuela, the Shanghai express or by canoe along a tributary of the Amazon. Jean is equally at home in a grand Hotel in Cape Town as she is in a rest house in the Tibetan lowlands.

What makes a tour special for Jean is meeting the local people, seeing how they live, learning of their health care, education, hopes and fears for the future and for their children’s future. There is no starry eyed enthusiasm for the simple lives of the people. Having practiced medicine as a GP Jean knows the stresses and realities of life. Many will visit a destination and enjoy its wonderful scenery, its art and architecture and history.   For Jean the experience should be deeper it should tell us of how a country really is for the majority of the people who live there. I do not envy the guides on a tour Jean travels on. There will be steady stream of enquiring questions and brush-offs will not be tolerated!

Many is the time when planning a tour I have contacted Jean for her advice, and she will tell me to include a community centre, a rural clinic or school, that we need to meet the locals and be able to spend time with them.

Travelling to so many countries over the years has allowed Jean to cut through the accepted view of national progress. Her perceptive mind and experience allows her to see through the shiny symbols of modernity to the more fundamental aspects of a society – how it cares for its sick, elderly and children. In this sense Jean follows in the grand traditional of travellers from Marco Polo to Freya Stark. Her writing provides a snap shot of real life, all around the world over many years, making Itchy Feet a fascinating, informative and revealing book.

Jon Baines 

Part family history, part personal memoir and part travelogue Lucky Genes is a unique book and one that deserves a wide readership. Her travels are fondly remembered and eloquently recounted, particularly her first eye-opening and adventurous trip to China in 1978. A reflective and warm-hearted book it is full of interesting anecdotes about family life and foreign travel but also touches on subjects as varied as scientific progress and local history.

Reviews

"I have just completed the first of Jean's books "Lucky Genes". Absolutely brilliant insight into the times, changes and lives of others from a time previous to ours. Gratifying and Inspirational. Please feel free to pass this critique on to Jean on my behalf, as the book is now doing the great northern run."

A brilliant review by a local reader who thoroughly enjoyed Jean Watkins 'Lucky Genes' and is now embarking on her more recent title 'Itchy Feet'.

To order Itchy Feet:

Price £15.00  P & P £2.50 UK £3.30 Europe £6.00 ROW

Available on http://www.thememoirclub.co.uk/ email: memoirclub@msn.com or tel 01913735660
with card details and address

Available on the internet go to link:
http://www.bookbutler.com/compare?isbn=9781841045238

To order Lucky Genes:

Price £12.95  P & P £2.00 UK £3.30 Europe £6.00 ROW

Available on http://www.thememoirclub.co.uk/ email: memoirclub@msn.com or tel 01913735660
with card details and address

Available on the internet go to link:
http://www.bookbutler.com/compare?isbn=9781841045009

Order both books for £27.95

Peter Horsfall

A Life Less Ordinary

Shunned by the Royal Marines at the age of 16, Leeds lad Peter Horsfall retired 49 years later as Staff Superintendent of the House of Lords. Karen Joyner delves into a fascinating career AS CAREER RISES GO, PETER HORSFALL IS PRETTY IMPRESSIVE. From being the son of a Leeds bus driver and joining the Army at 16, the former Sheepscar schoolboy joined the Coldstream Guards as a drummer boy and 34 years later retired as Major Quartermaster. Now living in North London, he is still fiercely proud of his Yorkshire roots, and his recent biography is packed with anecdotes from his travels. Even the title of the book, Hard to Believe - Too Old at Sixteen, tells a story. "I was turned down for both the West Yorkshire Regiment and the Royal Marines because, having had my 16th birthday, I was too old," he recounts. "Indeed it was the latter who wrote to me suggesting that I apply to the Brigade of Guards, as they accepted Drummer Boys at the grand old age of 16. It is questionable whether the Royal Marines' loss was the Coldstream Guards' gain". Right from being a youngster, it was clear that Peter Horsfall would make his mark. With his older brother Terry, he was a tearaway child, spending the early 1930s in blissful ignorance of impending war and emulating his cartoon heroes in the The Dandy comic. "When we lived in Sheepscar, there were a number of derelict houses," he recalls. "We took timber from these, chopped it and tied it into uniform bundles, and went round the houses selling it. It seems ridiculous now but the prices charged were one penny for a small bundle and two pennies for a large one". A regular at Elland Road to watch Leeds United and Headingley for Rugby League and cricket with his father, Peter remembers the warm atmosphere at football matches. "We never saw Dad during the actual games," he says. "In those days children were passed over the top of adult spectators and stood in front of the crowd". A Drum Major in the West Yorkshire Regiment cadets before he was 15, he had a spell as an apprentice electrician at the Yorkshire Switchgear, then signed up for nine years with the Colour and three years on the Reserve with the Coldstream Guards. Travelling with the battalion for 35 days at sea in 1948 to reach the Far East was Horsfall's first taste of life abroad. This two-year stint was the start of tours to Germany and Kenya, but after returning to Britain in December 1960, Horsfall and his young family knew exactly where to settle. "Mary and I bought our first house in Pudsey," he says. "What a shame that Terry and Bob were not born there. They would have qualified to play for Yorkshire at cricket." By 1976 Horsfall and his family were out in Londonderry with the Coldstream Guards. Amid numerous recountable incidents, there are a few light-hearted moments which he enjoys sharing. His wife Mary had a Smith's alarm clock which broke down, so Peter packed it up and sent it to the Smith's factory in Scotland to be mended. He recalls: "A couple of days later my telephone rang and a voice said `Captain Horsfall? Stay where you are sire, I'm coming to see you'". The corporal in charge of the Postal Depot informed him the clock had started ticking and caused a huge bomb scare. This had closed the whole department while the bomb disposal squad checked the suspect device. "It goes without saying that I have never felt so stupid in all my life. I felt a right berk," he smiles. "A story for the biter bitten." At the age of 50, Horsfall made the decision to retire from the regiment, securing a job with a computer company and just working out his notice. "Life takes strange twists and there was about to be a big one," he recalls. Contacted by the Black Rod of the House of Lords, Sir David House, he was invited to apply for - and got - the position of Staff Superintendent. This led to some intriguing insights into the highest echelons of society. When Lady Thatcher arrived to take up her office at the Lords, the Iron Lady told her secretary the room would suit her fine. "Then came a classic moment as she said to me, `Major Horsfall, if I bring a couple of pictures in, would I be allowed to bang a couple of nails in the wall?' I replied. `No my lady. If you bring some pictures, WE will bang a few nails in the wall!" Horsfall is immensely proud of all the famous people he has met in the course of his career. Golfer Henry Cotton, footballer Ted Drake, and cricketer Denis Compton feature in his memoirs. And in the world of entertainment, names such as Arthur English, Tommy Steele, Mollie Sugden, Bill Moore and Pauline Collins crossed his path. Regular brushes with Royalty also featured in the diary. "Anyone who has been in the company of the Queen at a `private' event will know that she has a spontaneous wit and an infectious laugh," he confides. "Everyone now seems to know that Queen Elizabeth (the Queen Mother) is determined to live until 100 to receive a telegram from her daughter. Pray God that she does." "Of course, all is not laughter and light-heartedness. Operation Marquee is the name of the procedure laid down for the Lying in State of a sovereign in Westminster Hall. Regrettably, as the Queen Mother nears her century, the meetings and rehearsals become more frequent. She is the most loved lady in the land and her demise will cause great sadness." In 1995 Peter Horsfall finally retired from his post and a year later was given the freedom of the city of London. "As a Yorkshireman, I enjoyed being described as a `citizen of London'," he jokes, his final thoughts being with the county of his birth. "This seems an appropriate moment to mention the ridiculous statement made by the author Beryl Bainbridge in 1999. She seems to think that people with regional dialects are either uneducated or should not be considered for prestigious posts. In recent years I have met with so many `senior' people with strong regional accents that this makes a mockery of her comments." As an ex-Coldstream Drummer Boy who has made it to the very top, Yorkshire boy Peter Horsfall is the living proof.

The Memoir Club

Have you had an interesting life? Then there is no better way to celebrate it than by writing a book.

For anyone thinking of writing their memoirs we are the experts. The Memoir Club specialises in the publication of high quality editions of memoirs and the histories of organisations. Founded in 1997, with just one author we now have hundreds of authors on our lists.

We firmly believe that you should enjoy the process. That is why we offer a dedicated personal publication service to all of our authors - from advice and guidance in writing the manuscript through to the all important book launch and marketing.

It is also why the majority of our authors are now recommended to us by other authors.

People from all walks of life publish with us. Businessmen, academics, military and naval personnel, diplomats, politicians, medics, clergy and lawyers all feature in our lists.

Our books and authors receive widespread coverage and publicity. They have been reviewed in national publications such as The Times, The Financial Times, The Telegraph, The Scotsman, The Observer, and The Daily Mail, as well as numerous specialist magazines and journals. Authors also appear on television including Frost on Sunday and BBC's Inside Out series.