I was seven years old in 1945, my head filled with guns and tanks and air-raids; looking forward to my father coming home from the War. I'd seen Polish soldiers living under canvas; enjoyed the bacon sandwiches they gave we kids in the village and the smell of good food that seemed to fill the air the whole time they were there. I'd seen men in bright blue clothing, presumably casualties of the war convalescing in the big house in the park, and I lived in awe of Don Bradman, Wally Hammond and Denis Compton, reading about their exploits on the cricket field in the Annuals for Boys that proliferated when  peace was declared.

Earnest though my subsequent endeavours have always been, I have never quite succeeded in achieving the goals I set for myself. Close on occasions, but never quite there. And now I write fiction, which I can  only hope you will enjoy half as much as I enjoy the process of writing it.