A Booklover's Tardis by Annie Try

It seems that every time I go to blog on this site, I want to write about something unexpected.  Bear with me while I tell you about a visit to the Post Office . . .  

This wasn't the nearest PO to me - a mere three miles away - but one I found, with Jane Clamp and Amy Robinson in Kettlewell, the nearest village to the Scargill Community in Yorkshire.  We were early for the ACW Writers' Retreat, having travelled the day before and stayed in a B&B overnight, so we left the car at Scargill and after a much appreciated coffee, walked into the village of Kettlewell. We were on a quest for money - two of us having failed to bring any to purchase books from the bookstall, or goodies from the Scargill shop.

We spotted the tiny Post Office and filed into it, more or less filling it with our presence.  The post-master beamed behind the counter and put up with us all squeaking exclamations of delight at the rows of secondhand books and other completely essential items, such as notebooks and pens, on the shelves.


As we each withdrew money he mentioned that there were more books in the café.  We walked across the hall in all its elegance (which I had scarcely noticed on the way in) and into a large room displaying menus full of interesting mouth-waters, with the very definite added bonus of shelves full of up-to-date fiction.  We wished there were sofas to sit on to complete the image of us lazing about reading all these wondrous containers of scarcely imagined worlds and characters.

For some reason we went back into the tiled hall and up inviting stairs and there it was - a room with all sorts of books plus comfy sofas and even window seats.  Unfortunately, we didn't have time for more than browsing, but this unexpected discovery of a place of stories and wondrous tales started our writerly weekend off brilliantly.
                                                                                                             

And . . .

One other surprise; on the next floor up is a youth hostel.  I think we might be booking at least one night there next year.  I think they let oldies in these days, don't they?

Is there a moral to this story?  Perhaps 'Don't judge a Post Office by its counter'?   I can't use the 'book and cover' one, because I am just about to reveal the cover of my next book which I hope will be read, one day, by someone in a place as special as the Post Office in Kettlewell.

  

Annie Try (Angela Hobday) writes the 'Dr Mike Lewis' Stories.  The second in the series 'Out of Silence' will be out in September 2017, published by Instant Apostle.  The stories are tales of discovery for the clients of Dr Mike Lewis, Clinical Psychologist, and for Mike himself.  Angela is Chair of the Association of Christian Writers and has recently retired from being a Consultant Psychologist.