I did not set out to be a published author.  I had no idea it would be so fascinating and so much fun!  I wrote the “Henry” stories for my two very young grandchildren when their family were living in Hong Kong.  I realised that as their father was American and worked for an American company, they would be unlikely to settle in England.  I wanted to give them some idea of what goes on in the English countryside which would be so different from where they were living at the time and from where they were likely to grow up in the USA. So, I included a little story for them every time I wrote to the family.  

The first spark of an idea came when watching our rather old and slightly overweight Jack Russell terrier barking furiously at something lurking beneath my garden shed.  I wondered what would be small enough and content to live under the dusty floorboards?  After much thought and a few false starts I came up with the idea of a small but curious mouse, who lived outside rather than in a house, who would make little forays out into the garden to see who and what was out there, and make friends with the other inhabitants of the garden.  And so “Henry” came into being.

 I researched which creatures might live in the grounds of a country house. I noted how they would react with one another, what they ate and how far they might roam in search of food. I considered how curious they might be, which were their sworn enemies, and how they would negotiate the human environment and its dangers.

I grew up in England during the second world war.  We lived in a large village in rural Suffolk, surrounded by open countryside, about four miles from the nearest market town and within an hour’s drive from the east coast with its wide open beaches. Our village had a full range of shops and essential services, including a large village school. This also housed the weekly library where I used to “help” after school. Regular bus services connected us to town for the weekly market, cinema, and theatre and for buses and trains connecting to other places.

My two sisters and I attended the local primary school (girls at one end – boys at the other) which stood next to the large Village Green where the Annual Fair and the visiting circus would be held. At the other end of the village stood the huge medieval “wool” church, a reminder of the successful textile business from centuries ago.  

School was extremely strict, and we were not allowed to mix with the boys who occupied the other end of the building. Sometimes, during the fine weather months, we were taken for “nature walks” along the lanes beside and beyond the school buildings into the nearby countryside.  We were taught to identify various wild flora and fauna and what happened at the various seasons of the year.  Of course, this was also a great opportunity for all sorts of misbehaviour!  Such a relief from the strict discipline of the classroom.

It was a rich and safe environment in which to grow up.  We walked to school (there were very few cars then,) joining up with friends along the way.  The path to school crossed over a slow shallow stream on its way to the main river.  With easy access to the banks below the bridge, this was very tempting for building dams and splashing about on the way home.

I was fortunate that one of my aunts, who was also my Godmother, took an interest in my growing-up.  For many years, she sent me a new book for every birthday, so I had all the children’s classics of the day – Black Beauty, Lorna Doone, Robinson Crusoe, all four of the Little Women books, culminating in a complete set of Dickens!

Reading has always given me such pleasure and sustenance in good and difficult times. So, I was enthusiastic to encourage a love of reading in my grandchildren and am pleased this has proved to be the case with the two “Americans” and my English grandson- they are all keen readers. Of course, I also wanted them to know a little of the English countryside and way of life in small towns and villages – so different from their life in a 14th floor apartment in Hong Kong!