Magical Mystery Tour of Village Life ; the Dangerous Edge of Things: A Village Childhood by Candida Lycett Green (Doubleday, Pounds 16.99)

Summary

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I'M NOT going to give a sermon today," said the Rev Mr Bates, "because a hen turkey is sitting on a clutch of eggs in the pulpit and I don't want to disturb her." What a cosy, innocent world it was, living in the village of Farnborough in the Berkshire Downs in the late 1940s. Miss Lockhart always left Pounds 3 in cash outside her door at night, to save any passing burglar the trouble of breaking into her cottage. Men worked the land, followed Mr Willoughby's tips on racing and drank in the Fox Cubs. Women washed and scrubbed, while their daughters read magazines called Confidential and Knit Your Way to Glamour.

Yet the world was changing, most of all for the village children who were moving into their teens. One of them was Candida Lycett Green, living with her parents John and Penelope Betjeman ("air mum and air dad", as she called them in her thick country accent.) She and her best friend, June, were the latest recruits to The Gang, led by the daredevil Terry Carter. Both girls were rather gone on him, but to their disappointment Terry showed a disloyal preference for Janet Henley, who didn't even come from their village.

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Magical Mystery Tour of Village Life ; the Dangerous Edge of Things: A Village Childhood by Candida Lycett Green (Doubleday, Pounds 16.99)

Adult behaviour was often inexplicable.

What were Wendy and the American airman up to when June spied on them?

Wasn't tha...

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