Pattern of Shadows was my first novel, the sequel, Changing Patterns was published in May 2013. The last of the trilogy, Living in the Shadows was published July 2015. In August 2017, the prequel to the trilogy, A Hundred Tiny Threads,was published. In March 2010, The Memory was published by Honno, a contemporary family saga. I also have an eBook, Silent Trauma, a fiction built on fact novel, published as an eBook. I have an MA in Creative Writing, B.A. (Hons.) in Literature, and a Diploma in Drama and Script Writing. I've had short stories, poems, plays, reviews and articles published throughout the British Isles, notably in several Honno anthologies. I am also a Creative Writing tutor and run workshops on all genres and available for talks and workshops.My blogs are on my website: https://judithbarrowblog.com/ where I review,interview other authors, and generally write about walks & photographs. At the moment I'm running a series of posts called Places in our memories, where writers talk about somewhere that brings back a memory. Always happy to hear from anyone who would like to join in with that. When I'm not writing or teaching creative writing I spend time researching for my writing, painting or walking the Pembrokeshire coastline
When I was a child my mother took me every Saturday to the small library in our village. I was allowed six books – usually all read by the Wednesday (I was one of those kids who read by torchlight under the bedclothes – and got away with it for years!) I would then wait, not always patiently, until the weekend, when we would go again. I think it was a great relief to both my mother and myself when I was at last allowed to walk to the library by myself.
By the way…In the very olden days libraries were named from the Latin “liber”, meaning “book.” In Greek and the Romance languages, the corresponding term is “bibliotheca”. Or, if you want to go with the medieval version “Calque of Old English bōchord (‘library, collection of books’), equivalent to book + hoard.”
Just thought you might want to know that.
Anyway, when I was a child – libraries were just… libraries. The place one went to to borrow books. For free!!
Image courtesy of Pixabay
Today, libraries are still one of the few free services left. Libraries are used for many different reasons; they contain not only books. magazines, newspapers, manuscripts, but also CDs, DVDs, e-books, audiobooks etc. They connect us to information.And, important in these days, they are also community hubs where authors (if they’re lucky) can go to give talks, hold workshops. It’s where people can connect with other people. They are safe havens.
Reading for pleasure, is one of the most important things one can do, so what we need to make sure of is that future generations have the opportunity to do just that. Books represent the chance for us not only to enjoy the work of so many brilliant writers, but to also to grow, to change, to see life from other points of view. We will only ever see life through our own perspective … unless we read.
In our area, the Pembrokeshire County Council has approved its budget for 2023-24. We will have a Council Tax rise of 7.5%. It would be wonderful if the value of libraries and librarians were understood; if those in authority – those with access to their council budgets – acknowledged this importance for every generation. If enough funding were to ploughed into libraries to preserve them.
Image courtesy of Pixabay
Each month on the Libraries Wales website, they focus on introducing an author based in or writing about Wales. I am thrilled to be the author for April 2023.And I am more than happy, alongside other friends who are also writers, to talk about the value of books and the enjoyment of reading.Just give us the chance!!
We found Pembrokeshire by lucky accident. With three children under three years of age, we didn’t want to go far on our annual holiday. Wales didn’t seem that far away from Yorkshire, well, not as far as Cornwall… we thought. We found the house we’ve lived in for over forty years by accident. Being auctioned we thought it fun to dream, to put in a bid. We’ll never get it… we thought. We did. With the optimism of youth and dreams of living near the sea we sold our house in Yorkshire. It’ll be an adventure… we thought. And we could always move back if we don’t settle. We’ll give it five years.We didn’t need five years. Although we moved to Pembrokeshire in the depths of November to a house with no electricity, heating, and not nearly enough furniture to fill a large five bedroomed house, we knew we’d done the right thing. Despite all of us muffled in so many layers of clotihng we looked like a set of Michelin Men ( remember those advert?), we were happy – we were bringing up our children in a wonderful place.
Over the years we’ve walked many times around the Llys – y- Fran reservoir, now called the Llys-y-Fran Country Park.
Back in the day (as my grandad used to say), the walk around the reservoir (about seven miles) was more of a hike and a scrabble around rocks, trees, and, sometimes, through streams.There’s still a little negotiating of streams, as I mention later.
But first the technical and public information bits…
Llys-y-Fran Country Park is three hundred and fifty acres in all, which includes the two hundred and twelve acresof the reservoir. In the parish of the village Llys y Fran, the community of New Moat, it’s on the southern slopes of the Preseli Mountains.
Llys-y-Frân dam was constructed between September 1968 and 1972.The final concrete was laid on the nineteenth May 1971, completing a total of over 500,000 tons of the stuff since the project began. By May, the depth of water had risen to forty feet but it was only on the fifth of December 1971, exactly nine months after impounding had started, that the reservoir overflowed for the first time.
The reservoir was officially opened by HRH Princess Margaret, Countess of Snowdon, on Tuesday, the ninth of May, 1972.
The dam is a hundred feet (thirty metres) high and the lake is fed by the River Syfynwy.The water is used by homes and industry in south Pembrokeshireand is managed by Welsh Water. It’s one of eight-one reservoirs in Wales.
The forecast for the day was good, so we donned walking boots and rucksacks and set off. I’m cheating a little here – the photograph below was taken on the last stretch of the homeward-bound section, as we looked back with smugness on how far we’d walked.
Back to the beginning… These days the walk is a wider, if still steep and winding in places, gravelly track around the circuit of the lake, and is interspersed with cycling routes of varying degrees of difficulty. I promise you, (and am most disappointed that I forgot to ask husband to photograph it), there was one route highlighted by a sign of a skull and crossbones… with a note that the route was only for those of the highest skill and fitness … (and, I added to myself, the most crazy!).
“There’s a lot of water to cross, isn’t there?” I remarked, after wobbling on strategically-placed rocks and tree trunks in one particularly wide stream.
“Well, it is a reservoir,” he replied, striding manfully through the water.
“Sarcasm is the lowest form of wit!” Was the only remark I could summon up, as I stopped trying to balance and sloshed after him.
The whole time we walked we met only two cyclists and three couples with dogs. The sun shone (most of the time) and there was just a slight breeze that moved the grasses, the patches of daffodils, the leaves and petals of the primroses, the early gorse. Except for the calls of the Canada Geese and, at one point, the noisy squabble of seagulls, it was peaceful. Through the woodland there were stunning views all along the way.
We stopped for a picnic. I won’t admit we stopped to catch our breath – although we did do a bit of puffing up those steeper parts. I’ll even go as far as to say it stopped me talking … sometimes!Anyway, we were ready for a bite to eat, a coffee, and another photograph opportunity .
The photographer! What isn’t seen here is the robin who followed us around for a least a mile after we’d fed him some crumbs, and is a few inches behind David, patiently waiting for him to move (he had his foot on a crust of bread).
What used to take us two and a half hours to walk this trail, this time took us over three and a half. I claim mitigating circumstances – we stopped often ( very often) for husband to take photos. Oh … and to eat the picnic.
And I refuse to talk about the fact that we both walked like ducks the day after!
N.B. The word llys translates into English as “court” and y frân translates as“[of] the crow“. Just thought you might like to know that.
Interviewing Debby, who is one of the easiest people to talk to, despite her and her father’s fame. She is so open, so honest, so interesting. And it was fascinating to delve into the reasons she wrote her book.
Over the last few years, I have interviewed many authors and writers of various genres. It’s fun, something I enjoy. Pre-pandemic it was in the studios, but since it’s been through zoom which means it’s easier to chat with anyone from all over the world.
The great thing about www.showboat.tv is that, unlike many other online interviews, these chats are edited. So any waffling (usually on my part), any stumbling or stuttering, or, as they say “Up North” any faffing about, is never seen by the audience.
And the other, brilliant part of the whole process, is that it brings the authors and their books, to the attention of readers and viewers all across the world.
What more could a writer ask? My future posts will be about some of the authors I’ve interviewed so far. I’ll be asking them a little more about them selves and how they enjoyed ( or dreaded!) the experience. How it was for them… kind of thing!!
About Debby Campbell
Country music singer and activist for Alzheimer’s, Debby Campbell was born in Albuquerque, New Mexico in 1956 to Diane Kirk and Glen Travis Campbell. She is the eldest of 8 children and the daughter of the most famous “Rhinestone Cowboy” Glen Campbell. Debby loved singing from an early age and spent many summers with her dad on tour, and in the television studios with his Glen Campbell Goodtime Hour television show.
Debby graduated high school in England living with her mom and step-dad Jack, while her step-dad was in the Air Force. Her dad, Glen became a world sensation, and would perform in England and send for Debby so she could spend time with him.
In her early 20’s, Debby married and became a mother of 3, two boys and a girl. She lived in Italy, and the US during this time and currently loves being a grandmother to 6 grandchildren and 1 great-grand child.
In the mid 80’s Debby became a flight attendant and today, remains flying international as well as domestic.
In 1987 Debby became part of her dad’s show on tour as a featured singer, along with her full time job as a flight attendant. She toured and traveled with the Glen Campbell show for 24 years, which included travels to Europe, Australia, New Zealand, Tasmania and Bermuda and so many more. Many of the Glen Campbell fans became loyal fans & friends of Debby’s and she has remained friends with them today.
Her appreciation for Country music landed her with her own show in Branson, Missouri at the Roy Clark Theatre in the early 90’s. She continued her career as a featured singer at the Grand Palace with her dad and then on to her Dad’s Theatre –The Glen Campbell Goodtime Theatre and ending with a residency at the Andy Williams Moon River Theatre.
Debby’s bragging rights include hosting the Jerry Lewis MDA Telethon, performances at the Grand Ole Opry, opened for greats and Grammy Award artist such as Charlie Daniels, Jerry Reed, Eddie Rabbit, Colin Raye, and performing the National Anthem for the National Finals Rodeo in Las Vegas. She is an author of her recently released book titled “Life with My Father Glen Campbell”. She has also been credited with recording duets with her dad on “United We Stand”, “Let It Be Me”, and “Little Green Apples” and on multiple recording of Glen’s “Live with South Dakota Symphony” on CD and DVD. As Glen recorded some of his final music, Debby was instrumental on background vocals.
Debby is active with the Alzheimer’s cause and finds time for her first priority, family and friends. She golfs, enjoys bowling, travel and of course singing.
The Glen Campbellstory is one of exceptional musical talent, a glittering career and a frequently disturbed personal life. In August, 2017, after battling Alzheimer’s disease, his death was announced to the world.
This celebratory Omnibus enhanced edition of Burning Bridges: Life With My Father Glen Campbell includes both an interactive digital timeline of his life, filled with videos and images of live performances and interviews, as well as a Spotify collection of the greatest recordings that Glen Campbell ever made.
As a studio musician Campbell contributed to countless Sixties and Seventies records; as a solo artist he produced the classic hits Galveston, By The Time I Get To Phoenix, Wichita Lineman and Rhinestone Cowboy; he had a successful US TV show, co-starred with John Wayne in the film True Grit, and was lauded for his talents. However, a series of failed marriages saw this shining star fall heavily into serious substance abuse, and the fabric of his life unravelled.
Persistent short-term memory loss resulted from this turbulence and Glen Campbell would have few constants in his life as the years waned on. One of them, however, was the co-author of this book, his daughter Debby. She witnessed his struggles and suffering, both musically and personally, as well as the beginning of his decline into Alzheimer’s disease.
Burning Bridges: Life With My Father Glen Campbell is a loving but unflinching reminiscence of a multi-talented musician, a troubled man and a father. Debby Campbell provides a poignant, eye-witness account of a musical legend like no other.
Actually, two zoom interviews have been uploaded with the incredible Debby Campbell, daughter of the legendary country singer, Glen Campbell. In Booksmart, she talks to Judith Barrow about her book documenting her life of the road with her father, while on Inside Notes, she discusses her latest album plus her new single “Sunflower”.Watch them for a limited time free of charge on the homepage www.showboat.tv
And here Showboat TV tells us how to watch anytime
I’d no intention of getting lost – but there again, I never do. It just happens. Usually I have a husband (not a random husband, the one I’ve had for some years) to point me in the right direction. He’s used to me saying ” how far away are we from where we were?”, but this time I was on my own. Well, me and daughter’s dog, Benji.
Looking non too happy. (the reason will become apparent later)
Radyr Woods is around fourteen acres of woodland, with a network of footpaths, boardwalks, and steps throughout the wood.
There is easy access to a mixed woodland and include a local nature reserve (Hermit Wood), with a canal, streams, ponds, springs, grass and heath land.
And ducks.
Look carefully… there is a duck, hiding on a mix of branches… honest!
And another… swimming this time.
And there are interesting panels explaining the intriguing history of the area...
Apparently there are the remains of a late-Prehistoric burnt mound where hot stones would have been immersed in water until it boiled and the burnt and broken stones or pot boilers formed the mound. Although it’s not known what the mound was used for (one could guess rituals – but I’ll go no further with that idea) The mound wasn’t discovered until 1911, but it is evidence that the site was inhabited centuries ago. There are also rumours that a 10th century holy well existed on the site In medieval times Radyr Woods formed a part of the walled deer park of Radyr Court, the historic home of the Mathew family.
The area was farmed and quarried up to the mid 20th century. Conglomerate stone from the Radyr Quarry was used in the construction of both Llandaff Cathedral and Cardiff Castle.
There were quite a few other dog walkers to pass pleasantries with and allowing the dogs to sniff one another’s bottoms socialise. Then I met a man walking his dog, and his ferret
He offered to show me how the ferret walked on the lead. But I had seen him walking towards us for some time. And Benji was showing rather too much interest in the proceedings. I thought it safer for the man to hold said ferret up high-ish. Still a bit too close to Benji, I thought. His dog just looked bored.
I walked on, not noticing which paths I took. Until I realised I didn’t know where I was, and how to find my way back.
When one path seemed to run out and I sank into the mud I thought I’d better turn back. After wandering aimlessly for ten minutesI met a young woman I’d spoken to earlier and when she realised how clueless I was, she took pity on me and, with the aid of Google maps (“you haven’t got Google maps?!”, looking askance at me), walked back with me (quite a long way) to where I eventually recognised a path.
Quite fortuitous meeting her, actually. She belongs to a reading group and I’ll be going to talk with them sometime soon.
As for the sulky looking Benji at the start of this adventure – covered in mud when we eventually arrived back at the house, he needed a bath. And wasn’t impressed.
Thank you so much to Random Things Tours for allowing me to be part of the book tour!
Synopsis: A terrible accident followed by a terrible lie tears two sisters apart. Many taking the blame for it all, because Angie believes she is too young to get into trouble. But she is very wrong and as a result, Mandy feels she is no longer wanted and goes to build a new life and identity at her aunt’s. Mandy starts new as Lisa, slowly she begins to get her life back on track, refusing to have anything to do with her sister again. But 13 years later, they meet again at their mother’s funeral and Lisa sees something is very wrong with her sister. Angie is terrified of her husband and her…
Seeing the results of the Wales Book of the Year Award 2024, and reading one or two of the books of the shortlisted authors over the last month, brought back memories of 2021 when I was nominated for the Literature Wales Book of the Year Award. It still feels strange.
The Memory was published around the first week of the first lockdown and I thought it became lost in all the disruption and anxiety of the pandemic. So, when I first heard that the book was being nominated, it was a complete surprise. Naturally I was also thrilled because, at that time,The Memory was so different from my first four novels, which are historical family sagas. And I wasn’t sure how it would be received by the readers who had enjoyed those books. So, to be recognised by Literature Wales for the Wales Book of the Year Award 2021, The Rhys Davies Trust Fiction Award, was a great accolade for me.
I believe we are all affected by our pasts; experiences that shape our present and future. And, as writers, memories feed our stories. Families fascinate me: the love, the loyalties, the rivalry, the complex relationships. Layers that are in all families. The casual acceptance of one another in a family can bring the best and the worst out in all of us, so there is a wealth of human emotions to work with. This is how The Memory evolved. A little of the background comes from a time when I was a carer for my aunt who lived with us. She developed dementia and I kept a journal so we could talk about what we’d done each day. Many years after she’d died, some of those recollections crept into The Memory. And then there are the memories from my childhood, when I had a friend who was a Downs Syndrome child. The affection she gave, the happiness that seemed to surround her, is something I remembered long after she died of heart failure at the age of eleven. And I wanted that love to be a huge part of the book, a main theme. Fundamentally it’s the story of a secret that is never discussed within a family, but which has had a profound lifelong effect on the relationship between the mother and daughter. The Memory is sometimes poignant, sometimes sad, but is threaded throughout with humour.
Reviewsfor The Memory:
“… As a reader, when a character becomes as completely real to me as Irene does, I often find myself wondering what happened next for her. But Irene’s story is so perfectly and elegantly resolved that I know without a shade of doubt what her future holds.The Memory is not a comfortable or easy read. But if you’re looking for a beautifully written, character-driven story with a dark base but superb resolution, it just might be the perfect choice.”
” …The writing is what I’ve come to expect from Judith Barrow. The effortless prose brings a fresh quality to the mundane and familiar. There’s also a building menace to the book and a sense of foreboding that drives you on right to the surprising end. The Memory is a remarkable book and I wholeheartedly recommend it.”
When The Memory was shortlisted for theWales Book of the Year Award in 2021 I was also pleased for Honno. I’d been published by them for many years and I believe it also gave them some much deserved recognition.
And I’m thrilled that Honno will be publishing my eighth book with them in November.
The Stranger in My House.
After the death of their mum, twins Chloe and Charlie are shocked when their dad introduces Lynne as their ‘new mummy’. Lynne, a district nurse, is trusted in the community, but the twins can see her kind smile doesn’t meet her eyes. In the months that follow they suffer the torment Lynne brings to their house as she stops at nothing in her need to be in control.
Betrayed, separated and alone, the twins struggle to build new lives as adults, but will they find happiness or repeat past mistakes? Will they discover Lynne’s secret plans for their father? Will they find each other in time?
The Stranger in My House is a gripping ‘cuckoo in the nest’ domestic thriller, exploring how coercive control can tear a family apart. Set in Yorkshire and Cardiff, from the 60s to the winter of discontent, The Stranger in My House dramatises both the cruelty and the love families hide behind closed doors.
“Judith Barrow’s greatest strength is her understanding of her characters and the time.” TerryTyler
“Then hate me when thou wilt; if ever, now”—William Shakespeare, Sonnet 90. With so many grateful to @barbtaub
, who understands what I tried to achieve.with Sisters. x
Family. We’re hard-wired to need them, to forgive them their trespasses, to love them. But what happens if we don’t like them? If they disappoint us? Or if they just don’t want to be in our lives? We watch it play out between royal brothers on a world stage, and more intimately in our own families.
Recent studies show that over one in four adults will experience family estrangement. It’s often compared to the grieving process following a death—denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and finally acceptance. The difference is that estrangement doesn’t produce the outpouring of support that follows an actual death. Instead, there are feelings of shame layered over loss, grief, and anger. There are questions about identity: are you still a sibling/child/parent if your child or your parent or sibling is removed from your life? With changes in economic dependency, families aren’t needed as…
Judith Barrow is a mistress of dissecting the triumphs and misfortunes of families confronted with crime, disgrace and tragedy. In Sisters, her latest novel, she is at her brilliant best.
The Marsden family of Micklethwaite are doing okay; Eric and Eve, their two teenage daughters Angie and Mandy, and the baby Robert. There are the usual stresses and strains, the usual sibling rivalry, but nothing out of the ordinary. Then tragedy strikes, enough to damage any family, but when it’s exacerbated by lies and guilt, it seems the damage is fatal.
Resentful and hurting, Mandy goes to live with her aunt and uncle, Barb and Chris, in faraway Ponthallen (Wales is often shown as a place of refuge in Judith Barrow’s books). Mandy has a new life, new friends, even a new name, Lisa, anything to start afresh, but she can’t forget or forgive her sister. It’s no easier…
Delighted to share my review for the upcoming family saga, Sistersby Judith Barrow, available on pre-order for January 26th.
About the book
A moving study of the deep feelings – jealousy, love, anger, and revenge – that can break a family apart. … Sisters is another absorbing, emotional and thought-provoking creation from the wonderful Judith Barrow. Janet Laugharne
Two sisters torn apart by a terrible lie.In shock after an unbearable accident. Angie lets her sister Mandy take the blame, thinking she’s too young to get into trouble. But she’s wrong.
Mandy is hounded, bullied and finally sent to live with their aunt, where she changes her name to Lisa and builds a new life, never wanting to see her sister again. Angie’s guilt sends her spiralling into danger. Thirteen years later, they meet again at their mother’s funeral. Lisa starts to suspect something is wrong. Angie seems…
Their mother, Julia Prinsep Stephen had become a widow in 1870 after her first husband, Herbert Duckworth, died of a burst abscess. She already had three children: George, Stella, and Gerald. The latter was born shortly after Herbert’s death in 1870.
Eight years later Julia married Leslie Stephen. English society in the late 1800s was built on a rigid social class system, and as a graduate of Eton and Cambridge, a respected literary critic and biographer, Leslie was seen as one of the literary aristocracy. He was also a widower and father of a girl, Laura, who had a learning disability, and who, incidentally, was the granddaughter of the Victorian novelist William Makepeace Thackeray.
Despite Leslie doting on Laura as a tiny child, by the time she was nine it was obvious that something was wrong; she was slow to talk or read, and veered from total fatigue to violent tantrums. It was a problem for both her father and Julia (although Julia, as friend of the family, had already partly taken on the role as a surrogate parent after Leslie’s wife, Minny, had died when Laura was five). But marriage and producing four children in quick succession: Vanessa in 1879, Thoby in 1880, Virginia in 1882, and Adrian in 1883, increased the difficulties for the two parents. Neither of them were equipped to deal with a child who had special needs.
Besides being agnostics, both Leslie and Julia were humanists, who advocated the rights for women to be the same as for men, to reach their own conclusions in matters of religion. Yet both believed that the home was the true basis for morality, a sanctuary free from corruption, and therefore home was the place for women. So Julia, who despaired that she was unable to discipline Laura, or train her to carry out domestic chores, apparently felt that her stepdaughter was deliberately wilful. And Leslie, who, during a time when society viewed anyone who was not seen as “normal” as undermining that society, was ashamed of her. His domineering patriarchy in in this upper-class, intellectual, and claustrophobic household would be viewed as bullying these days.
He must have been very frustrated by Laura, and it was a conflicted family: having little parental authority over one daughter, whilst succeeding in having total control over the other two.
Unlike their brother, Thoby, neither Vanessa nor Virginia were allowed to go to school. It was still not considered suitable to send girls to school, so they were educated at home by tutors.
Initially, as small children, they spent their days inventing whimsical stories about their neighbours, then progressed to writing illustrated stories and poems, and making up riddles and jokes for a family magazine they called the Hyde Park Gate News. In years to come, biographers of the two sisters were to declare this as early proof of the reciprocal nature between them that, well before any formal training, they nurtured each other’s art, acting as the other’s friend, adversary, and creative muse. And they must have decided between themselves which of them followed which creative path: Virginia the writer, Vanessa the artist. Yet each one’s individual talents led to the same ending, an endeavour to tell stories through their craft, Virginia with words, Vanessa through her paintings.
But, in the background there was always the perceived family problem of Laura. And, in 1886 at the age of sixteen, when Vanessa was seven, and Virginia was four, Laura was sent away to live with a governess. And was absent from the public family.
Four years later, despite being deprived of any early official schooling, and notwithstanding the Victorian restrictions on girls and women, Julia and Leslie decided to encourage their other daughters to pursue their talents. Over time, Vanessa studied both at the Royal Academy Schools and the Slade School of Fine Art, Virginia took classics and history in the Ladies’ Department of King’s College London.
Laura, on the other hand had been diagnosed by psychiatrists as suffering from ‘imbecility’. However I do need to point out that, despite extensive research, I could find no established medical rules of defining mental illnesses at this time. Yet in law, under such acts as the Lunacy Act of 1845 and the Idiots Act of 1886, there were precise specific and distinct legal classifications for certain conditions. These groupings fluctuated though. Laura was initially admitted to Earlswood Asylum in 1893, aged twenty-three, as an “imbecile” but in the 1901 census she was labelled a “lunatic”. which could suggest worsening symptoms
Virginia and Vanessa had battles of their own to contend with; both, as children, were sexually abused by their half-brothers, George and Gerald Duckworth. As an adult Virginia Woolf wrote extensively about this incestuous abuse in her diaries and letters, although there is little I can find about the abuse with either sister. Understandably, many say this was the origin of the fragility of Virginia’s psychological state. But It needs saying that it has been suggested in various papers that there were genetic connections of mental instability on the paternal side: Leslie Stephen was prone to violent mood swings, his father suffered from depression, a nephew had a bipolar disorder and was admitted into an asylum for mania. Virginia herself suffered from depression, and Vanessa is reported to have had at least one nervous breakdown.I should also add here that therefore it could follow that this family history of the Stephen family means it is likely that whatever condition Laura suffered from in her life, her genetic composition means she was more susceptible to other mental disorders.
In 1895, their mother. Julia Stephen died of heart failure, following a bout of influenza. Shortly afterwards, Virginia had her first mental breakdown.And, when their older half-sister Stella Duckworth, who in the absence of their mother had stepped in to run the household, also died two years later, and after their father died in 1904 after a long battle with stomach cancer, Virginia made her first suicide attempt.
Vanessa took charge. After dealing with all the domestic affairs, she moved the family (Vanessa, Thoby, Virginia, and Adrian) from Hyde Park Gate to the Bloomsbury district of London in 1904 to begin a new life.
Here Vanessa, Thoby, Adrian and Clive Bell started The Bloomsbury Group with friends who were writers, intellectuals, philosophers, and artists who rejected the oppressive Victorian principles of their parents’ generation, and they adopted creative freedom, sexual permissiveness, and atheism. They became known for their unconventional lifestyles and love affairs, shocking many outside their social group.
As the older sister Vanessa dealt with many of Virginia’s emotional and mental breakdowns. But she also held true to her own code of conduct; her lifestyle, her unconventional, sometimes eccentric relationships, were reflected in her art: the nude portraits of her friends and family, the use of design in her work. (both considered to be the prerogative of male artists) Yet her loving care for her sister was balanced by the long term and continuous rivalry in their separate spheres of creativity. Reading through the lines during my research I wondered whether, sometimes, this conflict was wearisome for the older sister; whether Vanessa’s marriage, in 1907, to Clive Bell was subconsciously an effort to distance herself from Virginia.
The marriage, a year after their brother Thoby’s death from typhoid, made Virginia descend again into some sort of nervous breakdown. The marriage meant that Virginia and their brother Adrian had to move out of the Bloomsbury house, thus providing a distancing between the two sisters. A distance Virginia resented, because, before long, she began to pursue Vanessa’s husband, Clive. Their love affair lasted, intermittently, over six years. And there is plenty of anecdotal evidence that reveals enough proof, I think, to believe that the underlying reason for the affair was so that Virginia was once again at the centre of her sister’s life.
In 1914 Vanessa began a life-long relationship with Duncan Grant, who was bi-sexual. Taking Vanessa’s two sons, Julian and Quentin, from her marriage to Clive, and accompanied by Duncan’s lover, the writer David Garnett, they moved to Charleston Farmhouse, Sussex. In 1918 Vanessa and Duncan had a daughter, Angelica.
Because I have concentrated on these two women as sisters, and because much has been written about their achievement by far more scholarly people than me, I have left out details of the body of work that both women produced. I was more interested in what made them ‘be’, what formed them as human beings.
I found an extensive amount of articles, journals, newspaper reviews, discussions, diary quotes, lectures etc. on Virginia that revealed much of her personality and mental health. But far less details on Vanessa’s character. Because she didn’t keep a diary as Virginia did there is little written about her personally, except for the time of her son, Julian’s death during the Spanish War, when she became extremely and understandably depressed. But, mainly, there are only facts about her place in the family, about her marriage and relationships, her part in the Bloomsbury set, and the cannon of her work. And I found almost nothing on Laura. Having left few records of her own, she’s as invisible in history as she was in her family. And yet, her small story needs to stand alongside her famous sisters, because, I think, her presence (wherever she was during her life) must have had some effect on Vanessa and Virginia. There had to be some experiences, some memories they shared, that would always have impacted on the three of them.
Troubled by mental illness throughout her life, Virginia was institutionalized several times and attempted suicide twice before drowning herself by filling her overcoat pockets with stones and walking into the River Ouse on March 28, 1941. Her ashes are buried in the National Trust garden of Monks House, Rodmell.
Vanessa died at Charleston Farmhouse, at the age of eighty-one, after a bout of bronchitis, on 7th April 1961. She was buried on 12th April, without any form of service, in Firle Parish Churchyard.
N.B. Leslie and Julia visited Laura until Julia’s death in 1895. Stella visited her until her death in 1897. Her aunt Annie Thackeray Ritchie visited her until her death in 1919. Annie’s daughter Hester Ritchie brought her home for visits on occasion. Then the visits stopped. When Laura died in 1945 the asylum did not know of any living relatives, though both Vanessa and Adrian outlived her and even inherited the remainder of the legacy Leslie had left for her care
Sometimes, family members can become estranged from one another, either by choice or by circumstances. “In one of her informal reminiscences from around 1922, Virginia describes ‘Thackeray’s grand-daughter, (Laura) a vacant-eyed girl whose idiocy was becoming daily more obvious, who could hardly read, who would throw scissors into the fire, who was tongue-tied and stammered and yet had to appear at table with the rest of us.’ Virginia makes the difference between them clear: Laura was not, in fact, one of “us,”’ https://tinyurl.com/36sj5mc5
And, in a way, this is how Lisa (formerly Mandy) feels about her sister, Angie, in my book, Sisters, when she says, “I never wanted to be in Micklethwaite ever again. Yet here I am. And meeting the one person I never wanted to see again. “
Sisters waspublished by Honno on the 26th January 2023:
It’s a funny thing about Judith Barrow’s books. I start reading, thinking they will follow an expected genre, get about halfway through, and realize that they are about something else entirely. In Sisters, for example, I thought I was going to meet another Cinderella, one who lives through and overcomes family trauma, meets her prince, and lives happily ever after. Only… not so much.
When we meet thirteen-year-old Mandy, she’s the classic middle-child of a working-class family on a 1970s housing estate. She’s proudly pushing the pram containing their family’s much-anticipated and beloved baby brother when she runs into her big sister, Angie, a typically boy-crazy young teen. Angie is attempting to show off for a boy when a terrible accident occurs and the precious baby is killed.
A devastated Mandy rushes back to her home, but to her shock is blamed for the tragedy. She waits confidently for her big sister to explain, but Angie doesn’t step forward. Instead, their family falls apart in a meltdown of grief, blame, and shame. Publicly branded a baby-killer, Mandy is bullied at school, shunned by her parents, and lied about by her sister, the one person who could have saved her.
Of course, we can see how the adults who should have provided love and support in spite of what was obviously an accident, instead fail their child. How the sister she’d always looked up to allowed her own fear to keep her from protecting Mandy or even telling the truth. And how all of the social structures of home and school and church fail to protect and support.
The bewildered girl is sent to Wales to live with her aunt and uncle. Mandy changes her name, rejects her birth family, and reinvents herself as Lisa. But that’s only the beginning of the story. As the two girls grow up, we can see that their split-second reactions in a moment of trauma are actually reflections of the people they will grow to be.
Both leave their broken family, and very soon come to life-changing forks in their separate journeys. Angie starts down a dark path where the only piece of herself she sees as valuable, her appearance, is regularly sold.
QUOTE: “There was a moment when Angie had a chance to change her life: that first time she stepped through the door of that house, that first night, that first week, that first time, that first man… But she didn’t.”
At almost the same moment, Lisa steps up to prevent a little boy being kidnapped. She recognizes that protective spirit as her life-calling, and begins training to become a child advocate.
QUOTE: “That day with the little boy, I knew I’d never have a choice if I saw a child in distress. And I knew what I wanted to do with my life.“
The meltdown of Mandy/Lisa’s nuclear family, the way everyone fails each other and her in a moment of ultimate stress— that was the story I expected to read. But it wasn’t the story Sisters had to tell. Instead, as the years pass, we see each sister tentatively begin to rebuild their lives, to unfold their personalities and characters from the smashed wrecks of that devastating moment.
Raised by her loving Aunt Barb and Uncle Chris in far-off Wales, Lisa finds her own strengths and life purpose. As she grows, she rebuilds some of the tattered relationship with her mother, and becomes a strong woman unafraid to love. The frightened little girl who keeps silent to protect the big sister who has betrayed her, channels that strength to protect other children.
But Angie’s path is one where that first instinctive cowardly betrayal sets the pattern for her inability to stand up for herself. It leads almost inevitably to a shameful existence and an abusive marriage.
When their mother dies, the two sisters finally meet up again. And this is where my expected story turned around completely. Instead of vindication for Lisa, we see a family whose core has disappeared, leaving each of them fundamentally lost. Each one has to forgive themselves for the all-too-human failings of being weak, angry, judgemental, scared. Along with each member of the family, the reader has to decide if it’s even possible to reclaim their humanity by reforming the family bonds shattered by tragedy, weakness, and time.
For me, Sisters is more than a story about a family destroyed by tragedy. It’s an exploration of how much we can give up in the face of devastating betrayal and loss, and how much we must give to reclaim our identity in the face of our imperfections.
I was particularly drawn to the settings. I enjoyed the contrasting descriptions of the family home, and the very different worlds the two sisters flee to, from the comfortable chaos of Wales that welcomes Lisa, to the sterile, compulsively bleached home that imprisons Angie. And yes, there was a bad guy, but somehow he lacked substance for me, an outline of nastiness rather than a fully-rounded villain. Instead, the true antagonists are the human failings in each member of the family, and even more their inability to forgive themselves and each other.
Sisters is a slow simmer, an intimate look at a gradually unfolding train wreck. It invites the reader to examine the effects of tragedy in the moment, but also as those effects ripple outward across the years, and especially the amount of strength and determination needed to swim against those ripples until feet finally find firm ground again. It’s not an easy read, but readers willing to explore the collapse of a family will be rewarded with characters who ultimately redeem their lives, reclaim their humanity, and most of all, affirm their båonds of love and family.
I unreservedly recommend this beautifully written, devastating, but ultimately hopeful story.
Ann Hatton and her older sister Sarah, were the daughters of Roger Kemble and Sarah Ward, who led a troupe of travelling actors. Sarah was born in Brecon in July 1755, Ann, otherwise known as Ann of Swansea, in Worcester in April 1764. There were ten other siblings.
All, except Ann, were early performers on stage with their parents.Considered by her family to be unsuitable to be on stage, owing to a disability (she had a slight limp), Ann was more or less excluded from the family. Later in life she often said she received little love from her parents, and that her education wasneglected.
In contrast Sarah was well educated, adored by her parents, and performed her first major Shakespearean role, as Ariel, at the age of nine.
Yet both fell in love with men whom their mother and father thought unsuitable.Ann, at the early age of sixteen, married a man called Curtis who was actually already married, and was later convicted and jailed for bigamy. She was considered to have brought disrepute on the family and was cast out by them; their only concern was their determination to validatetheir respectability within the theatrical world.
Sarah was dealt with in a different way. Initially sent away to work as a lady’s maid because she began a relationship with William Siddons, (one of the members of her father’s troupe), she was soon forgiven by her parents, who gave their blessing for her to marry William. Sarah was then allowed to continue her acting career. She was so outstanding that she was noticed by David Garrick, actor, playwright, theatre manager and producer, who took her to London to appear on the stage at Drury Lane, although her first role at Drury lane wasn’t a total success.
Rejected and isolated Ann became increasingly depressed and suicidal, actually attempting suicide in Westminster Abbey. She lurched from one catastrophe to another. After her failed marriage she attempted to earn her own money by working for a Dr James Graham, a sex therapist, who ran a business called the Temple of Health and Hymen,in Pall Mall.Her family was enraged to discover he advertised the lectures Ann gave as “given by Mrs Curtis, Mrs Siddons’ younger sister”.
In 1783, Ann produced her first volume of poems, (Poems on Miscellaneous Subjects). Again she gained her family’s wrath; she published the collection under the name of “Ann Curtis, sister of Mrs Siddons”.
The Kemble family was determined to disassociate themselves from Ann, so Sarah, joined with one of their brothers, granted Ann a yearly allowance, but only with a condition that Ann lived at least a hundred and fifty miles away from London.
The annual payment meant that Ann’s reputation and station in society became more acceptable, and in 1792 she married William Hatton.
They emigrated to America, and it was here that she wrote her opera libretto Tammany (otherwise known as The Indian Chief), which was given its première on Broadway. This was the first known libretto written by a woman.
Following the triumph of her libretto, Ann and William returned to Britain, and by 1799, had settled in Swansea in South Wales, where they ran a bathing-house and lodgings near the coast until William’s death in 1806. She then moved to Kidwelly.One of her poems, Swansea Bay, describes her emotions as she left Swansea. Eventually, she returned to Swansea in 1809 where she settled down to write her poetry and Romantic novels. These encapsulated themes of social and moral parody,(sometimes with gothic leitmotifs). She used the pseudonyms of “Ann of Swansea” and Ann of Kidwelly.
Many of her books were set in Wales; Cambrian Pictures, published by my publishers, Honno, is one of them.
Sarah and her husband William, took up the life of a travelling thespian, playing many parts all over the country. She cleverly chose roles that made her more popular, that protected her image and preserved her reputation as a wife and mother of five children, as well as an actress. This helped her to avoid any rumourmongering and scandal that usually plagued actresses at the time. She ultimately became Britain’s most renowned and highly paid actress in the 1780s, much sought after by equally famous painters, such as Sir Joshua Reynolds, to sit to have her portrait painted. She even gave private readings for the king and queen at Windsor Castle and Buckingham House. Reputed to have a striking stage presence she became most famous for her role as Lady Macbeth; a role she was reported as played to perfection, and she was also called the Queen of Tragedy.
But, after thirty years the marriage between Sarah and William became strained and they separated.
She retired from the stage in June of 1812, playing Lady Macbeth in Macbeth. So enthralled by her performance were the audience that they continued clapping when she finally left the stage and the play ended there.
She died in 1831 and was buried in St. Mary’s, Paddington. Her funeral was attended by thousands, and a statue of her was later created by Francis Legatt Chantrey and erected in Westminster Abbey (ironically, as I said, earlier, the place where her sister, Ann attempted suicide after her first marriage to the bigamist, Curtis, and when she was both ostracized by her family, and desperately poor). .
Ann died and was buried in 1838 in a churchyard in High Street, Swansea. She left most of her belongings to her servant Mary Johns, executor of her will, as a “very small remuneration for her affectionate, honest and undeviating conduct” for almost 16 years.
At no time in my research for this post, did I discover that the two sisters ever met again.
It occurred to me that, sometimes, it is only through fate and coincidence that estranged families are forced into contact. And so it is for the two sisters, Angie and Mandy (later known as Lisa) in my next book, Sisters.Due to be published by Honno on the 26th January 2023, I’m thrilled that it’s now available to be pre-booked.
‘Let’s go to Lake Vyrnwy,’ Husband said. ‘Take some photos.‘
“Take some photos”, is a phrase that has been used many time down the years of our marriage. Sometimes it makes my heart sink; it often means I carry on walking along a chosen trail, before realising I’ve left Husband behind, oblivious, and capturing, “just the right shot” and have to retrace my steps. I have complained that this means I have walked miles more than him, but he, (“quite reasonably,” he says) means I’m burning more calories off. I ignore the implication of this… normally… but make sure I eat his chocolate bar as well as my own, when we stop for lunch.
Anyway… Lake Vyrnwy...
Just on the edge of The Snowdonia National Park and south of Lake Bala, Lake Vyrnwy is set amidst the remote and beautiful Berwyn Mountains. With spectacular waterfalls, and unspoilt open countryside. Except that, although the scenery is, as always, fantastic, the waterfalls are sadly depleted. As is the reservoir. However, since these photos were taken in August, and we’ve had such downpours, with fingers crossed, an inch or two may have been added to the water level. One can but hope!
We parked in a designated area that was supposed to be on the edge of the lake. It wasn’t; the water was so low we could have walked quite a few metres on shingle that should… would … in ‘normal times’ be submerged. It reminded us that, underneath, was a village, lost many years ago.
Llanwddyn was a village on the hillside next to the Cedig river. There were thirty-seven houses, three chapels and a Church of St John, and, in the surrounding countryside, ten farmsteads. Farming was the main occupation of the people in the valley, they ate simple food, such as mutton broth, porridge, gruel, and milk and burned peat from the moors in their fireplaces.
But, with expanding industries in the the Midlands and the north-west of England, and the prospect of higher wages, many people left. To make matters worse for those still trying to make a living from the land, in 1873 the local vicar,Reverend Thomas H. Evans published a report that the area was useless for agriculture, because it was waterlogged for much of the winter.
Seeing this, made us realise how many streams must has poured down the hills. Imaging the rush of water, I suppose it’s easy to understand the Reverend’s statement. Yet it has left me wondering why he wrote the report. Was he paid? Were the villagers aware of what he’d done? If they did find out, what was the reaction? I haven’t been able to discover that. The writer in me is itching to research that time. It did coincide with a time when the authorities of Liverpool were exploring the country for sites to build a new reservoir to cope with the growing population on both sides of the Mersey. So who’s to say!
Various sites were under consideration in northern England and Wales, but in most cases there were snags By 1877 a group of engineers arrived in Llanwddyn. Their visit was to look into the possibility of damming the river Vyrnwy. A survey revealed a large area of solid rock, just where the valley narrowed, two miles south of the village, which could act as a base for creating a large, artificial lake that had the potential for holding many millions of gallons of water.
It brings a feeling of awe, of sadness, almost, to be walking on land that is normally submerged under water, on land where a village once stood, where people once lived.
Driving further around the lake we pass a sign at the side of the road – “Track to impressive hillside view. Not to be missed”. Well, if ever there was a challenge to a photographer, that was it. Husband got out of the car and disappeared for a few minutes, soon to return. ‘It doesn’t look too bad. Come on.’
And indeed the first few steps were not too bad. And then we turned a corner… to be faced by an almost vertical path, a rocky vertical path. I stopped; why do I always let myself be fooled?
‘Come on, it’s not far!’ He said that numerous times for the next ten minutes. Hauling me from bend to bend. ” Think of the view!”
I couldn’t think of anything, except how to get my next breath.
But I had to admit, the view was worth it. The coniferous forests planted around the lake by the Forestry Commission are impressive.
On the way back, Husband found two stout branches to use as walking sticks, to scrabble down between mossy rocks and sliding muddy stones. It was either that or an undignified descent on my backside.
In 1880 the Liverpool Corporation Waterworks Act was passed by Parliament, and received the Royal Assent. Preparations were at once put in hand to gather the work-force and equipment necessary for the construction of what was to become the first large masonry dam in Britain and the largest artificial reservoir in Europe at the time. Work on the site began in July 1881.
The stone for the masonry was obtained from the quarry specially opened. All other materials were brought by horse and cart from the railway station at Llanfyllin, ten miles away. Stabling for up to 100 horses was built in Llanfyllin. The labour force topped 1,000 men at the busiest stage of the work on the dam. Many of them were stone masons working in the quarry, dressing the stone which was not easy to handle.
In a very short time the dam was completed. The village of Llanwddyn, and all buildings in the valley that were designated to be covered by the water, were demolished.
St Wddyn’s church was built on the hill on the north side to replace the parish destroyed by the flooding of Vyrnwy valley. Many of the graves were relocated from the graveyard of the old church to St Wddyn’s before it was flooded. It was was consecrated on the 27 November 1888, the day before the valves were closed. It took a year before the water reached and spilled over the lip of the dam.
On a previous walk, some years before, we witnessed a wedding procession coming from the church, led by a chimney sweep in all his glory. Apparently it’s considered lucky to see a chimney sweep on your wedding day, the belief being they bring good luck, wealth, and happiness. The bride and groom did look joyous. I would have loved to have tagged onto the procession, but, that day, we were looking for “a good view of the water”, further along the road.
On the same hill as the church a monument was erected in memory of ten men who died in accidents on the site during the building of the dam and another thirty-four who died from other causes at the time.
Stone houses, matching the stone of the dam, were built on either side of the valley for the people whose homes had disappeared under the lake. I suppose there must have been a lot of opposition to flooding the valley to provide Liverpool with water at the time, and since, but records have apparently shown that it brought prosperity and stability to the area.
Our final excursion on our walk was to the waterfalls.
One of the highest is the Rhiwargor waterfall at the northern end of Lake Vyrnwy. From the car park I was relieved to see the relatively flat path along the valley of the river Eiddew. There was a trail leading up and up along the side of the falls. Despite much attempted persuasions, I declined, and opted for a coffee and a picnic at a nearby picnic table. And I ate his chocolate bar! Well, after that impromptu climb earlier, I thought I deserved it.Who said I hold grudges?!!
N.B.The Lake Vyrnwy Nature Reserve and Estate that surrounds the lake is jointly managed by the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB) and the Hafren Dyfrdwy (Severn Dee). The reserve is designated as a national nature reserve, a Site of Special Scientific Interest, a Special Protection Area, and a Special Area of Conservation.
It’s four years since Mum died. My sister arranged the funeral for eleven o’clock today. This is a post I wrote shortly afterwards. The relationship between Mum and me, and the one between her and my sister, proved so very different. There’s nothing wrong in that, but at no time was it more obvious than on that day…
I wrote…
I haven’t been online much over the last few months; my mother had been on end of life care for over a year and she passed away peacefully three weeks ago. It’s been adifficult time, both for her and for all the family. There have been many occasions when I’ve wished her at peace. Now she is.
I didn’t intend to write anything publicly about this.But something happened after she died that made me think and to remember a piece I wrote some years ago on motherhood…
The sunny day disappeared as we walked through the short steep-sided gorge – following in the footsteps of Victorian touristto the Water-Break-its-Neck waterfall, around a mile from the village of New Radnor ( Maesyfed – the Welsh name), in the county of Powys,Wales.
It was a spectacular sight.Yet, beyond the sound of the water it was strangely silent.
The water tumbled through the black slated rocks, a silvery mesmerising flow, to the small stream and creating a fine rainbow mist in the air. Yet there was an eerie and ephemeral feeling to the fallen, bare oak branches laced with lichen and boulders covered in dark green moss and surrounded by curtains of gently swaying ferns.
We made our way back along the narrow path. I thought we would be taking a slow ramble along the walking trails in Warren Wood – so named for…
Judith Barrow 