THE PLACE
The village of Stanwood lies in rural East Northamptonshire. Like any other village it has, in its time, been a microcosm, a lithosphere, a discrete domain with its own world of characters, its agglomeration of incident and its arrivals and departures.
I retain memories from my early childhood of a small, Victorian, red brick, end of terrace house there, with its rarely used front parlour, zinc bath still hanging on the back of the stairs, the no longer used outside privy, the long garden laid out to vegetables, the old water mill down the lane and a mere half mile away the mansion – the Big House – ever present, ever remote. Older villagers still remembered the uncertainty of seasonal work on farms or the grinding drudgery in machine-regulated mills or in the factories that churned out the country’s boots and shoes.
THE CHARACTERS
THE BOOKS:
Volume One: Aila’s War
It’s 1913 and Dudley Smythe has decided to rid himself of his half-sister, Aila, who stands to inherit part of their father’s estate. A fatal fall from her horse is the perfect solution. But ploughman, Will Hammond, finds and rescues her. His reward? A savage beating from Dudley’s cronies.
World War wrenches Will away from Aila. And it is three years until their worlds collide again. Aila is now a nurse; Will, a decorated Colour Sergeant. Dudley, now an artillery major, has one more chance to take revenge on Will.Three years earlier Will Hammond had saved Aila Smythe’s life. Can she now save his?
Volume Two: Kit’s War
Seventeen-year-old Kit Dobson is slight, combative and a brilliant mechanic who is fascinated by the extraordinary new world of powered flight.
In 1917, Aila Smythe of Stanwood House whose maid Maisie is Kit’s cousin, introduces her to the famous Sopwith Aviation Company.
Kit overcomes the contempt and aggression of the male factory workers to become one of the first female pilots to deliver planesacross the Channel to the First World War’s front-line squadrons.Recruited to steal plans from a German spy in London, Kit is already facing murderous retribution when Aila’s half-brother, Dudley, learns of her existence. If a German spy fails to destroy Kit, maybe Dudley will succeed.
Volume Three: Aila’s Peace
World War One is over. Flora, Amelia and Huon are about to face Henry, Earl of Chichester, with their respective partners, to discover what his plans are regarding their inheritances. They have already guessed that Dudley Smythe, Flora’s half-brother, is living at the Earl’s mansion, tying to cause enough trouble in order for him to regain control of his father’s estate.
But then, to Flora’s utter amazement, the letter from her long lost mother arrives at Stanwood House. Her world is turned upside down.
STEPHEN TIMMINS 