Thank you so much for inviting me to be your guest on your amazing blog, Debbie/JB.

I thought I would switch myself about face, try and imagine myself as a potential reader of my new book, someone who has barely heard of ‘Miriam Wakerly’. Who? Amongst all the zillions of books on offer why would anyone zoom in on mine? 

My typical reader is probably a woman, although my other books have been enjoyed by men too. And, for this Nineteen-Sixties novel, does that mean the reader is bound to be of a certain age, I wonder?

Well, here I am under-cover, wearing my cloak of anonymity, and the first two things I see are the title and the cover. Secrets in Appley Green  – hmm, that gets me imagining different kinds of secrets, good and bad. Well, for sure, I would need to read the book to find out what they are all about! 1960s design just screams out at me from the distinctive cover and I wonder why its focus is on something like fabric rather than a village scene. Is there a good reason for that? It’s supposed to be a village novel, isn’t it? Also, it’s classified as a ‘romance’, but I read somewhere that the author said the story is not a sweet romance, but rather a love story with a twist (ouch).

I like the idea of this village, where folks help each other – even if they do hide things and gossip! Now for the blurb: the idea of a schoolgirl getting pregnant from a fling with an older man, that is something that does ring a bell from my own memories of that era (not me, I add). I happen to be of that ‘certain age’ you see. I am curious to step back to that most exciting, culturally revolutionary, decade of all time, in my humble opinion, even if I do end up feeling mightily relieved not to be a teenager living in the Sexties (oops, Sixties) right now. In fact, I think my own daughters would be amazed to read about how materially lacking life was then, with no mobile phones, computers or eating out, lucky to have a TV, being gay still illegal, drugs … aah, nostalgia is coming over me in waves of mixed feelings. I wonder if this author did her research properly; I bet it’s full of those annoying anachronisms.

I haven’t yet read Wakerly’s third novel, Shades of Appley Green although apparently, Secrets in Appley Green is some kind of prequel. Uh? Well, that’s certainly different.  There seems to be a major cliff-hanger at the end of Shades … (reading the Amazon reviews) and Secrets … runs with that. Basically I am assured that I could read either book first, so that’s OK. 

Well, now I know how a ventriloquist’s dummy feels. I am back to being me now, after that quite disturbing slip into a parallel world that is, perhaps, yours.

Be sure to let me know how you get on with Secrets in Appley Green in an Amazon review, won’t you?

BOOK BLURB