WICKERSLEY'S HISTORIC BUILDINGS: IN REALITY AND IN FICTION

The Round Houses on Wickersley's historic Morthen Road near Rotherham, South Yorkshire, UK

Above are the Round Houses on Wickersley's Morthen Road as they are today.

I used the local geography as one of the backdrops for my novel 'Goatsucker Harvest' set in 1855.

These gorgeous buildings, once used as a place of worship and a shop, now private dwellings, are the ones that catch our heroine Thirza Holberry's eye and fire her imagination as she is waiting for Lucas to collect the new millstone from the quarry to cart back to Thirza's grandparents' windmill on the outskirts of Thorne and Hatfield Moors near Doncaster.

The quarries were one of lovely Wickersley's claims to fame, once renowned for their high quality "Wickersley Rock" sandstone. Their excellent grindstones were in demand for Sheffield's cutlery industry and exported worldwide. You can still see grindstones scattered around Wickersley and in the village there are still many beautiful old houses and walls built of the local stone.

"To while away the time, Thirza set out to stroll the length of what she imagined was the main street, back towards the parish church of St Alban. She gazed at a pair of unusual bow-fronted cottages and puzzled how the occupants chose furniture that would bend to the shape of the room. Or did they design their own? It must be like living in a windmill, only a windmill cut in half." - Joyce Barrass 'Goatsucker Harvest' ch 25 "Grindstones and Goatsuckers."

Here's St Alban's Parish Church. As Lucas says in the book, the top of the tower is the highest spot between Sheffield and Bawtry and used to have a lantern lit on top to guide travellers by stagecoach in the nights before streetlamps made night like day!

St Alban's Parish Church, Wickersley, from Church Lane

In the story, Thirza is hoping for a quick getaway from the stifling summer heat as she wanders around the village, but Lucas has met his friend from the Old Hall and is getting more than a little merry and incapable of driving their carriage, as he takes more than one drink at the Needles Inn (now Wickersley Social Club, still an excellent venue for a pint or two!)

The former Needles Inn, now Wickersley Social Club

The Inn stands alongside what used to be the main road between Bawtry and Sheffield, before the dual carriageway (Bawtry Road) was built just to the north in more recent memory.

The Gazebo in the grounds of Wickersley Grange beside the Inn, is a listed building reputed to have been where passengers would wait for the stagecoach, dating from the early eighteenth century. More info here on the Historic England website.

The listed Gazebo, just east of Wickersley Grange

Wickersley Old Hall is still standing proud nearby on the opposite side of the road from pub and gazebo, the road across which Lucas staggers dangerously drunk in my novel. Today, it has been converted into flats.

Wickersley Old Hall, south face

Available free on Kindle Unlimited or to purchase on Amazon Kindle or in paperback

Flamborough Cliff Climbers: Historical Human Cliffhangers in my Work in Progress

The Flamborough "climmers" (climbers) or egg collectors, seen in this Yorkshire Film Archive footage from 1908, YORKSHIRE FILM ARCHIVE: THE EGG HARVEST - CLIFF CLIMBING AT FLAMBOROUGH (1908) are integral to the action of my WIP "Cloudhover Solstice" set in the 1850s. Thirza and Bram on their keel "Thistle" find themselves swept off course, caught up in a maritime nightmare where seabirds face daily peril from gangs of tourists with guns and locals who harvest their eggs for profit and their feathers for fashion.

What hidden dangers haunt the East Coast chalk cliffs and caves? Beached and stranded, Thirza and Bram strive against the odds, risking everything to uncover what makes the Kittiwakes cry and turn the tide of creeping commercialism and vested interests towards care and conservation of our fragile coastline. This quest will challenge Bram's ancestral skills as a wildlife whisperer, his inventive ingenuity and compassion, not to mention his unsteady sea legs to the limit, as well as plunging the feisty and fearless Thirza literally over the edge.

Warning: We wildlife lovers may find distressing the sight of one climmer near the end of this short film, staging a mock 'fight' between a captured Guillemot and Puffin. It is historical scenes like this that motivate Thirza and Bram in the struggle to 'reverse the ravage' caused by humankind and to champion these voiceless and vulnerable creatures.

Watch for future updates about "Cloudhover Solstice" and meanwhile don't miss my first novel featuring Thirza and Bram in the heartstopping historical fantasy "Goatsucker Harvest" on Amazon in paperback and ebook.

Thanks so much for stopping by!

Slice of cake, anyone?

Just for you, suggested by a comment from reader Rose, here I am reading the moment from chapter 5 of "Goatsucker Harvest" when Thirza visits Carrdyke House and discovers what *that* coconut cake really tastes like! Things may not be quite as sweet as they seem...

GOATSUCKER HARVEST on Amazon UK
GOATSUCKER HARVEST on Amazon USA

Available for Kindle on Amazon worldwide and FREE on Kindle Unlimited

Goatsucker Harvest: Yorkshire author Joyce Barrass reads from her historical heartstopper

Welcome to your must read moment!

Here I'm reading from Chapter 4 of my Yorkshire historical heartstopper "Goatsucker Harvest." Bloopers, fluffs and all!

In this short snippet, Thirza's Aunt Emma visits Kitson's Windmill to make Thirza an offer she can't get a word in edgeways to refuse!

"Goatsucker Harvest" is yours to own and enjoy in its entirety for your Kindle or in Paperback from Amazon worldwide.

Thanks for watching and for all your wonderful support, reviews and feedback!

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Goatsucker Harvest: Yorkshire author reads excerpt from her novel

A couple of almost bloopers, weird morning lighting and a recalcitrant pigeon flying in for his breakfast in the background.

This is an excerpt from the beginning of Chapter 17 "Under the Milk Moon" from my historical fantasy novel set in Yorkshire in 1855 Goatsucker Harvest. Written in Yorkshire, set in Yorkshire, celebrating Yorkshire, here read by its Yorkshire author.

This is a few pages from the middle of the story where canal lass Thirza meets Bram "Dutchy" Beharrell, reclusive pinder and marshman and his kooikerhondje dog Piper, at his mysterious duck decoy in the remote boggy peat moorland known to history as Thorne & Hatfield Moors, South Yorkshire. For the first time, outsider Bram finds a kindred spirit, another soul with whom he can share his secrets.

No plot spoilers here, so you can listen with confidence!
The book is available to buy as a paperback (seen in this clip) or to download to your Kindle from Amazon worldwide.

Hope you enjoy and thanks for all your support.

They say the dead tell no tales...

Two of the hundreds of names on gravestones in Wentworth's old churchyard, near Rotherham, South Yorkshire

Visited gorgeous Wentworth village in South Yorkshire to see the Old Church with its medieval tower, 16th century memorial statues, 1684 rebuild by the 2nd Earl of Strafford & its damp & gloomy subterranean burial crypt of the Fitzwilliams built c1824. 

I was amused to see two tombstones nearby, one bearing the name of my heroine in "Goatsucker Harvest", 'Thirza', the other the surname of my villain, (Darnell) 'Salkeld'. Not surprising really, as all my characters bear local Yorkshire names taken directly from my own family tree. What was touching is that the names on these graves were pointed out to me by two people who are enthusiastic readers of my novel! 

Flamborough graveyard also holds links to my next story; and they say the dead tell no tales... 

Goatsucker Harvest: "Mother Seacole. I'm shattering. Shivering in shards like glass"

Mary Seacole (1805-1881)

"Was this Mary Seacole, with her dark eyes and certain step of motherly sense and comfort, bringing biscuits, rum and soft blankets? Was she here to try and revive Matty again?"

"Mother Seacole. I'm shattering. Shivering in shards like glass."

- "Goatsucker Harvest" Chapter 22 'Ravage and Ruin' (c) Joyce Barrass 2014

In "Goatsucker Harvest," Jem Kitson, the traumatised Crimean veteran, invalided home to Yorkshire after the Charge of the Light Brigade, recalls the tender care of Mary Seacole, the nurse who was unsung heroine of the Crimean battlefields, her story often overshadowed by history's halo around her contemporary, Florence Nightingale.

This programme on 'YouTube' gives a dramatised insight into "Mary Seacole: the Real Angel of the Crimea" and gives an intriguing glimpse into the background to my novel and the events that bring Jem home a broken man.

Mary Seacole Part 1

Mary Seacole Part 2

Mary Seacole Part 3

Mary Seacole Part 4

You can discover more about my novel on this blog, or purchase it from Amazon in the UK here or in the USA here or in Australia here.

Goatsucker Harvest: A "Receipt" for Victorian Intrigue

A few readers were a bit puzzled by Thirza's use of the word 

"receipt" instead of "recipe" in "Goatsucker Harvest." No, it

wasn't an inadvertent mistake!


The title of this 1847 cookery book, "Lady's Receipt-Book" 

shows that in the mid nineteenth century, those two words

still hadn't quite parted company to mean "written

acknowledgment of money received" or "cookery method"

exclusively.

Oh, those Victorians!

Goatsucker Harvest: Coconut Cake!

Readers of "Goatsucker Harvest" will understand why the arrival of this little delicacy on my doormat caused such hilarity!

It was part of the first "Graze Box" I've had in a while and plopped onto my mat with this morning's post.
New item - "Coconut Crumble Cake." No, actually, the "prickly texture of straw and horsehair and a sickly sweetness like treacle mixed with sawdust" didn't apply this time! This piece has a saucy little passionfruit and mango dip with it!

“Where is your plate, Theresa? You must try the coconut cake. The receipt is a closely-guarded secret and the ingredients imported especially, I believe. Neither the hoi, nor, indeed, the polloi have tasted this.”

“Your new cook's clever to make something...” she coughed, searching for a polite word that would also be true, “ ... so different.” 'Delicious' would have been cruel flattery. Different it certainly was from anything Thirza had tasted on land or sea."

All quotes taken from "Goatsucker Harvest" [Kindle Edition] Chapter 5 'Carrdyke' (c) Joyce Barrass 2014

Goatsucker Harvest: Picturing your characters - Bram & Piper

Do you picture characters in your head and your heart as you read a book? I confess as I wrote "Goatsucker Harvest" I fell a bit in love with Bram, whose sensitivity to nature, creatures, landscape and intuitive caring is everything I care about. Here's a picture of a real-life decoyman and his dog (like Bram & Piper in my book). Of course, Bram's decoy is quite the opposite of the regular wildfowl-trapping kind! 

I first saw a duck decoy in Doncaster Museum and the spark of an idea for Bram was born. But unlike duck trappers of old, Bram lives by a different principle: the ancient lore of his own people, descendants of the Dutch drainage engineers who came over in the 17th century with Cornelius Vermuyden to drain the peat bogs in Doncaster area and the Fens of East Anglia. His mission is the "Reversal of Ravage", "Omkering van schade" passed down through Bram's ancestral line. But there are those on the horizon who have other ideas. 

Uncover the mysteries of the South Yorkshire peatland moors and meet Bram for yourself in GOATSUCKER HARVEST (Kindle Edition)