Bücher von Roy Grantham

Little BeechdownThis is a novel about a village and a village is its people and their goings on. Little Beechdown has its pub, the Cheesemans Arms, its church with new vicar Scott Mayfield, its village shop run by the local gossip Mrs. Batchelor, a village green and the school with its dedicated teachers and of course the caring local doctor Tim Gosforth who lost his wife some years ago. Add to the mix the local formers, their farm workers and their families and the local characters such as Madeliene Springfield (Maddy) a lady with a history as well as barmaids, a couple of happy lesbians, a retired sea captain and his Chinese wife Mai Lu and then people who just live in the village because they love it and you have the makings of a story. The novel covers a the joys and tribulations of several of the villagers such as those of teacher Elizabeth Holroyd, recently freed from her life of toil looking after her mother who has now died. Ted Johnson,out of step with the age and now guilty of rape, the young farmer's daughter, Rachel, victim of the crime, Mark Gosforth back from South Africa falling for the Cullthorpe's daughter Christine over from France, the tragic Mai Lu mysteriously dying of what she perceives as betrayal.Then onto the scene comes Roger Hanbury buying the dilapidated Ullacome Manor, saving the local shop and giving the local youths something to do. The Standishes, newcomers to the village have their own domestic problems while troubled partners, the Trylans also face their demons. The very attractive local barmaid with her affair with local garage owner Paul Skipton and the minor criminal Billy Fuller add to the kaleidoscope which makes up village society.

Relationships between two adults and between parents and their children are common. This story is about a different sort of relationship in which a young librarian and a totally dysfunctional eleven year old boy form a growing bond strengthening through time and association. The child's resistance to anything educational, and the way in which the librarian tries to alter the boy's mindset, form the backbone of the story, but perhaps more significant is the growing affection between man and boy culminating in a private fostering arrangement. Alongside the main theme, the librarian has problems of his own at work and in his love life. At the start of the novel he is trying to get over a split with a long standing girlfriend but eventually starts a relationship with a woman about whom he has doubts about her sexual proclivities. That ends through lack of commitment on both sides leaving him to find happiness with an attractive divorcee with whom he wants to have children adding one more twist to the difficult connection between man and boy.

Finding the body of a young girl in the woods whilst musing on the frailties of human relationships (particularly those with his mistress and his wife) fails to make Peter's life less complicated.It tumbles him into a period of enforced maturity when he either has to start sorting out his life or give himself up to his sexual longings.This adult-rated book explores the complex emotional and sexual relationships between: husbands, wives and lovers against a mounting police investigation that seems to be focussing on him.