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A Wind is Blowing (1969) is the last book in the Romney Marsh series. It’s such a scarce title that Girls Gone By have reprinted it for the second time and it’s sold out already. Years ago, I had one of the very rare hardback copies around. After reading, I sold it for rather a lot of money, even though it was ex.lib. I’m usually a completist when it comes to authors I love, but I felt that having this book on the shelf would contaminate the others.
Why such a strong reaction? I felt it nearly ruined the whole series for me. It’s quite different from any of the other books, almost exclusively about Meryon and Tamzin. Near the beginning of the book something terrible happens to Meryon which puts paid to all his hopes of being a doctor and seems to him the end of everything. Gone is the cheerful, clever boy. He becomes quite unbearable, while his parents and Tamzin try to help him. At the end, an extraordinary series of events (jolly bad luck for someone else) leads to an almost happy ending.
Monica Edwards thought, quite wrongly in my opinion, that this was her best book. I can see why she wrote it. At that time her husband had had an horrific tractor accident which left him with what are nowadays called ‘life-changing injuries’. So, it was a very dark time for her but did she have to inflict it on the rest of us? I can truly say that I hate this book and wish that it had never been written. I can only attribute this to the romantic streak in me which likes to believe that somewhere, ‘a little boy and his Bear will always be playing.’ In the same way, I like to fancy that somewhere, Tamzin, Meryon, Rissa and Roger are forever sailing in the harbour or galloping over the marsh. Monica Edwards created a happy world and then blew it up. I find it hard to forgive. (Other things I don’t forgive: Jo not marrying Laurie; writing Goodbye Mog.)
( Why I love the Romney Marsh series in spite of everything )
Why such a strong reaction? I felt it nearly ruined the whole series for me. It’s quite different from any of the other books, almost exclusively about Meryon and Tamzin. Near the beginning of the book something terrible happens to Meryon which puts paid to all his hopes of being a doctor and seems to him the end of everything. Gone is the cheerful, clever boy. He becomes quite unbearable, while his parents and Tamzin try to help him. At the end, an extraordinary series of events (jolly bad luck for someone else) leads to an almost happy ending.
Monica Edwards thought, quite wrongly in my opinion, that this was her best book. I can see why she wrote it. At that time her husband had had an horrific tractor accident which left him with what are nowadays called ‘life-changing injuries’. So, it was a very dark time for her but did she have to inflict it on the rest of us? I can truly say that I hate this book and wish that it had never been written. I can only attribute this to the romantic streak in me which likes to believe that somewhere, ‘a little boy and his Bear will always be playing.’ In the same way, I like to fancy that somewhere, Tamzin, Meryon, Rissa and Roger are forever sailing in the harbour or galloping over the marsh. Monica Edwards created a happy world and then blew it up. I find it hard to forgive. (Other things I don’t forgive: Jo not marrying Laurie; writing Goodbye Mog.)
( Why I love the Romney Marsh series in spite of everything )
