So a new name has now been added to the BIll Budner trophy.  Barry Martin won the competition last night with his story entitled  My life so far.

We had a good meeting although only nine members attending and Liliane was outnumbered by eight to one males. Where have all you ladies gone?

We had apologies from Caz and Beryl who could not attend and the only other business was the mention of the Scribblers having a modest presence in the Library on the weekend of the Book Festival on the 15/16 June. We will have a table with a selection of books lent to us by our own authors, for the public to see and hopefully to encourage some new members.

If anyone out there has a book they have had published and wish to contribute (on a temporary basis) to our stand on that week end perhaps you could drop me a mail so I can arrange with you to get them to either me or the Library on the Festival weekend.

Now for the meeting.

In First place, and winning the trophy for this period it was a story by one of our newer members, Barry Martin.

The title was My life so far and was an excellent tale from 8 year old Phoebe and her brother Lewis who is 3 but does not talk much. They spent many hours at the doctor's surgery with their mum who was ill a lot. They consequently did not get much sleep as the evenings were generally at the Doctors.

They used to have another brother and sister but they went to live with their own dad, Shaun. Eventually the council came and told Phoebe's mum that they didn't think she was coping well with the children so they had to go and live with their Nan and Granddad, which they liked because they had a room of their own and besides, Nanny had lots of animals.

Phoebe and Lewis love living their and mum visits sometimes on a Saturday. This is Phoebe's life so far.

Second place went to Dave's story, For King and Country. This was a story recounted to Dave by a friend who joined the Merchant Navy during the Second World War and served heroically on ships most likely to be the first target of the enemy U Boats, oil tankers. The story tells of his training in Cardiff and the noise made by the ship's guns, which afforded a little protection. The story told of how it was sometimes more hazardous to have the American Navy guarding you as they dropped their depth charges quite close to the convoy ships. One time the rear of the tanker was lifted so high the Chinese crew thought they were surely done for and they abandoned ship, but they were rounded up later. The storyteller survived the war with many tales to tell.

Third place went to a story written by Tony called Who the hell is Diane Ashworth? 

Dave Ferguson had had a skinful the night before and when he awoke he imagined the bum he was cuddling up to was his darling Sally. Several things seemed to indicate to his hung over brain that things were not quite right in this bed. The bottom was a different shape and as he spooned up to her he realised the ribs felt different too.

She turned over, murmuring 'Good morning' and he realised this was definitely not Sally but a fluffy blonde, not bad at all really. She said her name was Alison and they had sort of picked each other up the night before.

On the bedside table was an old post card, addressed to Diane Ashworth both all he found out about the mysterious Diane was that the card had been written and posted in Ramsgate in eighteen ninety three. 

Now we come to the remainder of the members stories, in not so great detail. 

In no particular order we had Fickle Fingers by Les. This was a tale of a potholer going into a cave system alone, instead of with a group. He was prepared for a couple of days but went so deep into unfamiliar systems that he became delirious and imagined he had found a gold mine. His rescuers found him, unfortunately passed away clutching a piece of granite as if it were a nugget.

Then we had a story called Long Live Freedom, penned by Liliane and one expressing views held, no doubt, by many deserted wives. This concerned Saskia and Michael who married but after speaking about it, decided they did not want children. They both had enough siblings to produce them. They lived a good life with the best holidays in plush hotels and a good apartment in the best location. Then suddenly Michael changed and he admitted to Saskia there was another woman, Maureen from the accounts department. She was pregnant and Michael was leaving to be with her. After much soul searching Saskia agreed to a divorce and soon was enjoying the freedom being able to choose what she did for herself.

Next we have When the roundabout stopped. This was a tale from Dick who gave us the true account of his memories of being on a roundabout at a small funfair on the sea front at Bognor Regis. It was September 3rd 1939 and as the roundabout was spinning merrily the music stopped as did the ride. Everyone wondered what had happened then a man's voice came over the loudspeaker system and the voice of the then Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain gave his now famous speech telling the nation that Britain was at war with Germany. One man, Hitler had plunged the world into war which had such devastating effect upon all involved, including the children on the roundabout.

Martin told us about someone's early attempt at writing. This was called Snow White. It was produced for the school at school and was telling of the bravery of a homosexual man called Alan Turing. He was a brilliant mathematician and during the war worked at Bletchley Park dealing with codes and computers. He was discovered to be homosexual and under the law at that time charged with gross indecency. The piece was received well but beaten into second place by a girl trying to beat the onset of anorexia. She was named Scarlet and shortly after, she and the author of Snow White were invited to edit a student magazine together and they began a long relationship. The original story for the school had been destroyed and was about an old man but the author was inspired to write about Alan Turing's bravery and eventual suicide. His discoveries were the beginnings of computers and although not officially pardoned, Gordon Brown did apologise for his treatment at that time.

Ray's story was next and was named Fear of the dark. This was about a young lady who had no fear of the dark. Her aim in life was to create fear in the predatory men who preyed on the women of the night. It tells of one of her conquests when she walks amongst the girls in the evening breeze and is picked up by a kerb crawler. She directs him to a deserted building where he lays back expectantly. When his neck is exposed she despatches him with a swift slash across the throat and with a passing remark she tells him it's his time to die. Not for the faint hearted.

My humble rendition concerned a young woman police detective and the loss of her daughter. It was called The day the Circus came to town. Moira's husband had taken Ellen to the circus and against all Moira's wishes had left her alone for a short time. He returned to find the girl gone and for seven long years after the marriage break up and gradually coming to fear that her daughter had died, Moira and her youngest, Trudy, went to the circus and by chance noticed a distinguishing birthmark on the trapeze artist's shoulder.

An investigation was begun and Ellen was returned to Moira and  Trudy to begin their lives again.

Many worthy stories on the night and Barry M takes the prize. Well done to him and congratulations to everyone on their stories.

The next meeting will be on the 4th of June and the subject for the homework is TEAMS.

Thanks to all who attended.

Barry.