Where to find the Reso Trilogy Books

If you are looking to buy a Reso Trilogy book, ake sure the publisher is JLB Learning Innovation.

If it shows Kings Hart Books, my former publisher, the company stopped trading a few years back and the book will be unavailable through them.

Probably the cheapest route to buying them is through Amazon marketplace, but nothing beats ordering them from an independent publisher.

 

Having been vindicated by a publisher picking up the books, which for me suggested there was some value in them, and it wasn’t simply a vanity project, I decided to embark on self-publishing on a print on demand basis. I would recommend it for new writers as the big players like Ingram Spark cover all the incidental costs and help with marketing.

In theory, my books should always be available as long as you look for them under the publisher JLB Learning innovation. If you look under Kings Hart, you are likely to be disappointed.

 

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Beyond the Reso : The Pavilion inspired cover

The cover of the second Reso book, Beyond the Reso, was inspired by a sight that illuminated the Rhyl skyline throughout my youth, The Pavilion Theatre on the Promenade.

The coloured lights played on it at night, making it look like a giant ice cream which changed from strawberry, to orange to lemon to lime and blackcurrant.

I remember coming home from Auntie Betty’s home in St David’s Square late at night, my mum and Auntie Betty had been talking incessantly whilst drinking tea and eating biscuits. I’d amused myself with Prince the dog, but both of us fell asleep in the muggy atmosphere created by the gas fire.

 

Eventually I was awoken and told to get my coat on for the short walk home. As we drifted into Victoria Road, the playing field of Glyndwr field shone with dew and in the distance the Pavilion radiated warm and invited light. The spectacle was such that my mum and I stopped for a few moments and she waxed lyrical on the constancy of that sight which had remained the same from her childhood. She told me that both my grandparents had been involved in building the Pavilion and I felt I had something invested in it.

It later provided shelter for what my parents would have called my ‘courting days’. Hours were spent in the shelters on the seaward side desperately trying to keep warm in a full on Irish Sea wind with only warm hearts and hot lips to keep us from freezing.

I probably had a share in its demise as well because in all my days, apart from going to see the Billy Smart’s lions and tigers camped outside, I don’t believe I ever set foot in the theatre. Despite the delights of Wyn Calvin and Prince’s Circus ‘as seen on TV’ to entice me.

There was a furore when the Pavilion was demolished in 1973. It was said that it was unsafe and the pillars that held the dome in place did show structural decay. However, when the dome fell some seventy feet to the ground without shattering there were murmurings in the town that this was civic vandalism of the worst kind.

Many went to see the demolition. I didn’t, I preferred to remember happier times cuddled up and gazing lovingly at the world’s most beautiful girlfriend.

Thanks to Ben Overton and Luke Hughes for the cover design.

Little Triker!

I’ve searched long and hard for this photo, and was beginning to think that it was lost! It is the earliest photo of me outside on the Reso under my own steam.

I’m sitting on the trike in a corner of the garden which would forever become known as Snowy’s Corner. A couple of years after this picture was taken, after asking incessantly for a dog like my Auntie Doris’ black spaniel Micky, my dad came up with a compromise and bought me an albino rabbit. It wasn’t quite the same in my opinion but Snowy spent almost a decade in a custom built hutch made with great care by my dad out of marine quality laminated wood. The hutch had two compartments, a lobby area and a main living space. The whole front of the hutch hinged upwards to allow food, water and bedding to be replaced on a daily basis. But I digress…

That trike was my pride and joy and I can remember vividly this picture being taken.  Behind me to the left is Iris Watkins garden. Her dad grew epic rhubarb and she taught me how to dance the Twist. Over my right shoulder is Vanessa’s garden. I used to climb over the fence behind me to play with her, Debbie and Mallie.

The spooky thing is that my lifelong friend Duncan has an almost identical picture taken at the other end of the Reso!

History does repeat itself because this is my son Luke almost thirty years later in a similar pose…

 

 

The end of the worst year of my life

Without doubt, the year 1974/5 was the worst of my life. It started quite promisingly but descended very quickly into a series of events which still make me wince when I think of them now.

To an extent, the A level results of August 1975 gave me an opportunity to start again and I was both relieved and excited to be leaving for University.

I came home from the end of the first term to find a letter inviting me to this Presentation. I was initially reluctant to go, but my parents were very keen so I went reluctantly.

It was good to see so many friends with whom I’d grown up again. We were all scattered around the country now and  this would be the last time so many of us were gathered together. I know of two on the list of A level candidates who are no longer with us and we are poorer for their absence.

Two years below us were the O level group and there are many friends in that group as well.

Family get together 1960s

A rummage through the old family archives ( a series of biscuit tins with pictures and documents really) has led to some further belated spring cleaning finds.

This photo turned up of my Nain and Uncle Elwyn together with our overseas relatives, in the front room no less, of the old family home of 5 Geufron in Rhyl. 5 Geufron was the scene of countless family gatherings and celebrations.

I think this might be of interest to the thriving US branch of the family!