Sarah J. Naughton’s The Festival review

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1 April 2021

I started reading Sarah J. Naughton’s The Festival in publication week, just to get ahead of interviewing Sarah for the Random 19. This was a bad idea – I do not have time to read for fun in publication week.

And yet… it just kept luring me back, and in bite-sized chunks and ever more frequent tea-breaks I find myself writing this having almost-but-not-quite-finished. And I’m on tenterhooks. By the time you’re reading this I’ll know the ending.

Four Women

Orly, Lenny, Mel and Thea have been best friends since school. But now it is 20 years later and inevitably they have drifted apart.

One Weekend

It is Lenny’s 40th birthday, plus Orly and Mel need cheering up, so Thea suggests a weekend away at a festival in their hometown. It’s a chance for them all to reconnect.

Not all of them will survive.

But their holiday soon takes a sinister turn, and not all of the friends will leave the festival alive…

Sarah J. Naughton's The Festival — Sarah J. Naughton’s The Festival is out on 29th April

Readers of Sarah’s bestseller ‘The Mothers’ will be familiar with the format as it switches between the four women sharing the tale. It’s a seamless transition, and though the first couple of chapters are a little disconcerting as you’re trying to straighten the characters out, you’ve soon spent enough time with each to know them, to understand their lives, see their flaws, and want to go for a drink with them anyway. And the friendships are as complicated and imperfect as any we all know from our teenage years.

The view of motherhood is instantly recognisable, and yet different for them all. The faint dark whispers of tension start early, and the echoes of it build with ever increasing speed until a pumpingly noisy, tired, oh-so-familar festival fairground feels physically assaulting to your brain… and that’s all I can tell you, because that’s where I’m up to.

If you enjoyed The Mothers, you’ll love Sarah J. Naughton’s The Festival. Even now, without knowing the ending, I’m strongly suggesting you read it in – in one long sitting, with an endless upply of hot tea, preferably.

Out now as an eBook, The Festival releases on 29th of April – order from Wayne at Winstones here.

Dazzlingly inventive’ – Sunday Times

‘A meticulously plotted exploration of friendship, foe-ship and the lies that bind, which builds to a gripping and powerful conclusion’ – Cara Hunter

‘The perfect dose of thrills and suspense, this will keep you engrossed to the very end’ – Heat

‘Tautly thrilling . . . This has hit thriller written all over it’ – Evening Telegraph

Win 1 of 2 Ruff and Tumble drying coats from DogsDogsDogs worth up to £70

By

Laura

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29 March 2021

9

* THIS COMPETITION IS NOW CLOSED *

We here at the digital Blackmore Vale magazine are always excited to be working with the canine team at Dogs Dogs Dogs – and we’re kicking things off with a giveaway of TWO Ruff and tumble drying coats – depending on the size you need, they’re worth up to almost £70 each!

If you win you get to choose the size you need, obviously: if you have a terrier we suggest you don’t need the GSD version.

Dogs Dogs Dogs are a local company with a national reputation, with a website which is quite strict on its product range. No, they don’t do cat stuff.

And we’re thrilled to be giving away TWO dogs drying coats by Ruff and Tumble – one in Beach (the yellow stripe above), and one in Harbour (the blue stripe below).

With one of these drying towels in the car, you can head to the beach or the river without fearing for the car on the way home. Or simply keep it by the back door in the winter – hose them off in the garden when you get home from a long walk, and then wrap them in their own hooded towel just like you would a toddler. The effect is the same – warm, dry and zero mess! It’s even designed so that your dog isn’t sitting in a chilly damp towel, the dog actually dries before the coat does. It’s magic I tell you.

To be in with a chance to win, just answer the first four questions in the widget box below. There are more chances to win by completing the other entry options if you so wish – they’re entirely up to you! The closing date for this competition is 5th May 2021 and only entries received on or before that date can be included. The prizes will go to the first two randomly chosen entries. Good luck!
(competition opens when the April issue of the magazine publishes on the 2nd April)

Martin Cowan | In Memoriam

By

Editorial team

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27 March 2021

0

27/03/1980 – Martin Cowan (Marv)

In Memoriam

Today you should be 41 but in our hearts and minds you remain forever 21.

Love from Mum, Ken & all the family xxx

ROBERTS, Pam

By

Editorial team

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27 March 2021

0

Death of much-loved Stalbridge ex-teacher Pam Roberts

Many ex-pupils of St Mary’s Primary School will be saddened by the death of ex-head teacher Pam Roxburgh (née Roberts) who died early last month in Blandford Hospital.

As ‘Miss Roberts,’ Pam taught at Stalbridge for in the 1970s before being appointed head of a primary school in Cornwall. She returned to Stalbridge as head of St Mary’s.

For the full oblituary please read here

Silver Stars | Community Care Assistant

By

Editorial team

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26 March 2021

0

Come and join the team as a COMMUNITY CARE ASSISTANT and make the SILVERSTARS Homecare difference.

We are looking for a kind and caring person who want to make a difference in the lives of others in their own homes.

If you have a caring attitude and willingness to make a difference, come and join our fantastic care assistant team based in Sherborne and the surrounding areas. You won’t regret it.

We’d love to hear from you if you’re:

· Prepared to drive from client to client as a part of your role (potential for a company car for the right candidate) terms and condition apply

· A caring attitude and a willingness to make a difference

· A desire to see elderly and vulnerable people treated with care and respect

· Reliability, flexibility, hard work, and honesty

· Good communication skills and a good sense of humor

· Good teamwork skills

· Previous experience desirable but not essential as we are providing in-house training and comprehensive induction.

As one of our care assistants, you will get to meet our wonderful clients and build relationships. Not only do we offer fantastic rates of pay, job satisfaction, and very flexible hours that suit you, but we also offer the following:

Guaranteed Hours (to reassure you that you will have a constant regular wage)
7.00 – 14.00 and 14.00 – 22.00 plus every other weekend
Local work
Great rates of pay – £9.65 TO £14.10 per hour
Company Car
Enhanced rates of pay for bank holidays
Paid holiday
Free care assistant induction training
Regular paid care assistant refresher training
Free care assistant uniform
Opportunity to study for Diploma in Health and Social Care
Roles are subject to DBS checks
Exclusive care assistant employee discounts on your favorite brands helping you make great savings (Blue light card)
Exceptional support from our management and senior staff.

As a care assistant, you can be the highlight of somebody’s day, or you can be there for them in their darkest hour, but you’ll do it all with the full support of our fantastic team of office staff and existing care assistants. Below are some examples of what our clients may need your support with as a care assistant:

Light cleaning, laundry, shopping, meal preparation, medication, personal care, help to get dressed, washing and bathing, medical appointments, day centers, appointments, and social activities.

Part-time hours: 25 – 40 per week

Job Types: Full-time, Part-time, Permanent

Salary: £9.65-£14.50 per hour

Contact – TEL: 01935 507792 or EMAIL: [email protected]

DEEK, Michael

By

Editorial team

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26 March 2021

0

Michael Deek

Remembering Mike, a dear husband, father and grandfather, died March 19, 2021.

Always remembered. – Much Love, Margaret, Sheila, Petra, Neil and families

The kindnessof strangers… | Simon Hoare

By

Editorial team

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25 March 2021

0

During this pandemic a light has shone very brightly – kind, community/neighbour focussed actions. Often, for the doer, a small thing; while for the beneficiary it can often be the thing that cheers their week and says to them, subliminally, ‘I mean something to someone’.

As well as shopping done, prescriptions collected, and catch up telephone calls made it has
manifested itself in organising birthday cards and virtual parties for recent Centenarians and a
myriad of other heart-warming actions. It’s just meant being a bit more aware of our fellow man
and the strength of community.

During lockdown this has never been more important, and I really do hope that that spirit of
caring and kindness can and will continue as we take the tentative steps back to more normal times.

If I may, I want to share one thing that happened to me recently.
I relay it because I think it makes my point above so well. A few weeks ago, on a wet morning, I was, along with others, volunteering to help with the logistics of the vaccine centre at The Exchange in Sturminster Newton.

A lady from Margaret Marsh was waiting for her neighbour who she had driven to the surgery (itself an act of kindness) for a blood test.
We fell, as you do, into conversation. I was so well swaddled against the elements, masked and hatted she had no idea to whom she was chatting.

She asked me if we were given refreshments to sustain us during our shift. I did the full ‘o woe is me act’ of which my wife and daughters are only too familiar.

“Well,” I said, “we do get the occasional cup of coffee served when they remember the troops out here at the front but that’s it. Not even a biscuit!”

(Pausing here for a moment, and in order to avoid a Legal Action, to say that Sharon the Exchange’s Acting Manager does look after us).

Her friend came out of the surgery, we bade our farewells, and off they drove. Twenty minutes later the lady returned in her car, drew up alongside me with a smile on her face and handed me a full carrier bag of tea, coffee and biscuits “for the volunteers and nurses etc to enjoy during a break”. Off she went

I don’t know the lady’s name; she was a stranger with whom I had chatted for a few minutes. We may never meet again. I must confess to being incredibly moved, as were the others on duty, by that tremendously generous and spontaneous act of kindness.
Of niceness.
Of care.
I doubt she will ever know (unless of course she is reading this publication and let’s be frank, who isn’t?) how much that single act meant to us. It was beyond the price of rubies and emeralds. It is Blanche DuBois in A Streetcar Names Desire who says..

“I have always depended onthe kindness of strangers.”

If spontaneous and unselfish kindness is a legacy of Covid that creates few strangers in our communities and lives, then that will be a blessing to cherish.

While I can’t promise tea and biscuits, if you do need any help or advice then do please get in touch with me. My email address is: [email protected]

or you can write to me:

Simon Hoare MP,
The Stables,
Whitecliff Gardens,
Blandford Forum,
DT11 7BU

or call on 01258 452585.

by Simon Hoare MP

Night Sky March 2021 | What you can see this month

By

Editorial team

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20 March 2021

0

Just before sunrise on 5 March, low on the south eastern horizon, search the eastern pre-
dawn sky and you’ll find tiny Mercury (now at its maximum distance from the Sun) will be
just above gas giant Jupiter. This conjunction between the Solar System’s smallest and
largest planets will occur in the constellation of Capricornus, known as the Sea Goat. You
will probably need binoculars, but be very careful using them close to sunrise! Mercury
takes just 88 Earth-days to orbit the Sun, while Jupiter takes 11.87 Earth-years.

By the 9th of March, the Moon will reach its full moon phase – look towards the south-east
in the early evening to see it. This month’s full moon will be a supermoon – in fact one
of several supermoons this year. Because the Moon’s orbit isn’t a perfect circle, its distance
from the Earth changes as it orbits the Earth. If the Moon comes within 90% of its closest
approach to the Earth and it coincides with a full moon (or a new moon) it is called a
supermoon.
Due to its closer proximity the moon can appear 14% larger and 30% brighter compared to
when it’s at its most distant. The April full moon will present the closest supermoon of this
year, and because there are no official definitions about what constitutes a supermoon,
some are counting the February and May full moons as supermoons too.

After dark on 19 March in the southwestern night sky, having drawn away from the
Pleiades, Mars will be visited by a 32%-lit crescent Moon.
Around midnight, from February all the way through to May, high in the southern night sky
you will be able to view the ‘Beehive Cluster’ which is an open star cluster about 520
lightyears distant in the constellation of Cancer, the Crab. It is one of the best-looking open
clusters of stars and one of the nearest to the Solar System. Also known as the Praesepe,
it appears as around 60 stars in a pair of binoculars, though a dozen or so really stand out.

The March equinox occurs on 20 March. It marks the first day of spring (vernal equinox) in
the Northern Hemisphere and the first day of fall or autumn (autumnal equinox) in
theSouthern Hemisphere. At the equinox, the Sun will shine directly on the equator and
there will be nearly equal amounts or hours of daylight and night throughout the world on
this day.

A delicious Dorset Cream Tea

By

Editorial team

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19 March 2021

0

I’m not going to get into the debate of jam then cream or cream then jam, but however you layer them, nothing quite beats a scone fresh from the oven, closely followed by some homemade cakes.

If you are looking for something to make for your Mum this Mother’s Day, or for a loved one for their birthday, then here are some recipes for you to try, both for some scones and for two flavour versions of a sponge cake recipe that looks decadent but is actually super easy to make.

If you are looking for some local ingredients to add to your Cream Tea, then we are spoilt for choice for local tea Dorset… but I recommend checking out Its Tea in Poole if you are looking for something hand blended. They have a huge range of teas, from the standard English Breakfast to the more unusual.

You can find Dorset clotted cream in many farm shops but if you are looking for something a little different, Dorset Dairy Co sell their Cultured Cream which is a slightly tangier version. From Dorset with Love have a wide range of their handmade curds as well as delicious jams.

Fruit Scones

Ingredients

 
8oz self raising flour 
2oz butter (soft) 
2oz caster sugar 
milk 
egg to glaze
fresh raspberries or blueberries.

Method 
Line 2 x baking sheets with greaseproof paper and preheat the oven to 180 fan/gas 6.

Add the flour and sugar to a large bowl. With your hands, add in the butter and rub it into the flour and sugar mixture. This involves rubbing your fingers together amongst the butter and flour mixture until the butter is worked in and the mixture resembles fine breadcrumbs.

Stir in the fresh fruit (you can leave this stage out if you would prefer plain scones).
Then pour in the milk a little at a time. Stir the mixture together with your hands and continue to add the milk until the mixture forms a soft dough (you don’t need to knead the dough).
 
Tip out onto a floured surface. Gently press out the mixture so that it is about 1inch thick. Using a cutter (or your can just use a knife), cut out the scones and place on the lined trays. You can gently reform the dough and repeat the cutting until all the dough is used up. It should give you 6 – 10 small scones (depending on how big your cutter is).

Beat the egg in a small bowl with a fork and then brush the beaten egg onto the top of the scones. Bake in the oven for 15 minutes or until golden brown on top.

You can leave them to cool, but they do taste fantastic straight from the oven.

Mini Victoria Sponge

Ingredients:

For the sponge mixture

8oz butter
8oz caster sugar
4 eggs
8oz self raising flour
Flavours… To make vanilla cakes – 1/2 tsp of vanilla extract.
You will also need 2oz butter and 4oz icing sugar for the icing and a little raspberry or strawberry jam. To make lemon cakes – grated zest of 2 lemons, the juice of the 2 lemons, some lemon curd and then 2oz butter and 4oz of icing sugar for icing
Method: Smear some butter around the base and sides of 2 circular baking tins 8″ in diameter. Then place a circle of greaseproof in the base of each tin. Preheat the oven to gas 6 or 180 degrees fan. In a stand mixer, with an electric whisk or with a wooden spoon, beat together the butter, sugar and vanilla or lemon zest in a bowl really well. The mixture will change to be light and fluffy and the colour will turn pale. Add in the eggs one at a time, beating well between each egg. If the mixture curdles, you can add one spoonful of the flour and beat well. Slowly stir in the flour. Take care not to beat hard and knock out all of the air that has just been worked into the mix. Spoon the mixture into the 2 tins evenly and level the tops so they are mostly flat. Bake in the oven for 22-25 minutes. Check the bakes after 22 minutes, you may need to swap them around in the oven so they cook evenly. The cakes will be done when the cakes have come away from the edges of the pan and the top of the cake is springy to the touch. Leave the cakes to cool. To finish the cakes… remove the cakes from the tins and remove the parchment from the bottom. Using a 2 inch circular cutter and cut as many circles from the sponges as you can from the 2 sponges. You should be able to get at least 12 little sponges, to make 4 x 3 layer cakes. In a bowl or stand mixer, beat together the butter and icing sugar until you have a light and fluffy mixture. You can add a little lemon juice to the lemon icing if you wish, or add vanilla extract to the vanilla cakes.

Spread a thin layer of your jam (if vanilla cakes) or lemon curd (if lemon cakes) and a thin layer of the icing between the layers and stack the cakes together. Dust the top with a little extra icing sugar.

Extra tips…

For the lemon cakes – you can brush a little lemon juice over the sponges before stacking for some extra zing.

If you want to go that bit extra, rather than making buttercream icing, you can make Italian meringue and use that for a more lemon meringue style cake. To make Italian Meringue, heat together 1 cup of caster sugar with 1/3 cup water until it reaches 240degrees fahrenheit on a thermometer. Beat together 2 egg whites until stiff and whilst the mixer is still running, slowly pour in the hot syrup mixture until it is all combined. Keep the mixer running until the bowl of the mixer is cold. You can then pipe this onto the cakes with the lemon curd.

For the Vanilla cakes – you can use whipped fresh cream instead of icing and add some fresh fruit to the top of the cake. This won’t keep as well but if you make just before your are ready to eat, they will be delicious!

By: Heather Brown

***** THIS COMPETITION IS NOW CLOSED *****

Fruit Scones

Mini Victoria Sponge

Extra tips…

* THIS COMPETITION IS NOW CLOSED *