CAST LIST

Just in case you’ve been getting as confused as I have, here’s a cast list (in no helpful order, I'm afraid) for ACTS & OMISSIONS so far:

Fr Dominic Todd (53, Vicar of St John the Evangelist, Renfold)

Dr Jane Rossiter (51, Lecturer at University of Lindford)

Danny Rossiter (19, Jane’s son, on Gap Year in NZ)

Mickey Martin (Danny’s Kiwi father)

Sal (Mickey’s partner)

Rt Rev Paul Henderson (58, Bishop of Lindchester, ‘Mary Poppins’)

Susanna Henderson (56, his wife, ‘Pollyanna’)

The Very Rev Marion Randall (54, Dean of Lindchester, ‘Maid Marion’)

Gene (dean’s husband, wine merchant from SA, widower, 3 sons)

Linda (dean’s PA)

Freddie May (22, bishop’s driver, former chorister)

Miss Barbara Blatherwick (Close resident, former matron of chorister school)

Rev Canon Giles Littlechild (precentor)

Ulrika Littlechild (his wife, voice coach)

Lukas (18) Felix (16) Littlechild (their sons)

Penelope (bishop’s PA)

Most Rev Dr Michael Palgrove (archbishop of Canterbury)

Rosemary (his wife)

Rev Martin Rogers (bishop’s chaplain)

Becky Rogers (his estranged wife)

Leah (8) Jessica (6) Rogers (their daughters)

Prof Bleakley (Jane’s HOD)

Dr Elspeth Quilter (colleague of Jane’s)

Simeon E Dacre (poet, CW lecturer, colleague of Jane’s, ‘Spider’)

Rev Canon Dr Mark Lawson (canon chancellor, ‘Mr Happy’)

Miriam Lawson (his wife)

Rev Canon Philip Voysey-Scott (canon treasurer)

Pippa (his wife)

John ‘the Bastard’ (former cathedral employee, took dean to employment tribunal and lost)

Amadeus (cathedral cat)

Rev ‘Father’ Wendy Styles (vicar of group of rural parishes, incl Cardingforth, All Saints’ Carding-le-Willow)

Doug Styles (her husband, teacher)

Laura Styles (daughter, killed in car accident 13 years ago, they also have 2 sons)

Poppy Styles (their granddaughter)

Lulu (Wendy’s chocolate Labrador)

Lucy (woman who ran Laura over)

Timothy Gladwin (39, Director of Music at cathedral)

Sir Gregory Laird (former cathedral organist and choirmaster)

Iona (sub-organist with a dragon tattoo)

June (Miss Blatherwick’s successor, matron at chorister school)

Laurence (cathedral organist)

Thomas Greatrix (head chorister)

Gavin (deputy verger at cathedral)

Mr Crowther (head teacher of Cardingforth Primary)

Rt Rev Charles De La Haye (retired bishop who leads triduum)

Rt Rev Robert Hooty (62, suffragan Bishop of Barcup)

Janet Hooty (midwife, his wife)

Mr Hoban (chorister school bursar)

The Ven Matt Tyler (48, archdeacon of Lindchester, ‘Matt the Knife’/’Voldemort’)

Geoff and Pauline (churchwardens of Lindford Parish Church)

CHAPTER 20

This week I spent quite a lot of time in what felt like a displacement activity: trying to decide what Freddie would sing as his solo piece for his audition for Barchester.  I lingered over various English art songs that might showcase a tenor voice (Quilter's 'Now Sleeps the Crimson Petal', Vaughan Williams' 'Silent Noon'), then moved on to more churchy things.  

Finally, because time was getting short, I plumped for 'Angels, waft her through the skies', a tenor aria from Handel's Jephtha.  It wasn't until I started writing this section that I realised how well it worked with Ascension Day.  Sometimes the subconscious is ahead of the game: 'Glorious there like you to rise, there like you forever reign'.  

You can listen to it here, sung by Mark Padmore: 

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UoC7c_XxLEc

Freddie maintains to the bishop's PA that he's planning to sing the 'Queen of the Night' aria from Mozart's Magic Flute.  This would be an unconventional choice, to say the least.  He claims he used to sing it as a chorister, and this is just about possible.  Here's a boy soprano giving it a whirl:

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ItfuUd6Omks

Eek!  And now, quickly, to take away the effect, here is Ian Bostridge singing 'Now Sleeps the Crimson Petal':

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gQm5Yi0ySBA

CHAPTER 19

There are some weeks when writing a blogged novel feels a bit like trying to start a train.  Each week there's one more carriage to drag along after you.  It can take a while to get things moving.  The secret, I suppose, is to uncouple some and park them in a siding for a few weeks.  I can't advance every mini plot line every single chapter.  But I can't leave things for too long either, or the tension dissipates.  

Not that this is proving to be a terrible tense affair.  It feels more like a gentle comedy of Anglican manners. The surprises are usually small ones.  I keep being surprised.  I had no idea what the archdeacon was like until I saw him hang his pork pie hat on the stair knob in the empty vicarage.  It all grew out of that moment.  

I had distinct plans for the archdeacon in Chapter 19, but they came to nothing.  The chapter was going to end completely differently. Here: http://catherine-fox-novel.blogspot.co.uk/ In fact, I'd written most of it, but it just wasn't working, so late on Sunday afternoon I deleted it.  We ended up with Fr Dominic remembering his Primary School swimming lessons instead, which I was not expecting.  I was just trying to invent something for him to do on his day off, and came up with bluebell woods.  Which made me remember my own trips to Deer Leap Open Air Swimming Pool in the early 70s.  A trip down memory lane courtesy of google. http://deerleap.ning.com/

Not quite knowing what's going to happen is one of the great pleasures of writing.  It is also one of the biggest stresses.  What if it all falls apart in my hands?

CHAPTER 18

For your delectation, an entirely new character.  Meet him over on my other blog, in my serialised novel Acts and Omissions.  The Venerable Matt Tyler, Archdeacon of Lindchester.  I hope you like him, because I invented him specially for you.  Perhaps you can tell me what make of car he drives?  http://catherine-fox-novel.blogspot.co.uk/

CHAPTER 17

Men and Women in Marriage.  What they made of the Faith and Order Commission's report in the Diocese of Lindchester.  And a spot of creative lawn-mowing.  http://catherine-fox-novel.blogspot.co.uk/

CHAPTER 16

Here are the reactions in the Diocese of Lindchester to the death of Margaret Thatcher: http://catherine-fox-novel.blogspot.co.uk/

CHAPTER 15

This week's chapter was partly crowd-sourced.  I'd like to record my gratitude to those people on Twitter who told me whether the celandines were out in their part of the country, whether they'd heard any chiffchaffs or willow warblers yet, or if the larks were singing round their way.  This is really helpful, because I'm not routinely walking past Lindchester-style English hedgerows here in Liverpool.

The other thing I canvassed opinion about was what type of tattoos Freddie May has.  Obviously, I had my own ideas already, but I wanted them endorsed.  One person told me he'd have 'Celtic circlet around the bicep' and that she wasn't guessing, she knew.  I found that rather gratifying.  It means that Freddie has become a 'real person' to that reader.  (Ha, bet you'd care if I threw him off the palace roof, now, wouldn't you?)  In this process I also learnt a very rude German word for 'lower back tattoo' ('Arschgeweih': 'arse antlers').  You can read what I decided on for Freddie here (she was nearly right with the Celtic tattoo): http://catherine-fox-novel.blogspot.co.uk/

In the past Twitter told me what kind of vestments Father Wendy would wear when I enquired, which was also extremely welcome.  What is much less welcome is nitpicking feedback after I've uploaded a chapter.  I'm inclined to flounce, and mutter Write it yourself then, if you're so clever.  But then I go back and make corrections in the dead of night, and never once admit I was wrong.  So I am grateful, really.