GWEN KIRKWOOD

 It is a long time since I gave this blog my attention so I am entering the last series of five books to complete my list of published books

This is the first book in the series and begins around 1875

Moorland Mist - Joffe Books description

Twenty year old William Sinclair whistled merrily as he strode along. The autumn sunshine glinted on his reddish-brown hair, hinting at a quick temper and passionate nature. He was lean and fit and he loved his native land, especially the farm where he had been born. He had never been to Glasgow but he guessed it was about fifty miles to the North West. Its houses and factories were spreading further out now the railways were weaving their web the length and breadth of the country with branch lines like tentacles reaching out to small towns. Another five years would herald the twentieth century. He wondered if the old queen would live to see it. He prayed the factories and industrial sites, with their iron girders, the dirt and noise and smells, would never spread as far as his beloved green fields and rolling hills and the majestic trees.

He and Emma were to meet where the farm track reached the stream, well away from the farmstead and his mother’s sharp eyes and sharper tongue. Her young maid rarely went further than the farm buildings and nearby fields where the fresh green grass grew and the Ayrshire cows grazed. Today he had promised to take her to the highest peak of the hill land, just beyond their own boundary. If they were lucky, and the day remained clear, he hoped to show her a glimpse of the River Clyde shining in the distance and he wanted her to see how intelligent his two collie dogs were, how they obeyed his commands and rounded up the sheep almost by instinct. As she waited Emma trailed her fingers in the crystal clear water of the burn as it burbled over the pebbles on its way to a larger burn and eventually to the river.  A few golden leaves floated gently down from the trees and she smiled with delight at the sight of a late butterfly.

The fifth book - LoveHas No Borders - ends the series with the third generation of Sinclairs at the end of the second world war. The settings move between Scotland and Yorkshire.