The Model for Miss Riddell
I felt it was time to tell you, my readers, more about the characters and author so here goes, with Miss Riddell herself.
Miss Pauline Riddell is very much modeled on my Aunt Annie.
[You can learn more about her by reading her diary, which I self-published as Annie’s War.]
My aunt and I got along well when I was young. Of all my extended family, she’s the one I remember best, which is why she asked me to get her diary published.
Sadly, there was no self-publishing in those days, and she wasn’t a good enough, or famous enough, diarist to attract a publisher. By the time I’d discovered self-publishing, she’d been dead for many years.
Like my aunt, Miss Riddell is brave and willingly puts herself in harm’s way for a cause in which she believes. Annie was a nurse in World War Two and spent much of her time in Casualty Clearing Stations, which were placed immediately behind the army’s front line so the doctors and nurses could quickly attend to casualties. For example, she spent about three months trapped with the army at the Anzio Beachhead in Italy, being bombed and shelled every day.
It’s that kind of quiet, unassuming courage I wanted to capture in my heroine (My aunt would have been appalled at being described as a ‘hero’ or as a Ms. She was a very proper woman.)
