Tiding

Disgrifiad Cymraeg / Welsh Description

Nofel ddirgelwch delynegol wedi'i gosod yn ystod Eira Mawr 1963. Caiff Eleanor O'Dowd, athrawes biano ganol-oed ei darganfod wedi'i phastynnu i farwolaeth. Wrth i'r Eira Mawr afael, caiff Daphne Morgan, merch yr offeiriad lleol ei gorfodi i ganfod ei lle ym myd dryslyd oedolion, lle bydd yn rhaid iddi wynebu ei throseddau ei hun a'r wybodaeth sydd ganddi am y llofruddiaeth.

Disgrifiad Saesneg / English Description

A lyrical, engaging, coming-of-age murder mystery set in the Great Freeze of 1963. Eleanor O'Dowd, a middle-aged piano teacher, is found stabbed and bludgeoned to death. As the Great Freeze takes hold, local vicar's daughter Daphne Morgan finds herself forced to navigate the confusing currents of the adult world, where she must face up to her own crimes and what she knows about the murder.

Dosbarthu

Byddwn yn dosbarthu eitemau sydd mewn stoc o fewn 3 diwrnod gwaith, fel arfer drwy Royal Mail Tracked 48. Ar gyfer archebion o flaen llaw, byddwn yn dosbarthu’r eitem o fewn 3 diwrnod gwaith ar ôl ei derbyn gan ein cyflenwr.

Dispatch

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Bywgraffiad yr Awdur / Author Biography

An Edinburgh graduate, Siân Collins taught Anglo Saxon and Medieval Literature in South Africa, worked as an assistant editor on The Lancet, and ran English and Drama departments in several well-known London secondary schools. She returned to Carmarthenshire to teach, write, and relish life in the beautiful Tywi Valley. Her debut novel, Unleaving, was published in 2019.

Adolygiad y Cyhoeddwr / Publisher Review

Sian Collins’s first novel, Unleaving , was praised for its sense of time and place as well as its unfolding of mysteries. Tiding , her second novel, has both of these qualities; it is also a gripping page-turner and captures brilliantly the preoccupations and confusions of childhood. It is set in a small town in south-west Wales, on the bank of a river near its estuary, and it begins late in 1962. The central character, Daphne, is ten years old. She is the younger daughter of Reverend Morgan, the overworked vicar, and his academic wife. Their chilly, rambling vicarage also harbours Daphne’s grandmother (if she hasn’t had a row with Daphne’s mother and ‘left’). At the opening, Daphne and a small group of friends are up to no good in the churchyard when Daphne should be at her piano lesson with Miss O’Dowd, but Miss O’Dowd has a visitor. This is the moment around which the book revolves – the murder of Miss O’Dowd and where Daphne was, what she saw and what she told. Collins’s evocation of the children’s mind-set – their rivalries, changing tastes, and superstitious fears – is masterly, as are the details of her recreation of a rural school in the 1960s. (I can remember those 11+ practice questions, thawing milk and drying gloves on the classroom stove). The other principal character is Jonny Nebo, the deaf mute fisherman and handyman, brought up by his uncles, with only a private sign language. He becomes the focus of suspicion for Detective Inspector Ronald Blight of Scotland Yard. The detective is described throughout in a slightly ironic style. He is totally out of his element in the town and bent on clearing up the case and getting back to London, his memoirs and promotion. Jonny is a most appealing character who is well-regarded by the community but whose victimisation by the inspector leads some to turn against him. The great snow of 1963 isolates the town (and delays the case), with the physical and social effects of this being vividly portrayed. The children of the upper town, like Daphne, are made aware of the conditions of people in the lower town as never before. The children’s conviction of a curse and Daphne’s sense of guilt are cemented by the freak weather. Throughout the book, the details of nature and the landscape are captured with great skill, especially the estuarine river and its shifting states. Collins’s ability to create intriguing characters is evident from brief sketches like Granny Gloria to more developed ones like the enigmatic Vita Robinson, Mrs Daley the cleaner and gossip, and Janice, Daphne’s reckless friend and rival. The balance of tone between tension, humour and a deeply felt understanding of the life of such a community in the 1960s is finely maintained. Some mysteries we know, or guess, from quite early in the book, some remain. Tiding is indeed ‘much more than a murder mystery’: it is a very successful evocation of a time and place and what it was like to grow up there – and to live with a guilty secret.