The basic plot starts to unfold - Act 1

With my small sheaf of A4 sheets with scrawled notes and my concertina paper laid out on my desk, I began to sketch out the preliminary plotline of the book.

As with previous screenplay plotting I envisage the story having 3 acts – in classic fashion. Act 1 is always the most difficult to get right; although I see the ‘situation’ clearly – London family transported to a totally different environment – there is a great deal to be set down in the matter of the various plotpoints and the secondary and extraneous characters to be introduced and explained.

Whilst the 5 family members – so far unnamed – are present in most scenes in Act 1 and can be introduced gradually, the minor characters are speedily introduced; at the same time the plot has to be pushed along when the 6th major character, the (as yet also unnamed) dog, is revealed towards the conclusion of Act 1.

As I wrote out each plot point in Act 1 I started to envisage each of the major characters in visual and verbal terms.

Well, Dr Johnson, I am not tired of London

Sadly, my penultimate uncle, Vic, died last week. This was a relief both to him and to my aunt Audrey who had suffered to see him rapidly deteriorate in the past few months.

As a result, I made the journey back to London for the day for Vic’s funeral. Though we’d kept in touch by phone and, ironically we’d arranged to visit them this summer, I hadn’t seen them since I’d help them move into sheltered accommodation just before we moved up to Yorkshire. It seemed that I was the only family member to attend the funeral.

It was a delight to see Audrey; she may be incapacitated by leg problems and poor sight but she remains mentally sharp with a wicked sense of humour. The service, both in English and Hebrew, at Golders Green was conducted well and there was much support for Audrey from her wide circle of good and warm friends. And it made me realise just how much ‘Londoners’ are a sociable and cohesive tribe.

The first thing I said to Mrs R when I returned to Refugee Towers was, “I’d really like to go back to live in London”.