Forever England - Luddington, David

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Résumé :
...And there will be a corner of some foreign field that will be forever England. Only these days it's more likely to be a half finished villa overlooking a championship golf course somewhere on one of The Costas. Following an unfortunate encounter with Spanish gin measures and an enthusiastic estate agent, retired special effects engineer Terry England is the proud owner of a nearly completed villa in a new urbanisation in Southern Spain. Not quite how he'd intended to spend his enforced early retirement Terry nevertheless tries to make the best of his new life. If only the local council can work out which house he's actually bought and the leaf blowers would please stop. Terry finds himself being sucked in to the English Expat community with their endless garden parties and quests for real bacon and Tetley's Tea Bags. Of course, if it all gets too much he can always relax in the local English Bar with a nice pint of Guinness, a roast beef lunch and the Mail on Sunday. With a growing feeling that he might have moved to the 'Wrong Spain', Terry sets out to explore and finds himself tangled in the affairs of a small rustic village in the Alpujarras. It is here where he finds a different Spain. A Spain of loves and passions, a Spain of new hopes and a simpler way of life. A place where a moped is an acceptable means of family transport and a place where if you let your guard down for just a moment this land will never let you go again. Forever England is the tale of one man trying to redefine who he is and how he wants to live. It is a story of hope and humour with an array of eccentric characters and comic situations for which David Luddington is so well known and loved.

Biographie:
In case you don't know, I write comedy. Gentle British comedy. Having grown up with P.G. Wodehouse, the Ealing Comedies and the Carry On movies I like to think I've captured the tone of traditional British Humour but brought it firmly into the... where are we now? No... not going to think about that.

I also write to a theme. I believe many of us have lost sight of who we are in our rush to ride the next big wave. But when that wave dumps us on the shores of 'Couldn't Care Less' then carries on without us, who are we then? Can I stand up on the beach in nothing but my... nothing and tell the world who I am, or do I need to preface it with Well, I used to be...

I used to be something big in the place where they needed people who were something big... for a while. Then they decided they didn't need people who were something big anymore and I become a nobody in a place where nobody cared anyway.

My stories deal with identity and the bewilderment we face when that identity is taken from us by a world that has suddenly decided it can cope perfectly well without bubble lamp repairmen or human telephone receptionists.

My stories concern real people who feel the world has become a slightly difficult place. A place where one used to know how to programme the video recorder or remove a roll of film from a camera without it exploding like a rasta's head in a hairdryer but now have to deal with isometric bandwidth widgity watsits on a daily basis before we can even put our MP3 in the toaster.

I am a believer in hope and second chances. I believe we all have a soulmate and that some lucky few are destined to find them. I believe that the truth is out there, in the number 42 and that HAL was just having a bad day. And I believe in butterscotch Angel Delight. Most of all I believe in butterscotch Angel Delight.

So, if you want a slice of old fashioned humour (Note to the colonists, humour has a letter U so please stop criticising my spelling) ... erm ... (that's criticising with an S not a Z by the way) oh (and it's a zed not a zee!) Anyway, good old fashioned humour with a heart and an understanding that our time here is precious.

However, if you're looking for cruel, biting satire then please buy my books anyway. You'll be terribly disappointed but I need the money.