It didn't help me, with my tired brain, finding this on BCTS first, and I thus took a while to work out what was eventuating. But it's interesting to see the story from the other side...

And I had to scrat around rather to find it on here, because I don't (didn't) link to the home page. Nor could I find a way to comment. I thought it must be my browser (couldn't be the engine, you gotta be Gecko-aware!)*

BTW Wouldn't the train be announced as the "Virgin Cross-Country service..."? And (I don't know but I'm guesing) is the service not operated with Voyagers (4/4 or 4/5 vehicles powered) rather than HST sets (power car each end)? (your response should Emerson! - now I have to find the Asimov reference for it).

Frieda

*I associate 'Mosaic' with a rather nasty disease of the Solanacae.

It's entirely possible I'm not trainspotterly enough, but OTOH I did take the same trains commuting from Cheltenham to Bath (change at Bristol) for a while in 1999, which is only a year after this is set, and at the time they had Virgin-liveried Intercity locomotives at either end. IIRC it was the service that went all the way from Scotland to Cornwall, and back.

I should read more carefully! I'd forgotten how far back canonical Tuck is set - and if your dates all flow from that...

You'd be right - there was a Penanze-Aberdeen service at that time, and in 1999 it would have been a Virgin train (livery would rather depend, but Branson - as always - was very quick on that). It was 'diagrammed' for an HST set - and Valerie's aural experience is spot-on as written.

But being Tuck (or one of them, at least) how was her hearing?
My son - who could sense bats (we tested his hearing on the gizmo in the children's gallery at the Sceience Museum and he was almost to 30 kHz IIRC)) - used to hate hearing those trains pull away, because he could hear the "turbo squeeze" much too well and it was quite painful.

Frieda

This certainly exhibits your usual high quality writing, but the 'Nathan' story seems to be out of time sequence and for that reason alone is confusing. Perhaps it's supposed to be and I'm not clever enough to realise that.

I'm about to start book 2, but before I do a couple of boring observations.

First DYB DYB DYB is an acronym for 'Do Your Best' etc. To which the response is 'We'll DOB DOB DOB' ie 'Do our best'. So your dib dib dib should be dyb dyb dyb. I can't believe I've corrected this. It's a long time since I was Wolf Cub and just as long since the cub master was jailed for paedophillia. It wasn't taken quite so seriously back in the late 40s; once out of jail he continued to live in the town unmolested.

Second, motorcycles with l/h gear change levers (ie all modern machines) have an up for up, down for down sequence. Older British bikes with a r/h gear lever were usually up for down and down for up, except for Triumphs.

Geoff

Nathan story is not out of sequence from what I remember but various bits are skipped without warning (and often without Nathan's knowledge) There are also a few dream sequence/flashbacks sections that complicate the matter.

I noticed 'dib' too - but rationalised it thus:

From the elliptical evidence that we have of his childhood, Sheo* was probably not a cubscout. It is thus possible that although he obviously knows the chant, he has learnt it phonetically and is not aware of the meaning that it imports.

Also, whilst Louise and Grey are not here heard talking of presenting as Brownies (Brownie Guides these days?) for any of their clients, that they might have been called on to do so is entirely credible; and the topic arising in a conversation to which we are not privy (but Jack is) is equally credible to me.

So what we get is the phonetic version - by which (and, yes, I know it's a circular argument) Rachel is further suggesting that he wasn't in the cubscouts.

*Jack seems very unlikely as a cubscout (and may be too old as well) and Jonathan is definitely too old.

"but the 'Nathan' story seems to be out of time sequence"

Assuming that you didn't mean the flashbacks - which are not only by definition out of sequence with the main text, but as is common, not in chronological sequence with themselves - which parts of the text covering Sunday May 3 1998 to Wednesday May 6 1998 do you think are out of sequence?

Well, in my innocence I've just plodded through the Attachments in sequence. Parts 1.01 through 1.06 tell Nathan's story, yet part 2.01 tells of his arrival in Cheltenham. Perhaps you're not supposed to do that.

btw I'd never thought of Nathan as a contraction of Jonathon, always as one on Nathaniel. Even at my age I learn new things :0)

Geoff

If you read through part 2 you'll notice that it is "not out of sequence" but a retelling of part 1 from different perspectives.

you are reading the actual story nodes aren't you? Not the plaintext attachments that were only put up there for the luddite element? ;-)

Me? I reject the accusation completely, though I am reading the attachments because to a new visitor it seemed the obvious thing to do.

I'll have you know I was playing with computers before a lot of you were born. They didn't have fancy things like keyboards and vdus, just card readers, and a few manual push buttons. The ICT 1301 we made was full of germanium transistors and had a brain the size of a planet, but an intellect smaller than my current wrist watch :0(

No, not a luddite, merely stupid, I guess. Enjoying it a lot, but not as much as Tuck Squared or even the Prologue to this. I've always found Jane Thompson an unsympathetic character and the stories contrived. Ellen's treatment is, by far, the best even though it caused controversy amongst those who cherished the cannon. Yours too, is lots better than the norm. Not fair to compare with Ellen's as I haven't finished yours yet, but I surely will.

with grateful thanks

Geoff

There are some people who, given the choice, will choose a plain ASCII version over a nicely formatted HTML version, and they kept bitching about it, so I put them on as attachments to the root node of the story, but actually you can just next-page through each chapter.

"btw I'd never thought of Nathan as a contraction of Jonathon ..."

Perhaps because it isn't?

[quote]
“Excuse me,” Jane began, “are you Jonathan Shaw?”

[...]

“Jonathan Henry Shaw?” Jane asked carefully. Valerie was pleased Jane had remembered her exhortation to verify the kid’s full name.
[endqote]

"Even at my age I learn new things"

I much prefer part 2. I felt 'Nathan's Story' had too much similarity with Joel Lawrence's/Tigger's stories and tends to be boring at times because of that.

The 'After a Fall' section OTOH is much more interesting because it allows the reader to follow Valerie's activities and budding relationship with Elizabeth and her young mother as well as providing sufficient information about Natasha.

Perhaps deliberately, it seems incomplete. It's not really vital, but I'd like to know more ... about Valerie and Mary; about Natasha's past; if Valerie is, in fact Jester. Lovely piece of work, for which my gratitude.

As usual a few boring points. I hope you don't mind my carping. It seems rather trivial to criticise such a well written and entertaining piece.

First, it surprises me that you allow that stickler for grammar, Mrs Thompson, to continually sprinkle her speech with split infinitives. I know it's a regrettable American trait, but we really should try to always maintain some sort of standards here.

Second, IIRC 'en face' actually means 'opposite' rather 'face me'. In the ascii attachments acute accents appear as apostrophes and oumlouts as double quotes - tends to be a bit confusing at first. Perhaps the html is better; I'll look after I've written this.

Third, I used to (pedal) cycle 13 miles each way to work before I retired. I started out at 6.30 and rode along a quiet now by-passed main road. Once I'd set the pedalling rhythm I tended to zone out and often came to wondering just where I was. Like Valerie I assumed I'd simply not bothered to upload the data to my HD but had been sufficiently aware. I hoped so. It must be common.

Geoff

"Perhaps deliberately, it seems incomplete. It's not really vital, but I'd like to know more ... about Valerie and Mary; about Natasha's past; if Valerie is, in fact Jester. Lovely piece of work, for which my gratitude."

It is most assuredly incomplete. I just took a time-out to do nanowrimo. My head's all in Jeodin right now, but I have the first chapter of part 3 in proofing (I've had proofing input back, but am sitting on it until I'm ready for it) and the second chapter largely written too. And there's a lot more coming.

"First, it surprises me that you allow that stickler for grammar, Mrs Thompson, to continually sprinkle her speech with split infinitives. I know it's a regrettable American trait, but we really should try to always maintain some sort of standards here."

Hm. Split infinitives are a tricky one. There's some debate that to worry about them really is more stickling over something archaic; the attempt to force a Latin rule on English that is rightly dying a death. That's kind of my opinion anyway. :-)

Also, there's a choice to make Jane's speech generally correct but not to the point of clumsiness.

Also, I may have missed things, and so may my proofers. :-P

"In the ascii attachments acute accents appear as apostrophes and oumlouts as double quotes - tends to be a bit confusing at first. Perhaps the html is better; I'll look after I've written this."

US-ASCII is lossy when you start using accents. Use the HTML, I spent a lot of time making that right. :-)

IMO more often than not, split infinitives *are* clumsy and ugly. Just look at the two (contrived) examples in my own reply. But that's not the point. Don't you think Jane would also abhor them - even the occasional acceptable ones?

I've done a bit of editing myself, usually for US writers, so I've had to accept their peculiarities, but it still jars ... and it's nothing to do with my rudimentary Latin education. Interestingly, (I think ;) ) I've also found really ugly sentences often end with prepositions. That's not a hard and fast rule either, but it's one to bear in mind.

Sadly for me, I'm much better at grammatical mechanics than I am at being truly creative. Comes from being an engineer ... lol.

Looking forward to the next parts - a lot.

Geoff

In Nathan's story, she keeps showing up. Is Nathan a mental case? SPLIT PERSONALITY? In his dreams, he is a boy dressed as a girl . I assume this is in response to Aunt Jane's schooling or is there another reason?