A Fortnight in August

Set in 1972, A Fortnight in August is a simple account that follows a large family of limited resources as - through humor and togetherness - they deal with loss, logistics, anticipation, and bad weather during a summer holiday in a small seaside cottage in Cornwall, England.

Everything is lined up and ready in the hallway: a pile of suitcases and holdalls stuffed full of summer clothes, hats, sandals, towels and toiletries, a plastic football, a cricket bat, stumps and bails, tennis balls, badminton racquets and a couple of shuttlecocks, Julie's hula hoop, a pile of library books and

assorted comics and magazines. And then there is the food: wooden crates and plastic carrier bags filled with bottles of milk, cartons of eggs and bags of flour. There are multiple cans of Spam, sardines, pilchards, tuna fish, salmon and Fray Bentos corned beef. Tins of Heinz baked beans, tomato soup and spaghetti hoops. Two bottles of Heinz salad cream. Ambrosia rice pudding and mixed fruits in syrup. There are jars of Marmite, lemon curd and Robinson's marmalade. Shallow jars of Shippams salmon fish paste. Sachets of Angel Delight. Packs of Jell-O. Loaves of Mother's Pride sliced white

bread. Packets of crumpets. Three bottles of Robinson's undiluted orange squash, two bottles of Ribena. A jumbo box of Tetley tea bags. Jars of Cadbury's drinking chocolate and Horlicks. A two-pound bag of Tate and Lyle white sugar. Columns of Rich Tea and Digestive biscuits. Two rectangular packs of Jacob's cream crackers. A McVitie's Jamaica ginger cake, a Battenberg cake, a couple of boxed trays of Mr Kipling's cherry and almond

bakewell tarts. Several packs of Penguin chocolate biscuits. Boxes of Tunnock's tea cakes. A huge block of cheddar cheese. A stack of half a dozen carton wheels of Dairylea soft cheese triangles. Bulky but lightweight boxes of Kellogg's Rice Krispies and Cornflakes. Weetabix, Ready Brek and Farley's Rusks. Then runner beans, protruding sticks of rhubarb, cucumbers, heads of lettuce and potatoes picked from the garden. All the things that a family of ten would need for two weeks at the seaside.