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A Certain Summer
A hilarious biography of a young boy’s adventures, set in Derbyshire, England, in the heart of the Midland’s mining communities, during the 1960s, in an area now known as the 'Five Pits Trail'.
‘A Certain Summer’ follows the young life of Sam, his imagination and fantasy world flood out from the pages to give a humorous and quirky perspective to the adventures contained therein.
Packed with nostalgia and the innocence of the 1960s, the scenes are set vividly in the reader’s mind. The sometimes earthy, gritty narrative creates a clear picture and an atmosphere where one can almost hear the dulcet tones of the skylark singing high in the summer sky, the heavy thunder of steam locomotives rumbling through the sleepy hamlets and the hoots and screams of young boys enacting the adventures of Robin Hood.
‘A Certain Summer’ follows the young life of Sam, his imagination and fantasy world flood out from the pages to give a humorous and quirky perspective to the adventures contained therein.
Packed with nostalgia and the innocence of the 1960s, the scenes are set vividly in the reader’s mind. The sometimes earthy, gritty narrative creates a clear picture and an atmosphere where one can almost hear the dulcet tones of the skylark singing high in the summer sky, the heavy thunder of steam locomotives rumbling through the sleepy hamlets and the hoots and screams of young boys enacting the adventures of Robin Hood.
240 pages, Paperback
First published June 21, 2012
4 people want to read
About the author
Peter Gray
4 books3 followersPeter Gray was born in 1957 in a small Derbyshire hamlet in a working class environment, still feeling the repercussions of post war austerity. His childhood was for the most part happy and full of adventure only marred by the requirement to attend school, which he greatly disliked. This did not prevent him from doing well academically though and he had a good education at an all boys school in Chesterfield.
After leaving school, he took an apprenticeship with the National Coal Board as a mechanic and worked for them over a ten year period until the virtual closure of the coal industry in Derbyshire. He then undertook many and various other professions over the years, eventually becoming self employed and has continued in this manner until the present day, at the moment running a clock restoration business.
He has been a musician since his late teens and still enjoys all kinds of music. He first found an interest in writing at the age of twelve, penning several short stories until school English lessons caused him to turn away from it.
He began writing again during the early eighties, mainly poetry at which he was prolific over many years. This developed into short fiction stories that were hand written into books and stored away, never to be read by anyone.
During later years he began to write articles and short stories for magazines which gave him a hunger for more adventurous fiction, but again these stories were stored away and never read.
During a brief career ‘acting’ he found local acclaim for several humorous ‘mummers’ plays he had penned and this began another surge of writing only this time using humour, as with most of his work, it remained unread. He now lives in Lincolnshire with his wife and has several interests and hobbies including American cars, music and flying.
After leaving school, he took an apprenticeship with the National Coal Board as a mechanic and worked for them over a ten year period until the virtual closure of the coal industry in Derbyshire. He then undertook many and various other professions over the years, eventually becoming self employed and has continued in this manner until the present day, at the moment running a clock restoration business.
He has been a musician since his late teens and still enjoys all kinds of music. He first found an interest in writing at the age of twelve, penning several short stories until school English lessons caused him to turn away from it.
He began writing again during the early eighties, mainly poetry at which he was prolific over many years. This developed into short fiction stories that were hand written into books and stored away, never to be read by anyone.
During later years he began to write articles and short stories for magazines which gave him a hunger for more adventurous fiction, but again these stories were stored away and never read.
During a brief career ‘acting’ he found local acclaim for several humorous ‘mummers’ plays he had penned and this began another surge of writing only this time using humour, as with most of his work, it remained unread. He now lives in Lincolnshire with his wife and has several interests and hobbies including American cars, music and flying.
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
October 4, 2018
A good nostalgic book about more innocent times.the last chapter titled Armageddon nailed it for me,the sudden realisation that childhood is going and the dreaded adulthood is upon you.better than some of the other books printed nowadays about loss of childhood and really bad experiences at such a young age.the other book similar to this was where did it all go right an antidote to the serious books of this ilk.
July 5, 2013
Excellent, humorous and descriptive. Looking forward to the sequel!
January 8, 2017
Brilliant!! Great detail and humour. Brought back memories of my childhood soot. Well worth reading and I look forward to reading the sequel.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews