Still Waters

the long version

The narrative begins in the war years (1939-1945) with three canal boat-women who worked a pair of narrow boats on the Grand Union Canal, and follows the individual development of their lives through the ensuing years. Noelle is the adopted daughter of Liz, one of the boatwomen, and her story, too, is etched into the biographies and into the tales as written down by her mother. Woven into the narrative are stories which are based upon superstitions and fragments of tales once told in the many canal-side pubs. All the characters are fictitious but there are close associations with the author and her experiences on the canals during the war years and subsequently when she lived aboard a converted narrow boat. The places are real and easily identifiable. The terminology relating to the boats and boat people is as authentic as may be conveyed by print. The setting of the tales varies in place and time. "The Tunnel" is set in the nineteenth century when experiments in building tunnels were regarded with suspicion and scepticism; "The Swimming Cat" is set in the war years and "The New Bridge" in the last decade. The other stories, "Boats Coming", "The Anchorage" and "Never Tie Up Under the Spinneys", are set in post-war years of canal history, but have their roots in a more violent and primitive past when rough justice among the boat people made little reference to more established procedures of law and order.