On a bitterly cold day in December 2009, the Smallwoods find themselves enjoying the Victorian Christmas market in the little-known Dorset town of Grimstone Peverell. Sapped by the cold, they retire to the town’s minster where they are accosted by an enthusiastic guide, who knows a great deal about some things, yet next to nothing about that which would, to most people, seem obvious; she seems keen not to let them go, but return to London they must – Lionel has a play to review. That, at least, is his intention.
It had originally been my intention to next release ‘The Cleft Owl’, but upon reflection, ‘Agnes of Grimstone Peverell’ seems to fit more naturally into the sequence of releases, not only because its action unfolds in the period immediately before Christmas, but also because it is stylistically more in keeping with the tales that have preceded it. It is, essentially, a comic tale with a supernatural element, whereas ‘The Cleft Owl’ marks a move into darker, more lyrical territory, with its seventeenth-century setting further distancing it from its predecessors. This shift backwards into Restoration England also ties in with next summer’s release of ‘Pendrummel: Gwen Gwinnel’s Return’, which opens in the late 1670s; the former piece unfolding in Devon, and the latter in Cornwall and beyond.
