Roses Round the Door Author:Doreen Tovey At the age of ten, Doreen Tovey was taken by her Aunt Louisa to a wedding in the heart of the Somerset cider country, where she promptly blighted Louisa's incipient romance with a handsome young farmer by getting locked in the earth closet during the reception. Despite this setback, Doreen developed an affection for the countryside that was ... more »to lead to many hilarious adventures with the long-suffering Louisa and subsequently, during the war years, to her courtship and marriage to Charles.
After Charles's return from war service in the Middle East, they experience another facet of country life - of living in digs where their landlord drops his boots on the floor above when he decides it is their bed-time. After the war, Doreen and Charles find a temporary country home in a dilapidated Georgian house whose owners spend most of their time feuding spectacularly with their neighbours. Eventually, they arrive with their squirrel Blondin, the first of the many remarkable animals that were henceforth to dominate the Toveys' lives, at the cottage in the remote Somerset valley where they have lived happily, but by no means uneventfully, ever since.« less