User:Sandrashakespeare

My name is Sandra Shakespeare, author of Marys Boys. The story begins in the 1880's. Queen Victoria Ruled England.

Harry loses his parents, uncles, little sister Ena, during the epidemic, to consumption. He walks miles each day whilst working on a stud farm, doing what he loves most, working with horses. He is also looking after his surviving and ailing younger brother Henry. Mary is the daughter of the Stud Farm owner, where he now works. Following the death of his younger brother Mary and Harry are thrown together. She proclaims her love for this stable hand to her parents. Ultimately, Mary is thrown out penniless, destitute and pregnant.

Marys Boys is a story of love, heroism, loyalty and comradeship, during the very difficult years leading up to and including WW1, where boys, brothers, cousins and husbands, are lost in there 1,000's each day for just a few feet of ground.

Mary has a large family when war is declared. Her eldest boys and her beloved Harry go away to war. She is devastated, her family is falling apart. The girls old enough to go into service are sent away and she is left with 8 children.

This is a true story about my grandmother "Mary". I promised my mother in 1991, a little while before she died, that I would write her story for her. Ena Victoria was my mother.

It took many years for me to start and fulfill my promise to her. I did not realise at the time what a very difficult journey I would go on to complete Marys Boys and the research needed to compile the historic events portrayed in this book.

I did not have a good education and left school without qualifications. I started work at 14.1/2. I was a rebel of the 1960's. I ran away from home and joined the AACC in 1962 and worked my way up the ladder during my working life.

My second book will also be true life. Mary's 7 boys join the Army and RAF to serve their country in WW11. This will be equally as riveting as Marys Boys.

Sandra Shakespeare lives in a small village in Staffordshire and also lives in Brittany in her property which has been painstakingly restored over the past 12 years.