The Poppy Factory (36 page)

BOOK: The Poppy Factory

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Tomorrow, she had a date to meet Kate, the Poppy Factory employability consultant. She was almost looking forward to it – she had sounded so positive and encouraging on the telephone. ‘There’s a world of opportunity out there for people with your kind of training,’ Kate had said. ‘It’s just a matter of finding what suits you best, and helping you get there.’

Perhaps I really am on the threshold of a fresh chapter in my life, Jess thought, a new career working with animals, perhaps, or even – she was now daring to imagine – a way of recovering her confidence so that she could one day return to being a paramedic.

Only one thing was missing: Nate. She’d been so courageous in other ways – she had the medals to prove it – so why was she so frightened of being rebuffed by him? It was just that stupid pride again, the legacy from her great-grandfather Alfie, the pride that she’d already overcome to get herself properly diagnosed and on the road to recovery. Surely she could steel herself to face this last battle, the one that really mattered to her?

What was it Rose had written? Something about ‘… how important it is for the rest of us to go on living the best and fullest lives possible, for those who didn’t survive.’

The best and fullest life possible? She couldn’t imagine it without Nate.

She took out her phone and, with a thumping heart, began slowly to type the words, deliberately, letter by letter, ignoring the predictive text. Hatts says she saw you at the weekend. How’s things? It sounds so pathetic, she thought, like a dumped girlfriend trying to wheedle her way into his life again. That’s what I am, after all. She deleted it and put the phone away, sitting back in her seat to watch the fields and farms going by.

The train passed a village cricket match, small figures in white dotted around a wide green field. It reminded her of the day, early in their relationship, that Nate had invited her to watch him play. She had no idea how the game worked and had spent most of the time lolling around on a picnic rug making a daisy chain. When he’d returned triumphant, having clocked up forty runs, she’d hung it round his neck like a garland and he had kissed her, full on the mouth, disregarding the amused stares of his team mates. The memory made her flush with desire, even now.

She took out her phone again and typed, faster this time. Hi Nate, how’s things? I’m really on the mend now. Lots to tell. Fancy a catch-up some time, no pressure? X.

Nerissa or no Nerissa, if it was over, it was over. At least she would know. But if not, if there was an outside chance, what was she waiting for?

Quickly, she pressed ‘send’, before she could change her mind.

Book Club Q&A

Q1: What was your inspiration for writing The Poppy Factory?

The anniversary of the First World War was on the horizon when my editor at Harper Collins asked me whether I would consider basing a novel on the subject. At first I hesitated, daunted by the remarkable canon of literature, novels and poetry about the war by some of the world’s best writers. But then I realised that relatively little had been written about the war from a woman’s perspective, so that offered a new challenge. I decided not to write a ‘trenches’ novel, but instead try to reflect the impact of that terrible, bloody war on people at home: the wives, mothers and the returning soldiers themselves.

The second inspiration was The Poppy Factory itself, founded in 1922 by a remarkable man called Major George Howson MC, an engineer and veteran of the Western Front, who was determined to employ his skills to help disabled ex-Service men and women. With a grant of just £2,000 given by British Legion, he set up shop in former collar factory in the Old Kent Road. Within a few months the factory was providing work and an income for fifty disabled veterans and has helped many thousands since. The organisation is still going strong today, producing millions of poppies, wreaths and crosses at their base in Richmond, Surrey.

Q2: Why did you choose to write Rose’s story in diary form? Did it present any difficulties?

I don’t remember consciously opting for a diary format but her voice just seemed to arrive and start telling the story in the first person. I quickly realised that by making it into a journal, written day by day, would give the story a strong feeling of immediacy. It also gives the writer the freedom to write in both present and past tenses. The emotions Rose expresses are absolutely in the moment, unaffected by any foresight of events to come.

Writing as a diary is great fun. You can reflect historical events alongside the very personal story of your character, and you can even look up what the weather was like on that day! But it is also tricky, because diarists don’t normally use any direct speech or dialogue, and a book entirely written without dialogue can be quite dull to for a reader. However, once you have established your diarist’s voice in the reader’s mind I think you can get away with a level of ‘artistic licence’. I hope you think so too!

Q3: Why did you choose to parallel the First World War story with a contemporary storyline?

When I visited The Poppy Factory I learned that although producing poppies is still at their core, they have recently developed a new line of work, helping disabled veterans to find employment with companies throughout the UK. Servicemen these days are often highly trained specialists and need to use these skills when they return to civilian life, and also want to live and work in their own communities.

The Poppy Factory provides disabled veterans advice, support, practical tools such as CV writing and interview techniques, and works with employers to meet the needs of an individual’s disability. This is such important work I wanted to reflect it in my novel.

Q4: Why is your contemporary character, Jess, an Afghanistan veteran?

Not surprisingly, my WW1 character Alfie is a man so I wanted to reflect the fact that these days many returning soldiers, sometimes disabled, are also women.

In Afghanistan, the only role in which women have been deployed right to the front line was in the role of medics – first aiders highly trained to carry out the first tasks needed to save an individual’s life in the immediate aftermath of an attack, so that they can be transported for specialist medical help back at the base. These medics work in the most difficult and dangerous of situations, often putting their own lives at risk.

Through contacts at the garrison in my home town of Colchester, I was introduced to two young women medics who had seen active service in Afghanistan. I have never met such extraordinary courageous, selfless and modest individuals in my life, and I felt compelled to tell their stories, combined into the character of Jess.

Q5: And why did you choose to feature Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome?

In the First World War they called it ‘shell shock’ and sometimes expected soldiers to ‘snap out of it’. These days it has, belatedly, been recognised as a genuine mental illness and disability, and a range of services are available to support sufferers. PTSD can destroy lives and families, can lead people into alcoholism, crime and even suicide. But the syndrome is so complex and varied, and often emerges only years later, so sufferers may find it hard to get the right level of support that they need. An additional problem is that some veterans find the notion of admitting to a mental illness difficult or shameful, and may refuse to acknowledge any weakness or seek help until their lives are already falling apart.

Q6: Why was the poppy chosen as a symbol of remembrance?

It was all started by two women!

In 1918 an American teacher, Moina Bell Michael, found herself so moved by a poem called ‘In Flanders Fields’ by a Canadian Colonel, John McRae, that she immediately went out and bought poppies with money collected from her colleagues and sold them to raise funds for US ex-Servicemen.

Then, in 1921, a Frenchwoman called Anna Guerin took up the idea and set up a small factory in France to make poppies to raise funds for the rehabilitation of villages in the northern part of the country that had been devastated by the war. She persuaded Earl Haig to adopt the poppy for the British Legion and sent French women to London to sell them.

In 1922 Earl Haig accepted Major Howson’s offer to supply poppies and today the poppy is one of the most powerful and iconic symbols in the western world – a corporate brand which any powerful international corporation would be proud of.

If you would like to find out more about how I came to write The Poppy Factory, or about my other novels including the one I am currently writing, please visit
www.liztrenow.com
. You can also follow me on Twitter
@liztrenow
.

Acknowledgements

This book would never have been written without the help and support of Melanie Waters, Kirsty Morgan, Tabitha Aldrich-Smith and others at The Poppy Factory in Richmond. For nearly a hundred years they have been employing disabled veterans to make the millions of poppies we buy every year to remember those who gave their lives in war. More recently they have been helping disabled veterans back into employment of all kinds, in their communities. My thanks, too, to several family members who contributed their memories of Major George Howson, the man who started it all in a former collar factory in the Old Kent Road. There’s more information and history at
www.poppyfactory.org
.

The characters and events are of course entirely fictional, but they were inspired by real events and real people, who shared their time and their experiences with me so generously. For the contemporary storyline, I am indebted to four remarkable people: Lance Corporal Abbie Martin, Lance Corporal Jordan Fern, Jenni Dudley and Annie Muir, HART Paramedics for the East of England Ambulance Service. Annie is also a reservist for the Royal Air Force. I can honestly say that meeting these extraordinary, brave and dedicated people has deeply affected me, and I hope that I have managed to capture some of the intensity of their experiences, and their quiet courage, in
The Poppy Factory.

Finally, my thanks to my editor at HarperCollins Avon Lydia Vassar-Smith, my agent Caroline Hardman of Hardman & Swainson, and to my family and friends, all of whom have been unfailingly supportive throughout.

If you want to find out more about how I wrote
The Poppy Factory
, please go to
www.liztrenow.com
. You can also follow me on Twitter
@liztrenow
.

About the Author

Liz Trenow is a former journalist who spent fifteen years on regional and national newspapers, and on BBC radio and television news, before turning her hand to fiction.
The Poppy Factory
is her third novel. She lives in East Anglia, UK, with her artist husband, and they have two grown up daughters. Find out more at
www.liztrenow.com
and join her on Twitter
@LizTrenow
.

Download Liz’s debut novel The Last Telegram
here
: