Rules of Engagement
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One This is a true story, not that that should concern you overly since, as they say, fact can be stranger than fiction - whatever that might mean. I tend to take the view that most aphoristic statements of this sort are either overrated or downright false; as with the one about charity - true charity is without self-interest and should therefore flourish outside the home. I was nineteen - twenty in three months time - and thinking myself to be much in love with a girl a year older than me and of different race; she a Jew, me a Gentile. I had taken a vacation job in a small country hotel, called - ironically as it turned out - The Priory. The house was situated in some three acres of grounds just outside the village nestling close by the South Downs. I had little money; scarcely enough to pay for my return train journey in fact. I knew it would be some weeks before I could get to see my love again. For this reason, if for no other, and there were others, I felt as if I were going into exile. It was a sultry July afternoon. The heavy atmosphere had given me a headache, and the long slow bus journey from Fordham (I had not taken the best route, I found subsequently) had done nothing to help.
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About the Book
John Gothard, a student of hydraulics, takes a vacation job one summer in a private hotel close by a small Sussex village not far from the South Downs. In common with similar establishments, things are not all they seem on the surface. The Priory has all manner of problems going for it. Apart from the fact that this story takes place in one of the hottest summers of the century, and that things come to a tragic close, there is no resemblance to L P Hartleys "The Go Between". Rules of Engagement is the first of a quartet of novels chronicling some of the events in the life of John Gothard. The second book, Two-years Two-months, looks at Gothard’s immediate post-graduate years when he is required to undertake prescribed civilian duties instead of military National Service. In Autumn Journey, the unmarried Gothard is now in his early middle-age. Latterly he has pursued an academic career in hydraulic engineering following a more active career in the field. He has a holiday cottage in the north of Britain where he spends most of his vacations. This autumn is different. Instead, quite unaccountably, he finds respite from London's academia, not at his holiday home, but in a large country house lived in by a widow and her young Down’s syndrome daughter. Finally, Lamentoso finds our subject returning to the old family house to tidy things up following the death of his aged mother. There he encounters, quite unexpectedly, his half-brother who is intent on making trouble by raking over the past. His second cousin, Jessica, also thinks she has a claim on him - an emotional one. He meets two other women who are to play an important part in his life at this stage. Once again an injection of passion ensures that things lead to tragedy. John Vetterlein 2000 June
About the Author
John Vetterlein was born in 1935. He spent the years of the Second World War at Redbridge, on the eastern approaches to London, and considers himself fortunate to have survived the V1 (flying bomb) and V2 (rocket) attacks. His father served throughout that war in the Royal Air Force. Having studied physics and mathematics, Vetterlein went on to work in civilian hospitals as a conscientious objector to military National Service. Before continuing his studies in chemistry and pharmacology, he worked as an astronomer and lecturer. In 1971, following a short spell as a secondary school teacher in London, Vetterlein moved to Wales in order to concentrate on writing and music. He worked in the Music Department, University College of Wales, Aberystwyth from 1983 until its closure in 1990. John Vetterlein is a true polymath. He is a prolific writer: his fiction output alone includes sixteen novels, six books of short stories, long stories, plays for radio and twenty poetry collections. An active musician, John Vetterlein is a member of the Haydn Society of Great Britain, the Rachmaninoff Society and the Ralph Vaughan Williams Society. His association with Orkney goes back to 1970. He has lived on Rousay full-time since 1990 from where he pursues his interests in astronomy, hill walking, music, photography and writing.