We were recovering from a serious financial crisis—do you remember the days of negative equity?—and Marcia decided she wanted to do something useful. The question was: what? I had no doubt that the answer was to write a book and eventually she agreed. I have been asked many times how it was that I was so sure she should become a novelist and I find it difficult to explain.

It was something to do with the way she talks about people she has met. It is almost pointless asking her what they were wearing, the colour of their eyes or their hairstyle. She would not have noticed. However, she can tell you what they were like: what worried them; what excited them; what made them tick. How she came to know these things is a mystery. When she talks to someone, nothing else exists for her apart from that one person and I think this concentration has something to do with it.

Then there is the way she talks. She is incredibly erudite: able to communicate the most complex ideas economically and accurately—and always with humour.

Having agreed to try her hand at a novel, she was very determined that she would write about what she knew and she felt that all she really knew was life as the wife of a naval officer. She knew from first hand the problems caused by the long separations and by the men returning from often difficult and challenging operations (this was at the height of the cold war) faced with trying to cast aside the persona of a fighter and take on the mantle of a loving husband and father. Above all she learnt just how important were the friendships of the wives; how they were able to support each other and just be there when they were needed. It is interesting to note that Marcia’s four closest friends were wives of submariners and that those friendships are as strong today as they were forty years ago.

The two most important characters in this book are women, friends from their school days, who marry men determined to become submariners. Kate is an idealist. Cass is a hedonist.

Together they face the problems of marrying servicemen: the long separations, the difficulties when men come home after stressful periods at sea, the need to bring up children and take family decisions alone. Both learn to rely on each other: it is their friendship that makes it all possible.

That makes it sound as if the creation of these two characters was easy. Marcia was to learn that while what she knew could be used, who she knew, oddly, blocked the development of the characters and to try to base a character on someone she knew just didn’t work. Before they became real to Marcia, she had to make two huge adjustments.

First she had to stop reading novels as she found she was too heavily influenced by other writer’s styles and characterization. This sounds easy but was comparable to a dedicated smoker giving up nicotine (and I know: I was and I did).

The second was harder: she found she had to create distance between her characters and her friends (and relatives). Only then did Cass, Kate and all their chums have the freedom to develop into the fully rounded people we meet in this book

The locations in which her characters lived were the places where Marcia had lived. She knew them all extremely well, especially Tavistock and the western half of Dartmoor.

After living in the towns around the base in Portsmouth, Kate was delighted to discover that her husband was to be on a submarine running out of Devonport. For the first time since her marriage, there was the possibility that she would be able to live in the country.

Knowing Kate would hate living in a quarter in Plymouth, Cass asks her father, living in a village near Meavy, to try and find a suitable hiring. He finds a bungalow in Dousland, on the edge of Dartmoor and within walking distance of Burrator Reservoir.

Kate spends the year she is living in Dousland exploring the moor and watching it change with the passing seasons.

This is Kate’s introduction to Dartmoor and she falls passionately in love with it. She knows that when she has to leave it, it will be one of the saddest days in her life.

She was right, and it was some years before she was able to return to the south west.

Mark is on the Submarine Commanders’ Qualifying Course when Kate’s father sells some land. He gives each of his children some of the proceeds and this enables Kate and Mark to consider buying their own home. Mark insists it be near one of the naval bases, but does not mind which. As one would expect, Kate chooses to be near Devonport and to look for a cottage on Dartmoor and soon she is moving into her new home to the north west of Walkhampton.

When Cass’s father hears that the rectory in his village is for sale, he telephones Cass, in Faslane where Tom is stationed, and suggests she might be interested. She makes the long trip from Scotland to Devon and, a few months later, is moving into ‘The Old Rectory’ in ‘The Village’.

Marcia is often asked about this village which is never given a name. As we shall see, Marcia rarely puts her characters in real houses although her fictitious houses are always set in a real location. Now she wanted to work on a bigger canvas: a fictional village within the factual landscape. It is one thing to find the space to put a house but quite another when it comes to locating an entire village. In the end, we decided that the best thing to do was to put it where there was a real but tiny hamlet which could not be mistaken for the village described in Those Who Serve.

The location can be determined from the books but follow the clues and all you will find is a small hamlet by the name of Lovaton—no church, no shop, no village green, no new housing development, no manor and no ‘Old Rectory’ (all of which will be found in ‘The Village’).

The last home to be found was that of Tavistock estate agent and surveyor, Michael Barrett-Thompson. Marcia felt that he lived in a remote property actually on the moor. Marcia would often take the dogs for a run on the western slopes of Cox Tor. Leave Tavistock on the road towards Princetown and, as you climb up the hill towards the moor, turn left over a cattle grid onto a very narrow lane and the tor is on your right. The lane divides: go left and you come to a farm; go right and the lane becomes a bridle path. Marcia decided this was where she would create a converted farmstead to be known as Lower Barton. At the time it seemed quite unimportant but in the next book its location was vital.

Within this landscape, Marcia wove a wonderful story of Cass and Kate. None of her characters is a stereotype. All have strengths and weaknesses, all are vividly drawn, most become friends to her readers. They hate to have to say good-bye at the end of a book—and are delighted when some of them return in later novels.

It is one thing to write a book—and quite another to be published. The manuscript had been sent to Cate Paterson, one of the commissioning editors at Hodder Headline and she had asked Marcia to make some additions. The second manuscript was posted and we waited—and waited—and waited. When Marcia had become quite desperate, she telephoned Cate to ask if a decision had been made and Cate said that there was a letter in the post so she did not want to talk until Marcia had read it. She added that it was good news.
Naturally, we were awake very early the next morning. As usual, we were living in a place where the post arrives in the afternoon and the thought of waiting that long was terrible so, on the off chance, I rang the sorting office in Totnes. Yes, there was a letter from Hodder Headline. Yes, I could come and collect it. It would be at the enquiries desk.

We collected the letter about seven fifteen: it contained an offer of a contract for two books. For the record, that was Ascension Day 1994.

A couple of days later, she bumped into Mary Wesley in Totnes. Mary asked how it was going and Marcia told her.

‘Ah,’ said Mary, comfortingly, ‘Enjoy today. You will never be happy again! A two book contract, you said. Are you sure you can write another book? If you do, will your agent like it? Will your publisher like it? Will your readers like it?’

There is much truth in those comments but, happily, the answer to all the questions was a resounding ‘Yes’. Incidentally, it is only right that I should add that Mary Wesley always gave Marcia great encouragement.

In due course, the book was published and the then owners of Bookstop in Tavistock invited Marcia to hold a launching party there: life would never be the same again.