Latest news with #HomeCounties
Times
26-05-2025
- Times
Meet Nick: ex-army, charming, funny, people-smuggler
There's an image you have of the people who smuggle desperate, vulnerable migrants into our country on boats, often with little thought for their safety. You think of them as shadowy figures, operating in gangs, most probably from other countries. You despise them for profiting from human misery. I had that image too, until a year ago, when I met Nick*. He is a man who, like me, is in his early forties, grew up comfortably in the Home Counties, has a child, and who I discovered over a year of talking to him, is charming, funny, likable, even. Unlike me, however, Nick was a people-smuggler who had brought dozens of migrants into the UK illegally. 'People coming to this country was making me successful,' he boasted.
Telegraph
19-03-2025
- Entertainment
- Telegraph
The Marlow Murder Club, review: thought Death in Paradise was cosy? It's got nothing on this gem
Cosy crime shows can't really improve on The Marlow Murder Club (U&Drama). It is a gentle delight devised by Death in Paradise creator Robert Thorogood and clearly aimed as much at an international audience as a homegrown one ,with its bucolic vision of England. The opening scenes showed us cricket on the village green, bunting over the high street and several red telephone boxes. Viewers in the US or Japan probably remain blissfully unaware that, in reality, all of Britain's phone boxes smell of wee. They are probably also ignorant of red trousers as a social signifier. The murder victim here, Sir Peter Bailey, was wearing a pair when he died. He was crushed to death by a falling cabinet and all we could see were his legs poking out, like a Home Counties version of the Wicked Witch of the East. Cue our intrepid sleuths, led by Samantha Bond as Judith Potts, with Suzie (Jo Martin) and Becks (Cara Horgan) in support. Judith is a retired archaeologist with a magnificent house on the river, where she's partial to a spot of naked wild swimming. Suzie is a dog walker and Becks is a vicar's wife; they strike me as rather unlikely friends, but this is not the sort of series about which one should think too deeply. It is unashamedly formulaic and all the Agatha Christie elements were here: the locked room mystery, the amateur detectives spotting clues that the police overlooked, the list of suspects who appeared to have strong alibis. Sir Peter's son, daughter and bride-to-be were the main suspects, although I had my eye on the gardener. The mystery played out over two episodes and the ending, when you reach it, is quite ingenious. I loved the little details, such as Judith dusting an object for fingerprints by covering it in a cloud of powdered sugar from her tin of travel sweets, and a footprint being identified by Becks as a ladies' Hunter: 'It's my specialist subject, posh wellies of Marlow.' The show doesn't pretend to be anything other than ridiculous, and for that I really do like it.
Telegraph
26-02-2025
- Entertainment
- Telegraph
The moment I discovered my husband was having an affair with my best friend
Lucy Marshall* is a qualified accountant and interior designer. She's single, with two grown-up children and two grandsons, and lives in Oxfordshire. It's nearly midnight and my husband, Leo* is not in the bed beside me. Sighing, I put my book down, heading downstairs knowing exactly where he'll be – passed out in front of the blaring television. The cup of herbal tea I'd made him hours ago remains untouched. There's an empty bottle of red (not the same white, I note, that we'd uncorked during dinner earlier) and a drained whisky tumbler. Leo is sprawled out, barely conscious. In his palm is his mobile phone, the messages still open on the screen. My eye is drawn to one he can only have written in the last two minutes.'Would you be prepared to leave your husband?' it reads. Then beneath is a second text bubble: 'Well, what's the point, if you're never prepared to leave Lucy?' The reply, clear and bold with no attempt to disguise her name, is from Jilly*, a friend of 30 years. I am totally stunned. I blink. There's no room for ambiguity: my husband of 35 years and a woman I've known for three decades are having an affair. A serious one. Right under my nose. And that night, back in the dreg ends of 2018, was when my whole life turned upside down. I'd been married to Leo since I was 24, meeting at university where we'd both studied accountancy. He was witty, charming, self-assured and sporty too, as I was. In my 20s I once completed a marathon in two hours and 41 minutes. Then in my early 30s, I had my son (who's now 32) and my daughter, 30. By then Leo had been offered a more senior position working abroad, which seemed a great chance to relocate, have a new adventure, and I gave up work. For three years we lived the high life socialising with other expats. One of the English couples we met were Jilly and Henry*. We fell into the scene of mixing in couples and families, it was all very convivial, fuelled by generous expenses allowances. Having never drunk much before, especially with my athletic background, suddenly we found ourselves drinking most evenings, albeit fine wine. By the time we returned to the UK in 2005, Leo's career was flying high. We were lucky enough to afford a lovely Berkshire family home, with a pool and large garden for the children (then nearly teens) and dogs to run around. Naturally, Leo had to earn his City salary, and while he spent long days working in London (or so I thought at the time) I busied myself being a classic Home Counties mum, retraining as an interior designer too. Many nights Leo spent away from home. 'He's grafting in the office for our family's sake,' I reminded myself to be grateful. He often seemed stressed, and drank heavily; I reasoned he was under pressure and needed to relieve some of that at home. Frequently, he'd come to bed hours later than me, or I'd wake in the night and have to haul him off the sofa, clearing empty bottles and packing him off to bed. It was while doing exactly that one evening – with him dozily clasping his phone – when I spotted those fateful digital exchanges between my husband and Jilly. Jilly and Henry's lives were woven into the fabric of ours. It felt like I'd been physically punched in the gut, too surreal to comprehend. I just kept thinking, 'I don't know what to do, I don't know what to do,' it was too enormous to take in. But fury and utter betrayal were seeded. Leo was too drunk for me to tackle him that night. And I was too shocked for a confrontation. Instead I went upstairs, sat on our martial bed with shaking hands, and typed out a midnight text to Jilly: 'I've just read the conversations between you tonight. And my heart is broken.' I didn't know what else to say, or do, at that moment. I didn't sleep much that night, in between the tears, tossing and turning. Questions going round and round in my head… How could they? Replaying every scenario over the weeks, months and – God, years? – trying to think if there had been signs I had missed.
