It is an honour to be able to feature this latest contribution today from Ronald Mackay in the Memoir Showcase, written from recollections by Bernardino de Armas. Ronald wrote this at the weekend and it is very close to his heart (as you will see from his bio below). 

You can read El Desconocido here.

Bio for Ronald Mackay September 2024

When he was 18, Ronald spent a year working in banana plantations around the village of Buenavista del Norte, Tenerife. He learned Spanish and blended in with the village. Later, he wrote “Fortunate Isle, a Memoir of Tenerife” to capture the importance of that period. At the suggestion of the Alcalde, the Mayor, he rewrote his memories in Spanish as “A Tenerife con Cariño”. Both books include photos of rural life as it was in the early ‘60s.

Every year, Ronald and his wife spend time in Buenavista del Norte. Villagers share stories with him and invite him to write about them. Don Bernardino de Armas shared this one, based on a real event.

Nino and Ronald Bar Pilon September 2024
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On the penultimate day of the 2024 Creative Writing Showcase, I am pleased to welcome a newcomer to Fred's Blog, Jeremiah Gilbert, with his contribution to the Memoir Showcase.

You can read Jeremiah's story Don’t Teach While Traveling here. 

Jeremiah Gilbert is an award-winning photographer and travel writer based out of Southern California. His travels have taken him to over a hundred countries spread across six continents. His photography has been published internationally and exhibited worldwide. He is the author of three travel books, including Can’t Get Here from There: Fifty Tales of Travel and From Tibet to Egypt: Early Travels After a Late Start. His most recent, On to Plan C, documents his return to travel in a post-pandemic world and is the first to include his photography.
 
Website: https://jeremiahgilbert.com/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/jg_travels/

As we enter the last couple of days of the 2024 Memoir Showcase, I have a real treat for you.

Award-winning author, Jackie Lambert, has contributed two fabulous stories and accompanied each of them with a wonderful selection of photos. 

You can read A Symphony of Horrors: Oravský Castle, Slovakia here and That Was So Hebden Bridge here.

Author Bio:

Jacqueline (Jackie) Lambert is an award-winning travel writer, full-time nomad, and dogmother, who loves history and curious facts.

B.C. (Before Canines) she hurtled, slid, submerged and threw herself off bits of every continent except Antarctica. Even though she was single at the time, she asked for – and was granted – 'maternity leave' to backpack around Fiji, Australia, and New Zealand.

A.D. (After Dog), with husband Mark, she gave up work to become an Adventure Caravanner. With The Fab Four, their four pups in tow, their stated aim is: To Boldly Go Where No Van Has Gone Before.

Jackie has published six light-hearted memoirs about her travels since quitting work: Fur Babies in France, Dog on the Rhine, Dogs ‘n’ Dracula, It Never Rains But It Paws, To Hel In A Hound Cart, and Pups on Piste.

Her seventh book, Building The Beast, is the first in her Wayward Truck series. It chronicles her Brexit-busting plan to convert a 24.5-tonne 6x4-wheel drive army truck into an off-grid home-on-wheels fit to drive to Mongolia. Subsequent books will follow The Beast’s adventures.

A keen off piste skier and windsurfer, Jackie is the wordsmith behind her own travel blog, and author website . She has contributed to several anthologies, and also writes guest articles and posts for various magazines and international blogs.

Connect with her via the links below:
 
Amazon:
author.to/JacquelineLambert
 
Blog:
www.WorldWideWalkies.com
 
Author Website:
www.JacquelineLambert.co.uk
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Jackie Lambert Author with Ruby in Provence
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The latest contribution to the Memoir Showcase is another fascinating chapter from Captain Denis Dextraze's memoir in progress, Once upon a time in Cuba.

To read Dr. Guziec, an American plastic surgeon teaching in Cuba, click here.

It is a pleasure to feature this latest submission to the Memoir Showcase from Syd Blackwell.

Syd has been a regular contributor to Fred's Blog and our annual anthologies over the past ten years with his fascinating combinations of prose and poetry.

You can read his most recent story Victoria Reminiscing here.

Syd Blackwell

Retired in Uruguay for seventeen years, I recently had reason to reflect on my years as a university student in Victoria, BC.  
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2023 with PALUCHE
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As this year's showcase enters the last few days, I am really pleased to be able to feature four short stories from Sue Wald's  ''I might actually have lost the Plot' compilation.

Sue provided me with the following explanations about each of these extracts:
The first one is an anecdote called 'Bluffing' about moving from one of the big Canary Islands (Tenerife) to one of the small ones (El Hierro).
The second one is an anecdote called 'Moving House with the Troupe' about leaving the Canary Islands for our new home on the northern shores of mainland Spain.
The third is called 'Saint Lucia's Eyes' and is an anecdote inspired by the beautiful beaches of the Cantabrican Coast of Galicia, and 'The Life of Brian'.
The last one is an anecdote from when I trained as a geriatric nurse at 55, so I could take better care of my ailing grandmother, then 97, and is called 'The Captain's Flags'.

You can read them all by clicking here.

A warm welcome back to Mary Mae Lewis who has contributed two stories to this year's Memoir Showcase. She has been a loyal supporter over the years and a number of her previous contributions have been included in our annual anthologies.

You can read  How I Became a VIP here and The Night I Became a Lady here.

Mary Mae Lewis 
 
Mary Mae is author of the novel Where There’s a Will, There’s a Woman and the memoir Don’t Stop the Fiesta and has had success with short stories; she came runner-up in North Staffordshire’s TOO WRITE adult fiction competition in 2017 and was highly commended in THE POTTERIES PRIZE for flash fiction in 2018.
 
She contributed to Robert Fear’s anthologies: Travel Stories and Highlights 2019, Memorable Stories 2020, 40 True Life Stories 2021, Intriguing Personal Insights 2022 and 30 Evocative Stories 2023
 
She’s also been published in the Telegraph and is a published poet.
A retired teacher, Mary came late to becoming a writer and her work is based on true life experiences.
 
She has been married for over 50 years has 3 sons and 4 grandchildren.
 
She has travelled extensively, including living in Grand Cayman for four years and Malawi for five.
 
She now spends half the year in Spain, where she does most of her writing, and half in Stoke-on Trent, Staffordshire UK.
 
 She blogs on her personal Facebook page and also on Where There’s a Will, There’s a Woman.
 
Besides reading and writing Mary Mae enjoys buying and selling antiques, local history, gardening and swimming.
  
www.author-marymaelewis.co.uk
[email protected]

With under two weeks left in this year's Creative Writing Showcase, we are honored to be able to feature a contribution from Don Hughes, a newcomer to Fred's Blog.

You can read Don's story Lost Treasure here.

About the Author

Don Hughes was born in Johnson City, Tennessee, before moving at an early age to a Chicago suburb called Lake Zurich. After graduating high school, he received a bachelor’s degree in political science and history from the University of Illinois, followed by a master’s degree in public administration from Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government.

He began working on political campaigns in Illinois right after college, starting out as a volunteer by walking precincts, stuffing envelopes, and attending fundraisers. Eventually he worked his way up to paid staff jobs on the Senator Charles Percy reelection campaign in 1978 and the George H.W. Bush campaign for president in 1980. The highlight of his political career was being elected at age twenty-seven to the Palatine Park District Board of Commissioners.

Following graduation from the Kennedy School, Don focused on shaping public policy in the areas of health care, insurance, behavioral health, and Medicaid at the state level until retiring in 2020. He served as deputy director for policy and health care policy advisor for Governor Jan Brewer, overseeing a staff of ten policy advisors. He was responsible for reforming the behavioral health system, expanding Medicaid, innovating health care and improving insurance practices.

In 2017, Don found his true calling volunteering at the Maricopa County Animal Care and Control West Shelter as an adoption counselor. In 2018 alone, he helped more than 275 dogs and eighteen cats find their forever homes.

In 2023, Don published his first memoir, The Mutt for Me A Beautiful Transformation from Project Dog to Man’s Best Friend. It’s a touching story of how adopting Barbie the dog everyone at the Shelter had given up wound up saving them both. You can find out more about their journey at https://donhughesauthor.com

Our latest feature in the Memoir Showcase is another intriguing contribution from Susan Mellsopp, a regular supporter of our blog.  This is her third submission this year and many of her other stories have been included in previous anthologies.

You can read Susan's story Ghostly Apparitions here.

Susan Mellsopp is happily retired and lives in Hamilton New Zealand with her cream and gold Labrador guide dog Maya. Much of her life has been spent as a dairy farmer, and also working as a librarian, archivist and accessible transport researcher. She runs a writers group and is constantly being challenged to write in genres other than travel and memoir. Susan has published two school histories, written for an alumni magazine, and writes for a national magazine which is published monthly. Last year she had a story published in a book about pavlovas. She is a voracious reader; usually having two talking books and a kindle book on the go at once, loves to travel, listen to classical music, cook, spend time with friends and use modern technology.  Volunteering is important to Susan, recently she began tutoring at Senior Net teaching older people how to use their ipads and iphones.  
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It gives me great pleasure to feature another story from our most loyal supporter, Ronald Mackay. This is his sixth contribution to the 2024 Creative Writing Showcase and his fourth in the Memoir category.

I am sure you will find Ronald's latest recollections as fascinating as I have. 

​You can read The Hollow Mountain here.

Ronald Mackay 
 
Ronald has always enjoyed physical work. He started by labouring on farms at weekends and during school holidays in his native Scotland and then in the banana plantations of Tenerife in the Canary Islands. He paid his way through his studies at Aberdeen University in the ‘60s by working on building sites and once, excavating rock from a tunnel.

Alongside his professional work, Ronald has farmed in Mexico, Chile, Argentina and Canada. Today, he lives with his Peruvian wife in Voorburg, the Netherlands and looks after the garden.

The short stories in his recently published “Windows On My Worlds” tells more about his work experiences around the world.  LInk: mybook.to/WindowsOnMyWorlds
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Viviana and Ronald - April 2024
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