No Time For Tears

Ellen Ramsden is a young woman growing up in humble circumstances in the Medway Towns in Kent, an historic area of military and naval importance on the river Medway thirty miles from London and an equally short distance across the English Channel to France. Ellen's father, a seaman has been lost at sea, since when Ellen has been the main provider for her mother and her brother Ben. Ellen is happily employed in a large drapers shop until she makes the mistake of antagonising an important customer, which results in her losing her job. She is fortunate, however, in finding work in a local grocery store and is contented with her lot until she meets and falls in love with a young man William Nugent who is of a better social class and related to the customer whom Ellen has earlier offended. It is soon clear that William's family will not tolerate their relationship. However, such problems have to be put aside with the outbreak of World War One and Great Britain goes to war with Germany. William and Ellen's brother Ben both volunteer and are soon involved in the fighting in France and Flanders. Both men are stationed in Ypres in Belgium and involved in the bloody conflict of trench warfare. There are two other young men in Ellen's life, Matthew Adams whom Ellen knew in the grocery store and Charlie Duncan, a neighbour from her childhood days. Matthew is also fighting at the front and Charlie Duncan is a seaman, who reminds Ellen of her father. At home with her mother Lucy enduring the constant anxiety of the conflict, the food and fuel shortages and the danger of Zeppelin raids Ellen finds herself doubting the reality of her romance with William. The story moves away from England to the Flanders' fields depicting the suffering of the young men at the front and the tragedy that engulfs them. Meanwhile Ellen anticipating rejection from William finds herself a victim of her own folly and involved in a scandal. It is only as the war draws to a close and the world moves away from war that Ellen dares to hope for happiness in her own life.
About the Author: Bettine Manktelow is a published playwright with her plays being performed frequently both in the UK and in other countries where English is the first language. Her plays are mainly thrillers or comedies or a combination of both. When the plot for "No Time For Tears" occurred to her it immediately recommended itself as a novel rather than a play. It takes place over several years and in different countries and involves characters at different ages and development and Bettine felt she needed the larger canvas of a novel to bring it to life. Bettine had an ambition to write a novel for many years but the subject eluded her until after her mother died when recollecting the many stories her mother had told her about the First World War she saw at once it she had the subject for a novel. The background is where Bettine grew up The Medway Towns in Kent. She also knows Deal well and in researching the novel visited Ypres and Passchendaele. The characters are all fiction but the story is true in as much as it is the story of every man and every woman caught up in the vicissitudes of war. Like Ellen in the novel Bettine's father was lost at sea but as a result of enemy action in the Second World War rather then bad weather and a leaky boat! She is the middle daughter of three and as long as she can remember always wanted to be a writer. She was also an actress for a while and something of that experience goes into her second novel "The Gossamer Thread", which also continues Ellen's story. Bettine has lived in Kent for most of her life but has travelled widely. She has two sons and three grandsons, as well as six step-grandchildren. 'Writing is not just a habit to me, ' she says, 'it is a way of life.'