The Body on the Beach
Chapter One
Fethering is on the South Coast, not far from
Tarring. Though calling itself a village, Fethering isn't
what that word immediately brings to the minds of people
nostalgic for an idealized, simpler England. Despite
the presence of many components of a village—one
church, one shop, one pub, one petrol station and a
whole bunch of people who reckon they're the squire—Fethering
is in fact quite a large residential conurbation.
The core is its High Street, some of whose flint-faced
cottages date back to the early eighteenth century. The
peasant simplicities of these buildings, sufficient for
their original fishermen owners, have been enhanced by
mains drainage, gas central heating, sealed-unit leaded
windows, and very high price tags.
Out from the High Street, during the last century and
a half, have spread, in a semicircle whose diameter is
the sea, wave after wave of new developments. The late
Victorians and Edwardians added a ring of solid, respectable
family homes. Beyond these, in the 1930s, an
arc of large, unima ... read full excerpt from The Body on the Beach: A Fethering Mystery ebook
