The sidebar widget has a girlie, pinkish purple foxglove (digitalis)on it, the significance is of course that digitalis is used to make some heart medications.

If you have a favourite book or author which you think is a bit neglected you can nominate them via the comments and I will add them to the list. If there are any reviews which I can link to, so much the better. If you don’t have a blog of your own which you can post reviews on you can either e-mail me your review or just add it to the comments and I’ll link it to the relevant author or book.

Joan Kyler recommended the author Angela Thirkell as one that I might like to try and after reading one of her books I’m now chewing at the bit to get my hands on some more of them. That was what gave me the idea because Thirkell’s writing doesn’t seem to be terribly well known and this is just a way of trying to spread the word about her and others.

I have a few authors which I could add to the list. A.J. Cronin and Lewis Grassic Gibbon are a couple which spring to mind. In fact most of the ones which I can think of are Scottish. How very parochial of me! Maybe other people have their own ‘local heroes’ in need of some tender loving care.

The CPR Book Group List – so far.

Arnold Bennett – specifically The Grand Babylon Hotel
Marjorie Bowen
A J Cronin
Robertson Davies
Edna Ferber
Lewis Grassic Gibbon
Audrey Erskine Lindop
Mary de Morgan
Miss Read
Mazo de la Roche
D E Stevenson
Angela Thirkell
Mildred Walker
Oswald Wynn

This is the oldest building in Dumbarton, it dates back to 1623 and it is situated in the High Street next door to what used to be the good old Woolworths store, now sadly missed.

Most of the time I lived in Dumbarton, Glencairn House was empty and neglected. Believe it or not it has had a bit of a facelift in recent years and at least now it is being used. It seems to be home to a credit union nowadays. The credit union is a great idea but I’m sure they could have found somewhere else for it to be housed. I wish somebody would deal with that buddleia before it does serious damage to the building.

Glencairn House would be the perfect location for a tourist information centre/museum, which as far as I can see, they don’t have in Dumbarton. It has links with Robert Burns as he was made a freeman of the town in the building.

Tobias Smollett and A.J. Cronin also have links with the town and Coleridge and the Wordsworths visited the town and castle too.

A.J. Cronin did the research for his book Hatter’s Castle at the local library, sadly years before I was working there. Like many of his books it was made into a film in the 1950s.

Considering all the history involved with having such an important landmark as the castle/rock, the links with Mary, Queen of Scots and even Merlin, the town council has done absolutely nothing to bring visitors into the town and exploit the treasure which they have on their doorstep.