The story of an ordinary couple in an extraordinary time

LEICESTER, U.K. - Nov. 15, 2013 - PRLog -- “I had intended this to be the story of my father, an ordinary man living in an extraordinary turbulent half century, which shaped his life and subsequently mine. However, when researching my father’s life, I realise what an extraordinary life my mother had also lived and I want to incorporate her own tale. This is a story that also belongs to my sister and me and tells how we came to be the adults we now are.”

This book chronicles the family history of Angela South’s father, John Louis Salter. It starts with his army career, at 14 years old, and how he was posted at 15 to Hong Kong and Mauritius. In WW1, he received the DCM – Distinguished Conduct Medal – and returned home in 1918, with a French bride, Albertine Marie.

John left the army in 1925, qualifying as a civil servant despite his lack of education. He settled with his wife in southern England during the 1920s and 30s. In 1937, Albertine Marie was admitted to a mental asylum for the remainder of her life due to mental instability.

During WW2, John worked in Whitehall and in 1945 was posted to Berlin, where he met Angela’s mother, Christa, who was 20 years old at the time. They returned to England together in 1947, where she studied English and secretarial skills so she could take over as the family bread-winner. John and Christa married in 1951, after the birth of Angela and her younger sister, Karin.

The book delves into Angela’s childhood, through the 1950s and 60s, in her somewhat unusual family, and reveals how it impacted on herself and Karin. “I was loved, but with hindsight I feel my parents never gave me sufficient self-confidence which I believe is vital to a happy and well-adjusted adulthood,” says Angela. “I lost my father when I was 17. I thought he was a difficult old man, and now I want to put that right,” she says, of the motivation to write her family’s story.

PUBLICATION DATE 1st November 2013

ISBN: 9781783069538       Price: £5.99