-
Anne Goodwin
a book bubble about
Matilda Windsor Is Coming Home
Literature & Fiction
Author Insight
Why this novel needs 78 references to tea
Many years ago, travelling through in India, Nepal and Bangladesh, I came to relish the traditional South Asian chai, boiled with milk and sugar, spiced with cardamom and cinnamon, and a malted-milk biscuit on the side. Now I prefer herbal teas, or weak Lapsang souchong or Earl Grey. Although I can drink what in the UK we call ‘builder’s tea’, strong enough to stand a teaspoon in, I appreciate I have a choice. Almost everyone drank tea in the long-stay psychiatric hospitals, where I worked, when I wasn’t travelling. But, while staff could make a cuppa how and when they wanted, patients were served tea at set times with milk and sugar already added to the pot. It made life easier for overworked nurses. Sadly, through apathy or through illness, the patients had lost the capacity to complain. It was as far removed as you can get from a Japanese tea ceremony, but I thought the ritual of tea would be a good way of illustrating the stultifying atmosphere of the Victorian asylum. So there are 78 references to tea in this novel; here’s newly-qualified social worker Janice learning about the system the hard way.
Book Excerpt
Matilda Windsor Is Coming Home
Out in the lounge, as if at the flick of a switch, the patients became animated, spines straightening and heads turning to the corridor beyond Janice’s view. She heard an orchestra of clinking crockery as a nursing assistant ferried an aluminium trolley into the centre of the room. “Is it okay for me to go and have a chat with her?”
“If you want, although it won’t be terribly illuminating. Our Matty’s no conversationalist.”
But a more congenial one than you! Janice humped her bag to a wipe-clean chair beside Matty. “Hello again.”
Matty didn’t speak until the nursing assistant brought her tea. “Thank you, dear, and one for my guest.”
“I don’t think our visitor would want this.”
The stumpy blue-green cups and saucers were the poor relation to Sister Henderson’s fine china. Janice felt outraged on the patients’ behalf. “I’d love a cuppa.”
The nursing assistant did some weird acrobatics with her eyebrows.
Matty drank. “Nothing beats a nice cup of tea.”
“I so agree.”
Stomping back to her trolley, the nursing assistant began to pour. Janice didn’t twig she hadn’t been asked how she liked it. At the first sip, she gagged.
The trolley was laden with cups and saucers and a gargantuan aluminium teapot, but no sugar bowl or milk jug. Not even a bottle. Had they set her up?
If so, Eyebrows seemed loath to participate. Janice refused to turn to check whether Sister Henderson watched from the window. She swallowed another sip, pretending it was Indian chai without the spices. If the patients stomached it, so would she.
Draining her cup, Matty broke the silence. Despite addressing the carpet, her enunciation was clear, her accent refined. “My mother takes Lapsang souchong with a slice of lemon.”
Under that unflattering outfit, beneath that crinkled-crepe skin, a young heart blazed. The hospital had stolen her home, her boyfriend, her baby. Her life. But fifty years’ segregation hadn’t erased everything. A spark of personality endured. It was down to Janice to blow on that spark and rekindle her fire.
Why shouldn’t Matty drink Lapsang souchong, orange pekoe or Earl Grey? Served with a sliver of lemon, a wedge of lime or a feast of seasonal fruit. Sweetened with honey, if she fancied it; coloured with Cornish clotted cream.
Amazon
Barnes&Noble
GooglePlay
Apple Books
IndieBound
Kobo
Click Follow to receive emails when this author adds content on Bublish
Comment on this Bubble
Your comment and a link to this bubble will also appear in your Facebook feed.