About the author

Vyridian E. Green was born in Nuneaton and loved writing while

she was young. She was a good breaststroke swimmer, holding all
of the breaststroke records when she left school, but unfortunately
wasnt good enough for the county team.
She went to the University of Bath, where she read Applied
Biology, specialising in Microbiology, and has been working in the
food industry for the last 25 years. She has dabbled in archery
(compound bow) and golf, and also played table tennis for the
county veteran team for a number of years before retiring to look
after her mum.
She is currently living in Ross-on-Wye with her mother, Thelma
Green, the inspiration behind this story.

To Maddison Green

Vy r i d i a n E . G r e e n

RUBY RED FINDS

HOME

A NEW

Copyright Vyridian E. Green (2015)

The right of Vyridian E. Green to be identified as author of this
work has been asserted by her in accordance with section 77 and 78
of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced,
stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any
means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or
otherwise, without the prior permission of the publishers.
Any person who commits any unauthorized act in relation to this
publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims
for damages.
A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British
Library.
ISBN 9781784557232 (paperback)
ISBN 9781784557256 (hardback)
www.austinmacauley.com
First Published (2015)
Austin Macauley Publishers Ltd.
25 Canada Square
Canary Wharf
London
E14 5LQ

Illustrated by Tom Haynes

Printed and bound in Great Britain

Acknowledgments
Firstly to Thelma herself for the inspiration, and to Val for her
encouragement over the years. Secondly to everyone at Austin
Macauley for taking a chance on an untried dabbler in words and
putting up with my inexperience, especially Tom, who had a hard
time with my thoughts about the illustrations!

Chapter One

Down towards the south-west of England the landscape

was green and folded. Nice rolling hills with pleasant little
valleys between them, often with a sparkling stream or
brook providing lovely picturesque nooks for children
(and sometimes adults) to rest and play.
Of course, the little towns and villages that were in this
area of the country tended to be wonderful playgrounds
for children once they escaped from school.
This story is about one of these children, a young girl
called Thelma Dorothy May Foster. She wasn't too
impressed with all of her names, and tried very hard to
only say 'Thelma' when asked her name, but of course,
schools being the same then as they are now, Thelma had
to put up with being called 'Dotty Foster', 'Maybe Foster'
and several other variations, none of which were
complimentary or even particularly nice. School children
can be very cruel without realising how nasty some of the
things they say or do can be!
Thelma was starting to grow up in more ways than one.
She was now half an inch taller than her mum, Ellen, who
although she was only 4 foot 11 and a half inches tall, was
a very formidable woman when anyone was foolish
enough to upset her! When she was young, her hair had
been a beautiful honey blonde, but it was now starting to
fade to a silvery blonde (never mention grey!) and she
1

would go once a month to her friend in the village to keep

it neatly permed and just long enough to touch her
shoulders.

Thelma had thick black hair which she always kept

long, most of the time reaching her waist, and usually kept
back from her roundish face by a couple of metal clips
above her ears. She often wondered how she had black
hair when her mums had always been so fair. Of course,
Ellen would try to make sure that her daughter looked
neat and tidy when out, and would spend ages brushing
and combing her hair, then pinning it up into whatever
style took her fancy that day. Thelma was a bit of a
tomboy at this age though, and even though she knew that
her mum was trying her best, by the end of the day her
hair would be all over the place or scrunched up in a
bunch on the top of her head!
2

Thelma's birthday was coming up, and she had been

trying to drop very broad hints that she would like a
bicycle for her birthday. Her mum, Ellen, had known for
some time what Thelma would have liked for her birthday
that year, but as a single mum, there was no way she
could afford a new bicycle. Ellen had asked around her
friends, but she didn't know of anyone with an old bike
that she could buy for Thelma, so she was anxiously
trying to think of something that she could afford that
Thelma would like almost as much as a bicycle, without
much luck.