Sadly 10 years after writing to The Independent the word ‘honour’ is still used to describe brutal murders.

24 11, 2025

The Joy of the Oxford Indie Book Fair

By |November 24th, 2025|Categories: Events, Letters to the press, Novels and short stories, Oxford, Oxford Castaways, Shepherd.com, The Bodleian library, The Oxford Times|0 Comments

The joy of the Oxford Indie Book Fair: inclusion, creativity, connection, fun & thought. The Lord High Sheriff gets it and describes it as ‘uplifting.’ https://highsheriffofoxfordshire.co.uk/a-morning-among-oxfords-storytellers Oxib is run by a volunteer committee, and you can see from the faces

19 11, 2025

The tables turned & Oxford Lives interviewed ME!

By |November 19th, 2025|Categories: Art, Biography, Events, History, Kennington, Letters to the press, Lost History, Novels and short stories, Oxford, Oxford Castaways, The Bodleian library, The Oxford Times, The Stars ArtMovement|0 Comments

...and my life in one picture thanks to the artist Diana Bell. Last week I was interviewed for Oxford Lives by Jeremy Allen and Graeme Fry produced this podcast from the interview. https://oxfordlives.libsyn.com/oxford-lives-episode-69-with-sylvia-vetta For ten years, I wrote the life

3 11, 2025

Writing ‘Reptiles’ evoked memories of Bagley Wood

By |November 3rd, 2025|Categories: Biography, Events, History, Kennington, Letters to the press, Lost History, Novels and short stories, Oxford, The Oxford Times|0 Comments

https://www.oxfordmail.co.uk/news/4430842.run-bagley-wood/?  Reptiles, my latest novel starts with Toad Patrol in Bagley Woods. In this pic, I’m wear my high viz jacket but the month wasn’t appropriate, the amphibians move at the end of February and in March.     This

14 02, 2025

The Fifties : Don’t romanticise them not even on Valentine’s day!

By |February 14th, 2025|Categories: Biography, History, Letters to the press, Lost History, Oxford, Oxford Castaways, Shepherd.com, The Oxford Times|0 Comments

 The Fifties: Don't romanticise them not even on Valentine’s Day! Yesterday, I watched two one act plays by Terrence Rattigan at the Oxford Playhouse. They took me back to the fifties like a time machine! When I interviewed Sir Roger

22 01, 2025

How to stop the marginalisation of minority groups.

By |January 22nd, 2025|Categories: Ai Weiwei, Art, China, Art & History, India, Kennington, Letters to the press, Madras Courier, Mixed relationships, Novels and short stories, Shepherd.com|0 Comments

In todays i Yasmin Alibhai Brown writes about British Citizens of Pakistani ancestry and how they regard the grooming gangs. The conclusion was that most people of that background despise them and are distressed by the suffering of the exploited