The Joy of the Oxford Indie Book Fair
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 of the delightful students volunteers from Oxford Brookes Publishing Course that as well as hardworking, they were enthusiastic.
There’s a pic of me when I was their age behind the Lord High Sheriff !
Here’s me now on my stand in 2025 ..ah well.
None of this could have happened without the support of Felicity and Richard Dick and the Lucy Group.
It is great to have an independent Oxford icon behind us. Shona Nicholson the experienced event organiser is neither an author nor publisher but manages everything on the day out of the goodness of her heart. It was great to see another incredible organiser at the fair Michelle Casteletti announcing the theme for The Oxford Festival of the Arts 2026 Signs Symbols and Secrets
The pics show that oxib is for EVERYONE. Dr Katie Isbester of Claret Press, my publisher, led the discussion of David v Goliath. She launched Secrets of Micro publishing… so if you want to start a publishing company get a copy.
The tables turned & Oxford Lives interviewed ME!
…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 stories of 100 inspirational people from five continents and every background for my Castaway Series in The Oxford Times. My profile features were popular so they were made into three books. The only condition was that the castaways had to have a link to Oxford. The series could have gone on forever such is the turnover of amazing people who come to live, work or study in this wondeerful city which I call the Hollywood of Stories. It felt to me that Oxford Lives is the successor of Oxford Castaways except it isn’t written journalism. The tables had been turned but the conversational style of the podcast was in the style of the castaways series where my aim was to let the castaways tell their story and not select from it and edit it in a way that distorted it or could lead to misinterpretation.
The Oxford Castaway series enriched my life because I became friends with many of the Oxtopians and they turned the island into a kind of club, connecting people across careers and classes. All the Oxtopians from Town, Gown and County were achievers but were modest with it. The advantage of approaching an interview without preconceptions was that I was constantly surprised by the stories I heard. I told the castaways that I would share the copy with them and that they were welcome to delete anything or add to it. That was why they felt they could trust me and were willing to reveal themselves. For example, Sir Roger Bannister, the famous scientist & runner, told me a story, not then in the public realm, of how he used himself as a guinea pig in an experiment on heat disease.
I castaway the Chinese artist, Weimin He, and he made the cover illustration for the first book, he also attended many castaway related events including the launch of his fellow castaway Ray Foulk’s memoir ‘Stealing Dylan from Woodstock’. In 1969, Ray and his brothers stole Bob Dylan away from Woodstock to the most unlikely location of the Isle of Wight. The Beatles and those festivals blasted through the class-ridden, patronising, conservative norm of the UK I knew as a child. I compared the launch in Blackwell’s and here is Weimin’s sketch of the event.
Ray and I have become friends and we are two of the founders of The Oxford Indie Book Fair (oxib) which has grown and grown. The 2025 Oxib will be opened on Sunday 23 November by the Head of the Bodleian Richard Ovenden. The castaway series had came to an end when Newsquest stopped using freelance writers. I would LOVE to have castaway Richard and many of our speakers including Paterson Joseph with whom I was just interviewed on local radio.
Many famous Americans have passed through Oxford including Bill Clinton whom I never met but I castaway his fellow American, Bill Heine, who worked for a while for Robert Kennedy and documentary filmmaker, Dai Richards who did interview Clinton. I had the privilege of getting to know Steve J Gould when on sabbatical here. There are few scientists famous enough in their life time to be canonised by the US Congress as a ‘Living Legend’ but that happened to Steve. In 1997, he even voiced a cartoon version of himself on The Simpsons. I have used him to inspire a character Steve Darwin in my just published feminist crime thriller Reptiles.
A fellow oxib organiser James Harrison published Oxford Castaways 2&3. The cover illustration of the book above was by his partner and castaway the animator, Joanna Harrison of the Snowman fame.Is it because I am getting old that local radio and Oxford Lives want me to talk about my life history in all its variety.? Unique surely is the way artist Diana Bell has depicted it? My life in one picture! 
Diana is part of the memoir panel on Sunday@oxib. She’ll launch her book – do come. The panel is facinating.
Writing ‘Reptiles’ evoked memories of Bagley Wood
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 is how I describe Toad Patrol in Reptiles
‘City girl, Alex, was amused when she first heard about Toad Patrol after buying a house in the village. She witnessed residents wearing high-visa jackets patrolling alongside the old Abingdon Road during mating season to protect a throng of frisky toads, newts and frogs from being flattened as they bounced out of Bagley Wood to the pond near Chandlings School. George had explained it to her,
‘Amphibians are not good at dodging traffic so we use torches to spot them as they near the kerb.’ Alex joined the team twice a week the previous year. She learned to place the rescued in buckets. George identified them including their sex, recorded the numbers and carried the buckets across the road where they were released to finish their journey to spawn in their favourite pond.’
I’ve good memories of taking my sons there in the holidays but you had to get permission from the Bursar of St Johns in those days. With Shirley & Idris Jones, John & Gill Hedge & Chris Warner, Atam & I founded the Kennington Peace Group and when the CND activist, Bruce Kent, was walking from Land’s End to John O’Groats, we arranged to meet him for a picnic in Bagley Woods on the way. I think it was 1983. Atam and Justin are talking to Margaret Ibbott. Bruce is sitting on the grass.
I became involved in KOA in 1974.
In the nineties, we started the Bagley Wood Fun Run. In 2013, I made a coup when I persuaded Sir Roger Bannister to open it. He invited the winners to tea with him. In those days, Ekhard Groth followed by Sylfest Muldal organised the Fun Run and it involved a lot of work! It was popularwith runners and walkers for 25 years. I walked it when not a marshall. 
KOA ended after 50 amazing years. Under the KOA banner and using our volunteers, the village ran brilliant events including Kids 4 KOA concerts, Opera Gala Nights, an annual pop up shop–the first in Oxfordshire- &,with the school and church, we ran a village fete. They like the Fun Run ended with KOA.
In 2018, when I stepped down from being chair of KOA we couldn’t find a replacement for me so decided that our 50th anniversary was the perfect time to celebrate our achievements and wind it up.
The final Fun Run was opened by the Lord High Sheriff who changed out of his ceremonial gear to run it.
When I wrote for the Oxford Times between 1998 and 2018, I was lucky enough to get a two page spread for a feature on Bagley Woods.
St Johns College,who own the wood, have been more open in recent years. I contacted Professor Heather Bouman, who has the great title of Keeper of Bagley Woods to try to make the woods family friendly. She’s open to the idea of nature trails and information boards but the wheels turn slowly in the colleges.
So watch this space….
ONLY CONNECT! Kennington ( Oxfordshire) and Musanda(Kenya)
ONLY CONNECT
There is a glimmer of hope with the ceasefire in Gaza although given, Netanyahu unilaterally ending the last one, the world can’t trust him. Trust is so important and it comes through connecting with mutual respect and showing, through actions matching words, that we are worthy of being trusted. My village of Kennington(Oxfordshire) and the village of Musanda (Kenya) connected on Saturday 11 October 2025. The attached photos from Kennington and Musanda (at the end of the blog) are testimony that this was a JOYOUS occasion that is to be treasured. The chair of the twinning committee, Rev Samson Kiponiyi (Associate Vicar of Kennington) connected with Rev Dr Joseph Wandere Maumo and the Imam Hamis Sakasa.
Taking part in the celebrations in Kennington were Kennington/ Oxford Silver Band, Kennington Chorale, Kennington Amateur Dramatic Society, the scouts and the Friends of Kennington Library. As well as entertaining each other over zoom there was a meet and greet followed by tree planting.
The twinning could not have happened without the support of Kennington Parish Council. The chair of the Parish Council, Alan Cobb, made a moving speech in English and SWAHILI! (His first brave attempt at the language.) It’s worth reading.Twinning Speech by Alan Cobb ( Kennington Parish Council)
I’ve known Nancy Mundenyo Hunt, founder of the Nasio Trust since 2014 when I cast her on Oxtopia for The Oxford Times. Nancy HuntNancy organised the events in Kenya.
Following writing a novel together, Not so Black &White, (NSB&W) we set about building the first community library in west Kenya. NSB&W was published during Covid so sadly had NO launches.
With John Argyle, the chair of the Friends of Kennington Library I talked about how storytelling is universal and can connect us. Cosmic Cats, a book of stories by children from here and there will be the first book in the library. We said goodbye with KADS singing THANK YOU FOR THE MUSIC. (Many years ago, in 1978 I was the founding chair of KADS.)
The zoom connection was followed by tree planting in Kennington and in Kenya.
There is enthusiasm to connect through sport too via Kennington boys and girls football teams. What’s not to like? The Union Jack and the Kenyan Flag were on display to celebrate each village and not to create hatred and division .
Making HISTORY and friendship across continents.
https://www.thisisoxfordshire.co.uk/news/25522672.kennington-twin-village-africa-weekend/
I am proud of my village. On Saturday there will be plenty of red, white and blue bunting mixed with Kenyan red, green and black. Flags for what they are meant to be used for, celebration and hope and not exclusion and hate.
Thank you The Oxford Mail for ‘flagging’ it up. I sent the paper pics from our May Towards Twinning event (see below) but ,instead, they used an old one of Nancy and I from the launch of our novel Not So Black & White that they found in their archive. But I suppose it does represent the ‘friendship’ we want to promote.
TOWARDS TWINNING EVENT May2025
On October 11, Kennington will twin with Musanda in west Kenya. Musanda looks as if it’s the first village in Kenya to twin with an English village. Four delightful inhabitants of the village were in Kennington at the weekend so we organised a Towards Twinning event. You can see from the pics that it was moving and fun. The choir entertained us and the scouts have become penpals with some children in Musanda. They received their on paper letters and that felt special.
I was the first speaker because I was able to tell the His and HER –story! The twinning was my suggestion but it was made possible by Rev Samson Kuponiyi agreeing to chair the twinning committee and getting the support of the Parish Council. This act of friendship wouldn’t have happened if Kennington hadn’t been the only village in the UK to, every year for 50 years, to raise money for an overseas project. The intention was to show a few minutes of this video (link below) but that didn’t happen. The video was made for a KOA Gala Night to be shown before the folk singer Peggy Seeger and I burst through the door. It celebrated the ways KOA enhanced village life through events like the Bagley Wood Fun Run, the Kids for KOA concerts to encourage music and the First Pop up shop in Oxfordshire which ran every August from 1975 -2018.
https://vimeo.com/64536645 Fifties Fandango
For 40 years, I organised the main social event mostly Gala Nights with a three course meal and musical entertainment (arranged by the much missed Rebecca Alison). But, my first attempt at organising a KOA event, was in 1975 when I produced a one act play by Checkov and, downhill after that, because next up was a trite piece of my own writing A Victorian Musical Extravanganza. It was out of that KADS was born. (KADS being our Am Dram Society.) So, for many, the video brings back good memories.
Then I looked at the scouts as I said,
‘KOA started in 1969 long before you were born -in a time before mobile phones and the internet and before easy travel around the world. It’s because of that history that we are here today preparing to twin with a village in another continent wanting to be friends and to learn from each other. Kennington should be proud of what we achieved in the 50 years of KOA. I am most proud of being involved for 45 years.
When I handed a cheque to the founder of Integrated Village Development Trust, Michael Wright thanked the village saying, ‘Over the years you have undoubtedly changed the lives of more than 100,000 people for the better.’
This little village has made its mark in 3 continents.
The Buildings and infrastructure: The buildings we funded are still working. I often see Tonia Cope Bowley who founded the Thembisa Trust so know the preschool / community centre in KwaZulu Natal is still benefiting the community there. The disability centre for victims of land mines in Cambodia, the library in Bonu, Benin, and the Spirulina production unit in Musanda( PiC behind me) are still operational. My ex- business partner former Kennington resident, Gill Hedge, went to Mali. She described how the electric grain grinders we bought for the women in the 40 villages in Manankoro saved them three hours a day work pounding the grain by hand. The project had transformed lives. The women were enterprising and with the time saved they started market gardens and small businesses and were able to help their children’s education.The water tanks are still on the school roofs in Jinja province in Uganda providing drinking water for the staff and children. The toilets high in the Andes in Peru are still working.
Revolving Loan schemes in three continents are ongoing.
Helen Wright keeps me updated on the project in Jharkhand. India (2002) The boys taken out of bonded labour and given loans to set up businesses or to buy tools for apprenticeships is working because all but one paid back the loans.
Projects that had ripples: The Henry Doubleday Research Foundation, received funds from our government for research in organic agriculture but not to put any in to operation in Africa. We paid them to do it in Baring district in Kenya. Halcyon visited that project. It was so successful that neighbouring governments are copying it. Similarly the peripatetic skin care clinic for people with albinism in Tanzania is still working and the Malawi government has copied it.
That was the past but a past I believe Kennington can be proud of .
I’m a believer in libraries giving access to the world and for upward mobility. I wouldn’t be talking to you today if, as a child, I hadn’t had access to Luton Central Library. That’s why I am also proud that many people in Kennington rallied around to save our library from closure and are helping to build the first community library in west Kenya in Musanda, the village we will twin with.
Meeting here Today connecting with Nancy Rajab and Eunice is the Present
The Future is the scouts and their pen pals and the Cosmic Cats authors. I brought together St Swithun’s School with a school near Musanda for this project. Storytelling is loved everywhere in the world- it can connect us all. The children here and there produced this beautiful book. That is what friendship can do, feed the imagination and encourage empathy and love not hate. In the video, I was in a fifties car. Rajab and Eunice have flown here in a modern jet. In October, we hope to be transported to a new era- a future you in this room must create.
Jacqs Motion serving the Cosmic Cat cake and Daniel Livingstone reading his fabulous story.
There was an exchange of gifts. Amena Sutton, adminsitrator of Kennington Chorale presented a copy of I Love You All– the history of the choir and Crucifixion the work especially composed for them by Tom Edny.
Meeting Giorgio!
Meeting Giorgio!
Today the death was announced of Giorgio Armani. What’s my connection with the fashion designer? My journey to becoming a novelist began when I took up freelance writing for magazines mostly about art, antiques and books.
The Imperial War Museum was about to launch an exhibition on one of my favourite British artists, Eric Ravilious so I rang the editor of Weekend to ask if I could review it. He said ‘No’ but you can review the Armani at the Royal Academy. I was pleased that we were talking on the phone and not face to face so he couldn’t see my unstylish outfit. Of course I agreed and it was my first foray into writing about fashion. I arrived at the press preview wearing not an Armani suit like most of the others present but a 1940s vintage tweed jacket! I stood out!
I watched with a wry smile while Norman Rosenthal introduced Giorgio Armani. Rosenthal had said that there would be fashion at the RA ‘over his dead body’ but he looked pretty alive to me. Georgio had given the RA a large donation, which I’m sure had nothing to do with the U-turn!
Not having studied fashion, I approached my review of the Armani retrospective as seeing how Giorgio adapted his designs as women’s roles and lives changed in post war world. It worked. The joy of writing about fashion is how it can look on the page.
The editor liked it and let me review the Ravilious too!
Unlike many writers, I tried to shine a light on exhibitions not given enough publicity including Black British Fashion, Africa Remix and the Indian textile culture.I was privileged to meet Vivienne Westwood when I reviewed exhibitions for the Weekend Magazine of The Oxford Times. I was at the press day for her crowning glory –the retrospective exhibition at the V&A in May 2004. I‘ve just watched Marie Antoinette and it reminded me of how she was inspired by fashion history especially when she moved from grunge to glamour.
https://www.oxfordmail.co.uk/news/1868593.decade-changed-face-fashion/ Dior in the fifties
To buy copies of Oxford Castaways 2
Go to
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