Born in 1933 at Wimborne in Dorset, Hazel Farrell spent the early years of her working life helping her father run a stationers and printing business in her hometown.

In 1961 Hazel married Edwin Charles Farrell and after living at Wimborne for a few years they moved to Bransgore in the New Forest.  In 1970 their son Adrian was born.  At this time, when Adrian was four or five, she started writing children’s stories and poetry, and also held her first solo  exhibition of paintings in  Boscombe Library, Bournemouth.

In 1978 the family moved to Malvern in Worcestershire.  For a while she drew and wrote a monthly feature for the  Malvern Gazette titled ‘Curiosities of the Countryside’.

In 1984 the family moved back south to Hampshire. During these latter years she has moved further forward into writing.  Her first novel was Truth Among Women in 1988 and the second The Dog Rose Summer in 2002. Her latest book to date is Over The Fields Of Clover and is the story of the family and her childhood, incorporating her father’s war diary.

She is a member of  The Society of Authors and The Writers' Guild of Great Britain.

Over the Fields Of Clover by Hazel Mary Farrell
Published by Wilverley Press (ISBN 978-0-9543089-3-3) 
Price:£7.50

This book is mainly an autobiography of the author’s childhood before and during the Second World War. It is the story of her family. She gives detailed description of how the family lived in those days. This book is full of memories.

On finding her father’s diary after he had died, she decided to publish it, and incorporate it in the book.

There are eight chapters full of description and the characters are brought to life. As Hazel is an artist as well as a writer she has illustrated this book with drawings as well as photographs.

'When families had many children, there were plenty of relations to take care of them and the children’s lives were very much enhanced by the uncles, aunts and cousins who came to stay. It’s remembering these very special people who made the story worth telling. These characters were often eccentric in their individual ways, but they would help us to form the basis of good family life.

'Our family is made up of various names, which crept in with marriage and so I remember the Slatters, Warehams, Ryleys, Nortons and many more besides.'
 
This book can be ordered from bookshops or send cheque and order to Wilverley Press, 15 The Rise, Widley, Waterlooville, Hants PO7 5DQ