Hero of
the Hill by Joy Cowley
I have
been doing a little research this morning on the Rimutaka Hill and also on the
fell engines. I remembered writing
something about them in a footnote back in September when I reviewed Joy
Cowley’s new book Hero of the Hill. I
had a nasty feeling something didn’t quite equate with what I had written when
I said I remembered travelling in a
little fell engine to Cross Creek from Wellington. What nonsense! The fell engines pulled
the trains up the incline from the other side of the hill and I must have
travelled in a railcar. It also
reads as though I was in the engine itself. It was a scary journey, it did
feel very steep and I did take books
to Cross Creek School but it can’t have been a little wooden train as I write.
Put it down to an over active imagination and a thwarted desire to write
children’s stories only vaguely based on truth!
Look at
the interesting pages at the back of Hero
of the Hill for the real facts (and share the story preceding them with a child).
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