The Press and Journal (Aberdeen and Aberdeenshire)
New chapter for grandad as Jack’s bedtime stories published
Reading stories to his grandson has opened a whole new chapter in the life of a Lochaber man.
David Anderson thoroughly enjoyed making up tales to read to nine-yearold Jack Knowles.
Now the stories will reach a wider audience in a book launched in Fort William at the weekend.
And all the money raised from the sales of Children’s Bedtime Stories from the Scottish Highlands will go to charity.
Mr Anderson, 69, who lives in Fort William, said: “It all started through reading bedtime stories to my grandson Jack.
“He gave me loads of ideas and I started to write them down, so they would come out the same when I told them. Children don’t like things to be changed, so I thought the safest way would be to put the stories down on paper.
“I write the way I speak, but it was great fun jotting them down.”
Mr Anderson is a member of the Rotary Club of Lochaber, and his colleagues encouraged him to put his bedtime stories into print.
He said: “This took quite a bit of courage, but it is very much a Lochaber effort. There are 14 stories altogether and the books are all printed in Fort William.
“Local people – Kerr Brown, Fiona and Armando Bercenas, Connor Campbell and Rocco Berdarelli – did all the illustrations. Connor is at Lochaber High and Rocco is just eight, but it was all their own work.
“All the proceeds will go to the Rotary Club and will be distributed to different charities.”
Mr Anderson ran an optician’s shop in Fort William’s High Street with his wife, Maureen.
He keeps busy in his “retirement” as a parttime Church of Scotland minister.
“Itallstarted throughreading bedtimestories tomygrandson”