Welcome to our Winter Issue. It has been a very busy time since my last letter (which I wrote in July). Thank you to the huge number of people who visited our stands at Exford and Dunster Shows in the summer to express their appreciation of the magazine. It was very humbling. We welcomed lots of new readers, too. If you are one of those who met us for the first time on show days, then hello and thank you! I hope that you really enjoy what we do.

At shows people always come up to us to suggest their ideas for articles, too; many a feature or series has been born out of show chat. If the idea has good legs, the next step is to pair the right story with the ‘right’ writer. I love this kind of planning. There’s no point in asking someone to write about something that doesn’t float their boat, and obviously it’s a good idea to pair areas of expertise with topics. Different stories require different kinds of interviewing, research, approach and so forth. But one thing is commonly needed for all articles: every story requires a good listener.

As I was putting together the lovely article which Sophie James has written about her dad, our long-time contributor, Tony James, it occurred to me that between us all – myself and all of our writers – we must have listened to literally thousands of stories. I particularly love pictures of this process, such as the portraits which Andrew Hobbs has taken over the last decade or more of Tony’s interviews in full swing (see p.91).

This issue is dedicated to the listeners and the storytellers. Sophie has listened to her dad for you, Sarah Eveleigh has listened to Heidi Mc Creesh, Avril Stone has journeyed far and wide to hear stories of service stations, Stephen Thompson has tuned in to tales of The Staghunters Inn, he and his partner Cally Elston have travelled on the West Somerset Railway to learn about its history and – in another exciting new partnership – Victoria Eveleigh has worked together with David Ramsay to bring you some of the countless stories about the much-loved Dick and Lorna French. The only limit here was space! David captured almost 15,000 words of interviews and Tortie had the job of delivering this in a suitable format for six pages; no mean feat. These are just some of the interviews which have taken place to bring you Winter Issue.

I hope that you enjoy all of this and more and that you have a chance to open your ears this winter to soak up the sound of leaves and weather, of lives lived and the memories made in the fascinating communities we call home.

Here’s to stunning winter days ahead, as beautiful as the day up at Alderman’s Barrow captured on our cover by photographer Shaun Davey. And, of course, wishing you all a happy Christmas, a peaceful New Year – and happy listening and reading!

Naomi, Hurley and all the team