A beautifully-written and moving story; thanks for posting it. Have you written any other fiction? I couldn't see it (or even this one) in the list of writing on your frontpage.

Wholeheartedly approve your reading list, by the way. O Caledonia in particular is an under-recognized gem; I've never seen anyone else capture the awesomeness of squirrels the way she does:

> Calm and tranced she walked up through the beeches again and saw two red squirrels leaping along their sinuous branches; they leapt and curvetted, stopped dead, flourished their tails and were off again, swift and smooth, fleeting like light up the trunks, so bright and merry and joyous that she wanted to shriek with delight.