It is a strange coincidence that two rural architectural salvage dealers have just written books, that both have been published, that their books are children's books, and that they are both books about domestic animals, one about a dog the other about cats.
 
Chris Strong of Fagins Antiques in Hele, near Exeter, has written Purrumbus, 146pp from Red Cat Books £6.99. Here's a taster:
'It was said that Purrumbus was the greatest gladiator of all time. This is the story of a cat named after him. The Coliseum rose out of the ground like some huge intrusion of volcanic rock. Its brooding walls and coarse gateways were made from the hard granite that had been quarried from the mountains ranging to the North of this Great Empire of Rome. Far below the Coliseum lay another level, even lower than the dank catacombs that housed the bones of great men and heroes as they waited for their souls to be taken back into flesh and blood by new birth. This level was known as Feraldom. Here, gladiators of a different kind prepared for their own games.'
 
David Urquhart of Posterity Antiques in Ledbury, Herefordshire, wrote Macintosh - Working Cocker, 52pp from Aspect Design, £4.50 which it describes as 'a charming tale of training a working Cocker Spaniel'. A reviewer (Urquhart's brother in law) wrote on Amazon:
'If Kate wants to know the joys and pitfalls of cocker spaniels, she should collar my soppy brother-in-law. The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge now have a three-month old puppy. Besotted is too feeble a word to describe my brother-in-law's bottomless love of his cocker spaniel, Macintosh, that he has burst into print for the first time in his 62 years, writing and illustrating a children's book about his best friend. His mini-masterpiece, Macintosh Working Cocker, was published only last month by a small local firm in his neighbouring county of Worcestershire. The revelation in yesterday's paper that in December the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge acquired a male cocker puppy, which they have been settling in at their rented farmhouse in North Wales. But the most compelling is that you have only to glance at the book (and reading it from cover to cover will take you less than five minutes) to realise that his only motives for writing it were pure love of his cocker and a compulsive desire to declare that love to the world.'
 
The Daily Mail was effusive:
'To him, Macintosh is as powerful and irresistible a muse as the Dark Lady was to Shakespeare when he was writing his sonnets. Before readers part with their £4.50, I should warn them not to expect great artwork from Davey's book - a point which he acknowledges on the title page: `Written and (poorly) illustrated by David Urquhart'. And when I say that the amateurishness of the drawings adds to rather than detracts from the book's charm, it may be that my judgment is clouded by my affection for the author. But charming it certainly is, as it charts Davey's early difficulties in training Macintosh - ` He won't make a gun dog; said Mr D, but we love him and he's a smashing family pet - before building up to a triumphant climax at which you can feel the author's heart fair bursting with pride. But I mustn't give the ending away. Enough to warn the sentimentally inclined to have a hanky ready - Daily Mail, February 3, 2012
 
"I have been ridiculously surprised by the attention it has been getting," Mr. Urquhart said in his local paper. "I'm not a writer or an illustrator and it was just a silly story that only took me a night to write. If I had known that it was going to reach this point then I would have spent a bit more time on it!".
 
Update:
Fagins based in Hele, Devon has since closed down. The site has now become an antique business, The Antique Village selling retro furniture, home décor, shrubs and bedding plants, statuary, garden furniture, architectural salvage with a tearoom.