ONE-TIME biology lecturer turned best-selling author Robert Ryan was guest speaker at the Malvern Writers' Circle Literary Dinner.

He spoke with great modesty about falling into journalism as a travel writer with The Sunday Times and then falling into writing.

The turning point came when he was researching an article about grand prix driver Grover Williams and his later work for the Special Operations Executive in occupied France, which became his first major book Early One Morning.

He found the information he was given had sections 'tipexed out' and his editor told him fill in the gaps for himself.

He described how the 'scales fell from his eyes' when he realised he could supplement fact with fiction and his writing has not looked back since.

Festival Diary - Week Two

Saturday, October 8: 10.30am, Burgage Hall, Church Lane, Ledbury. Gregorian Chant Workshop, with John Rowlands-Pritchard. Tickets £5.00

7.30pm, St. Michael and All Angels, Ledbury. Opus Anglicanum presents Green and Pleasant Land, a celebration of England, its spirit, humour, landscape and people. Directed, devised and produced by John Rowlands-Pritchard, in association with Ledbury Poetry Festival. Five male voices and reader John Touhey present a sequence of music and readings including John Betjeman, Edward Thomas, Charles Dickens, Jane Austen, John Dowland, Henry Purcell, CV Stanford and Edward Elgar. Tickets £7.50

Sunday, October 9: 11.30am, The Lyon Room, Music School, Malvern College. Nicholas Cleobury on Tippet as I knew Him. Mr Cleobury was privileged to work with Sir Michael Tippet, preparing orchestras, recording and performing his works. Tickets £5 (8-18 yrs free).

3pm, Great Malvern Priory, Allegri String Quartet will perform Purcell's Three Fantasias, Tippett's Quartet No2 and Beethoven's Quartet D major Op.18 No 3. Tickets £9.50 front nave, £7.50 rear nave (8-18 yrs free)

Saturday, October 15: 3pm, Great Malvern Priory. Aldwyn Voices, guest conductor Benjamin Nicholas, organ Carleton Etherington and the Richard Watkins Horn Quartet of London. Benjamin Nicholas is director of music and master of the choristers at the Abbey School, Tewkesbury and director of choral music at Dean Close, Cheltenham. Carleton Etherington is organist and master of the choristers at Tewksbury Abbey. The programme will include Tippett's Sonata of Horns, three Motets by Monteverdi and Purcell's Elegy on the death of Queen Mary. Tickets £7.50 (8-18 yrs free).

Tickets for all the above events are available from 01684 892277.