Miriam: A Tale of Pole Moor and the Greenfield Hills

Set against the bleak moorland above Greenfield in the early 1830s, the story follows a close‑knit community of Romany families living in sod‑thatched huts near Pole Moor. Their isolated world is governed by its own rough codes, and the violent murder of a landlord and his son at the remote Moorcock Inn casts a dark shadow over the valley. The author weaves authentic regional dialect into the narration, giving listeners a vivid sense of place and the rugged lives of those who call the hills home.

The narrator awakens on the first morning of the Saddleworth Wakes, sharing a cramped bedroom with the towering yet gentle Jim Haigh. Though praised as a “powerful scholar,” the narrator wrestles with expectations from a pastor father and a binding apprenticeship at Wrigley Mill, yearning for learning while fearing the rigid path of the ministry. This opening paints a portrait of friendship, ambition, and the tension between tradition and personal desire in a world on the brink of change.