The Little World

And old eccentric.

Trapped in a second childhood. A harmless weirdo. Or so it would seem from a recent detective novel I read. Written about a modern-day serial murderer in Somerset and the detective work that catches her, it takes more than a passing swipe at model railway enthusiasts – and railway hobbyists in general. They are accorded no respect whatsoever.

Oddly enough, one of the elderly ( over 70 ) model railway buffs supplies the clues and logic that lets the story find the killer. He survives.

I wonder if there would have been a similarly dismissive treatment of someone who builds model ships – or aircraft. Is there a novelist’s playlist that ranks hobbies and hobbyists from the elegant and approved to the small and manky?

Where would my collection of stuffed badger dolls rank?

Note: Neville Shute treated us rather better in one of his books – but then he was a real writer, rather than a hack…