“ON A DREARY AUTUMN EVENING when the clouds hung low in the heavens and the masts and yards of the tall men-of-war in the harbour were obscured by a chill drizzle of rain, there was no more inviting spot in Portsmouth than the taproom of Will Tunn’s Cheerful Tortoise.”

And so begins James N. Hall’s Doctor Dogbody’s Leg, in which Doctor Dogbody, a retired Royal Navy surgeon, sits by the fire at the Cheerful Tortoise with a glass of old Port Royal rum and over a series of nights recounts how he lost his larboard leg. Every night he tells a completely different story about how he came to lose his leg, each more outrageous and hilarious than the last.

Whether for readers or writers, there is a great lesson to be learned from Doctor Dogbody. Plainly put – all well told tales are true. And with that, let us raise a glass to Doctor F Dogbody and his missing larboard leg.