ELY resident Ray Cross received the perfect Christmas gift this week when his book My Life and Memories was published.

Mr Cross, who lives at Fairfax Court, has just celebrated his 81st birthday and originally started writing down his memories to share with his family.

With the help of a local publisher, however, his book is now available to buy.

Susan Harrison of SHBB Publishing, the publishers behind the book, said: “Mr Cross wanted to write down his thoughts and memories for his family. Part of my job was to help him organise those thoughts and memories in a format that would make them readable and enjoyable.

“The result is a dip-into book, with lots of snippets of memories that cover the whole of Mr Cross’s life to date. That’s 81 years of living and working in the Fens, memories of his schooldays in Haddenham, of being a young man courting his first wife with outings to Ely, of working on local farms, and his latter working years as head groundsman at the King’s School, in Ely.”

My Life and Memories by Ray Cross is available from Burrows Bookshop, in High Street Passage, Ely.