It hadn't been an easy year. A second marriage for me at the age of 40 meant that my two sons, aged four and 11, had to break in a new dad, while he had to work at the uneasy role of stepfather.

There were four personalities, all complete with short fuses, ready to send off sparks in all directions: me the defending mother, he the uncertain father, and the kids wishing they were someplace else.

To top it all off, winter came early that year. That was all we needed - a long, cold winter. The greatest consolation was our open fire, a novelty to us all. He was content, and so was I, to toast bread and marshmallows, roast chestnuts, or just hold hands and stare into the ?re, but the boys soon got bored. They scrapped, he snapped. I stood in the middle, tense, torn between loyalties, my mind scrabbling for a solution.

And that's how winter dragged on until one night during a brief pause in hostilities, he asked: "Would you like me to read to you?"

We would. We all agreed on that.

Quite a large-sized chunk of his attraction was his voice. At full throat it could thunder and roar, or it could hold enough warmth and tenderness to melt my bones. It also had the power to make the hair on the back of my neck rise in salute. Yes. We wanted him to read to us.

In the glow of the ?re we snuggled close, prepared in mind and heart for adventure via Treasure Island.

We listened in blissful silence, broken only by occasional gasps of laughter as Long John Silver came alive with his lilting voice and his rich, rolling rs: "Now young Hawkins . . . you are as smart as paint. I see that when I set my eyes on you." And Captain Flint, Long John's parrot, would squawk: "Pieces of eight, pieces of eight."

The first night the expressive, resonant voice went on and on until sleep claimed the boys and missed me by a whisker. The next day my four-year-old said to me: "He talks it good." Suddenly he had acquired storyteller status.

He "talked it good" every night, always ending on one of Robert Louis Stevenson's cliff-hangers and so engaging our imaginations.

It seemed that each day served merely as a prologue for the joys to come after the evening meal - a meal we now sailed through without fights or fuss over untouched food. All was eaten with a relish that stopped just short of bolting.

After we'd eaten we suddenly had two willing wiper-uppers who just as happily dived into bath and pyjamas in order to settle by the fire to find out what Jim Hawkins heard while hiding in the apple barrel, or what was the "fresh alarm" that brought Jim "to a standstill, with a thumping heart."

He enjoyed it, too. I could tell by the way he settled, wearing a half-grin, book in hand, keeping us waiting until we had to beg him to begin.

Night after night we lived in the 18th century with Jim Hawkins, Long John Silver and crazy Ben Gunn. We shuddered at the very mention of the "black spot" or that devil Black Dog and we laughed at Long John's giving of his "affy daffy." The reading was suspended if he had to work late or attend meetings. I, who until then had been accepted as an OK bedtime storyteller, made no attempt to bridge the gap. I knew when I was outclassed.

Somehow we got through the storyless night and the day that followed, until finally we sat by the fire, wordless, waiting for the resumption of what had become, for us, the greatest story ever told.

When the last page had been turned and the final word had been spoken, we heaved deep, regretful sighs. We wanted it to go on and on, but it was over. So too was the cold, bleak winter.

The kids, now grown, will never forget that time - the winter of our deep content. The simple act of storytelling had broken through my sons' defences leading to a trust that eventually extended to the ?xing of bikes, ?ying of kites and building of cubby houses.

It wasn't all plain sailing, but after that drawn-out winter spent with Long John Silver, the boys were ready to return to the present: to their new life with a new dad - who definitely showed promise.

Marie Gordon, 59, lives in Kaleen, ACT. Her sons, Ben, 30, and Sam, 24, are now married with children of their own. Her interests include writing, amateur drama, singing and chess.