her final year at the University of Hartford, her main project was to research, write and organise the production of a children's book.

After obtaining the highest possible grade for the project, Ms Hollis went on to graduate with a Bachelor Arts, magna cum laude, majoring in English Literature.

The story which drew such high praise centres around a little girl growing up in Bermuda at the turn of the century. Ms Hollis now hopes to develop and expand her manuscript for eventual publication.

With this in mind, Living promised not to divulge the plot of Love and Hope -- A Bermudian Tale at the Turn of the Century: Suffice to say that Ms Hollis's tale is set around an old Bermuda house visited by a young descendant of its earlier inhabitants. The adventures that befall the family there provide an entertaining narrative that is full of suspense.

Ms Hollis says her story was influenced by her own family's history and its seafaring background and the details she has gleaned about everyday life in late Victorian Bermuda.

"I had been thinking about writing a story and somehow, at the back of my mind, I thought I would like to do something that would tie in with my grandparents. They used to tell me lots of stories about old Bermuda.

"I remember my grandmother reminiscing about `the good old days' when there was dancing in Hamilton, and balls at Admiralty House and Government House, and things like that.'' She reveals that the Hollises came to Bermuda, sometime in the 1770's in somewhat dramatic fashion: "We think John Hollis may have been press ganged from London. He had to buy his way off the ship when it finally docked in Bermuda, so he arrived here with nothing. He married Jane Mason, whose family had been one of the original colonists in the early 17th century.'' The family prospered, however, for by the turn of the century, Capt. Henry Hollis was well-known as a ship merchant.

"Most students choose to write about teenagers of today and all their modern problems so I think the people at college were rather intrigued that I had written something historical, and something which, although it was fiction, was set in a real place, where people led the sort of lives that are described in my story,'' she says.

"But this is still a rough draft of what I eventually want it to be,'' she admits, "Allie, in this story, is ten years old. So now I want to take her up to the age of 15.'' She says she was pleased to be able to develop her writing within the University Scholar programme.

"It's very helpful, because you have an advisor to assist you with the concept and then you're given full rein to develop it. It has to be approved by a committee first, though.'' As part of the project, she chose five outstanding childrens' books to survey.

These included The Reluctant God by Pamela Service, The Witch of Blackbird Pond by Elizabeth Speare, Jacob Have I Loved by Katherine Paterson, The Cage by Ruth Minsky Sender and that perennial favourite, The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis.

"This exercise was very useful for me in finding out the sort of range that children read. I found they usually read two or three years above their age -- so then I felt I had to investigate those books as well, to see how they handled vocabulary and so on.'' She spent two months reading and then two months typing and sorting out photographs to illustrate the booklet (they are of her niece, Stephanie Hollis, then aged five, now six years old).

Unusually for a student of this computerised age, Ms Hollis prefers to write in longhand: "I like the creative process. I carry a notebook around with me and write at any old time. One of our professors of poetry wanted us to carry tape recorders around -- but I couldn't see myself doing that - my public image does determine some of my behaviour!'' She feels the value of the whole exercise, which she says was "a very demanding one'' gave her confidence to continue with her writing in the future.

This semester, she is starting her Masters in library and information science at Simmons College in Boston.

"I would like to be a librarian of some sort, but I would also like to try and write. There's nothing to say that you can't write in your spare time!'' Ms Hollis, who was educated at the Bermuda High School and the Bermuda College, was awarded the Chamber of Commerce Outstanding Student Award and was a recipient of the Nicoll Scholarship.

An essay that she wrote was published in the European Council of International Schools Student Literary Journal.

HOPE AND LOVE -- For her University Scholar programme, student Ellen-Jane Hollis has written a children's book set in Bermuda at the turn of the century.