BOOK worms will be in with a treat as St Joseph's Players present a real page turner next month.

The play, 84 Charing Cross Road, is based on a 1970 book by Helene Hanff, which follows a 20-year correspondence between herself and Frank Doel, the chief buyer of well known antiquarian booksellers Marks & Co and has been adapted for the stage by James Roscoe-Evans.

The play, directed by Nicola Raynolds, will run from Tuesday, September 8 to Saturday, September 12 from 7.30pm.

Nicola said: "The story follows Helene Hanff who is in search of obscure classics and British literature titles unavailable in New York. She noticed an advert in the Saturday Review of Literature and first contacted FD Marks & Co in 1949.

"A long-distance friendship evolved between Frank Doel and Helene and subsequently with the staff of the shop. Christmas packages, birthday gifts, and food parcels to compensate for post war rations were exchanged.

"Their letters included discussions about topics as diverse as the sermons of John Donne, a recipe for Yorkshire Pudding, the Brooklyn Dodgers and the Coronation of Queen Elizabeth II."

The five-story building where the long departed bookshop Marks & Co was located during the novel's action still exists, and has a small round gold-coloured plaque mentioning the memoir on a pillar of the outer wall. 

It housed a music and CD store in the early 1990s, a Med Kitchen restaurant as late as 2009 but is now a McDonald's restaurant.

The play will no doubt spark some memories of the pre-internet age of those wanting to stay in touch.

Nicola said: "We are all able to write a birthday card or short postcard but, like most a millennial; I don't usually keep in touch by 'snail mail. Sadly letter writing is becoming a lost art in this fast paced world of emails, text messages and Skype.

"This play will hopefully evoke memories of a gentler time and maybe inspire some of you to write a letter to a long lost friend overseas.

"Everyone in the theatre group has worked so hard to do justice to this wonderfully entertaining play, which I'm sure people will enjoy."

The production of 84 Charing Cross Road will be performed at St Joseph's Hall in Chapel Street, Leigh. Call 01942 673481 for tickets.