BBC Radio 4, November 14, 2022 and BBC Sounds

 “Hostilities are resumed.”

I’ve been teetering on the edge of falling into scepticism thus far, it’s time for me to confess that as we’re at the half-way point of the series. I didn’t think that was possible, but there have been so many plausible scientific explanations, they’ve been hard to dismiss. It’s no shaking my belief as a whole, just that possibly there’s something more prosaic happening at Heol Fanog.

I spoke far too soon.

Dicky Dodds the Dowser – yes really, again – introduces Bill and Liz to the concept of ley lines. The bad news is, there are two of them under the house and that does not bode well. Where do they intersect? By the door of the barn, where the animals who went crazy lived. And right next to the – altogether now – electricity meter!

The basic logic of energy living in the earth tracks for me… volcanoes and earthquakes, anyone? But there is more of a supernatural flavour to ley lines, and the ones under Heol Fanog are no longer simply “neutral” as the Druid, Lawrence, explains for us – but black streams, polluted by an evil that haunts the land.

Evil is certainly a thing I believe in, sadly. We underestimate it at our peril and even with the rational theories from Ciaran, it feels like it’s still not enough to explain the feelings Danny experienced when Dowsing with Lawrence and I’m with Evelyn as she suggests the next stage of our investigation should focus on Heol Fanog’s past. I’m guessing the fear factor is about to kick up a gear, and I’m here for it.

Verdict: Don’t cross the black streams! 9/10

Claire Smith