The second series of Lark Rise to Candleford ended with a strange sense of closure without resolution, which on balance is probably a good thing for a franchise with more stories to tell. James Dowland's son Sydney arrived to stay at the Post Office while his father recovered from his riding accident, and fitted in all too well, while back at Lark Rise Margaret was finding that love can bring you out in a rash. I know how she feels.

What's this? Rain in Candleford? RAIN?? It seems the idyll of Lark Rise too does occasionally suffer from the weather. It's not all lazily humming bees and the air is, rarely, devoid of dreamily floating dandelion seeds. On this occasion though, it's merely a plot device. It enables Laura and her father to take refuge in the barn, and thereby catch Nan apparently in the middle of an assignation with the farmer's son. This poor lad is another of those Lark Rise characters who goes through life without an actual name, but at least he gets to give Nan a surreptitious kiss, so that's some compensation.

A world away from the grim grit of Red Riding - geographically, chronologically, and dramatically - is the leafy, gentle, genteel world of Lark Rise To Candleford. A drama guaranteed to lull you dreamily to the end of your weekend rather than sit you on the edge of your seat and douse you with cold water before cracking your head with a viciously swung pair of handcuffs. So it's with a sense of inner warmth that I greet the BBC's news today that a third series of Bill Gallagher's adaptation of Flora Thompson's memoir of her Oxfordshire childhood has been commissioned and will film later this summer for transmission in early 2010.

One way or another it's all about the land this week in Larky. Whether or not you can leave it behind, what you can produce from it, and what goes on in the bramble patch. The appearance in Candleford of Candleford's very own policeman, who everyone seems thoroughly familiar with despite never have seen or spoken of him before this week, gives a clue to who will be at the heart of the drama. Yes, it's PC Paterson. Also known as Cabbage. And his wife, who is on her seasonal deathbed.

There be feuding in paradoise what 'as bin goin' arn fer forty year or more. And it continues roit at the very start o' this week's episode when a young girl boi the name of Nan throws a milk churn at our Laura. All roit, Oi admit that may be a bit of an exaggeration, but mark moi words them Fordlow folk are a bunch of hooligans and ruffians, so they are, wot no decent folk would 'ave anythin' to do with.

In the opening scene this week Laura walked to work as the new clock struck the hour and you just knew that the poor girl was going to feel a knife through her heart every time she heard those chimes. But like a harbinger of doom, those chimes rang out over the rest of Candleford and Lark Rise like an ill wind of sound, and Laura's problems paled in comparison with some who heard them.

Olivia Hallinan hasn't had much to do with Laura Timmins beyond smiling sweetly to the customers in the Post Office, coyly at any passing young man, or sternly at the wayward antics of young Minnie. She showed her acting chops this week though, as she came to terms first with wanting Fisher Bloom to stay and, minutes later, with having to say goodbye to him.

The delicate balance of society almost came crashing down in Candleford this week as Miss Lane had a fit of the vapours. Well, a bout of influenza anyway. Enough to confine her to her room for a few days and throw the well-oiled machine of the Post Office quite out of kilter. It also provided an excuse for some of the most risqué dialogue ever heard in this genteel drama.

It was all about the babies in Lark Rise this week. Whether or not to have them, wishing you could if you can't, thinking you were when you weren't, what to do with them when you've got them, and wondering if you did the right thing all those years ago. And in among all that, a huge dollop of the kind of homespun wisdom for which Lark Rise is becoming (in)famous.

When Thomas and Margaret discover her father has passed away suddenly in the rectory, the whole community joins together, not only in condolences for Margaret but also with pointed suggestions that now might be a good time for Thomas to pop the question. But the funeral of the old vicar means the arrival of a new face in Lark Rise and as we all know, that can only mean a cat has been dropped firmly in among the pigeons.

Can a woman outsmart a man? That was the basic question behind tonight's LRTC, and it took an hour to deliver the answer everyone must have been expecting: yes. Meanwhile, dear old Alf was learning his letters - not to mention his syllables - while trying to maintain the semblance of disinterest in Laura by pretending to have another girl - the mysterious and non-existent "Rose" - in tow.

After the feast of festive fun that was the Lark Rise Christmas Special, we settle down to the remainder of Lark Rise's 11-week run, and the first thing on the agenda is a new love interest for Dorcas. Only she's not alone in having her eye on the new arrival in town.

If I'm honest I haven't been feeling very Christmassy up to now, even though all the deccies are up, the TV schedules are looking fabulous and we've started on the mince pies. That was until last night, when I spent 75 minutes in the company of the people of Lark Rise and Candleford. By the time they were all gathered in front of the Post Office for their carol singing I was not only Christmassy I was positively Dickensian. And they threw in a bit of a ghost story too!

A complete second series of Lark Rise to Candleford will follow the Christmas special that Paul mentioned earlier, beginning in January for a total of 12 episodes. Many of the old faces are back, some new faces appear, and then, in the established tradition of Candleford, there'll be some faces that newly appear each week and are treated as if they are familiar old faces. Details after the cut.

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