What does it take to make a living from the land in modern Britain?
'A priceless portrait of one of the least understood and frequently most vilified of people: farmers. It should really be read by all in this country who buys food - i.e. everyone.' - Daily Mail
'Highly researched and deeply thoughtful ... Bathurst peers under the bonnet of these lives and reveals things that rarely make it into print.' - James Rebanks, The Times
'A fine achievement: describing the indescribable' - Rosamund Young, author of The Secret Life of Cows
We think we know what makes Britain's countryside: drystone walls, stiles, sheep on a distant hillside. But for many of us, farmers themselves - the men and women who shape, maintain and care for that land - often remain a mystery: familiar but unpredictable, a secretive industry that's still visible from space.
In Field Work, Bella Bathurst journeys through Britain to talk to those on the far side of the fence. From fruit farmers to fallen stock operators, from grassy uplands to polytunnels, she creates a portrait of modern Britain, exposing in the process the inextricable bonds that exist between land and the people who farm it.
As farmers find themselves torn between time-honoured methods and modern appetites, these raw, wise and funny accounts reveal an ancient way of life changing beyond recognition.
About the Author
Bella Bathurst is a writer and photojournalist. Her books include The Lighthouse Stevensons and Sound, Book of the Week on BBC Radio 4. Her books have won or been shortlisted for several awards including the 1999 Somerset Maugham Award, the Guardian First Book Award, the William Hill Sports Book of the Year and the Crime Writers' Association Gold Dagger. She lives on a farm in Wales.
Industry Reviews
'Highly researched and deeply thoughtful ... Bathurst peers under the bonnet of these lives and reveals things that rarely make it into print. She has a talent for asking the right questions ... Field Work is by turns funny, enlightening, frustrating and deeply sad.' - James Rebanks
'A beautiful hybrid of social history, memoir and nature writing, Field Work manages to bring an entire world out of the shadows. ... Bathurst shows us how interesting all life is if viewed with the correct mixture of sympathy and curiosity' - Alex Preston
'A genuine attempt to get under the fingernails of the people who work in land-based industries and understand why they carry on doing what they do, usually for little financial reward, often in great discomfort and in the face of adversity. And it is a distinguished work of journalism by someone who asks the questions that the reader wants asked [and] sifts the answers perceptively ... This thought-provoking book portrays, with uncomfortable accuracy, life on the green bits beyond the 30-mile limits of Britain's towns' - Jamie Blackett
'A priceless portrait of one of the least understood and frequently most vilified of people: farmers. It should really be read by all in this country who buys food - i.e. everyone. If anyone wants to understand farming better, I would press this book into their hands ... The writing is at once tough and lyrical, unsentimental, piercingly truthful and observant ... heart-wrenching as well as dryly funny ... Field Work is a superb testament to that way of life, and richly demonstrates what a terrible loss that would be - for all of us.' - Book of the Week
'A fine achievement: describing the indescribable' - Rosamund Young, author of The Secret Life of Cows
