Clara’s Verdict
There’s a particular strain of rural memoir that arrives pre-loaded with pastoral cliché – rolling hills, muddy wellies, redemptive sunsets – and then there’s My Farming Life by Emma Gray, which is entirely free of such sentimentality. Gray became Britain’s youngest solo shepherdess at twenty-three, took on a remote Northumberland farm, fell in love with it and with someone on it, and then had to rebuild herself after heartbreak and a serious accident threatened everything she’d built. This is not a cosy countryside read. It’s honest, funny, occasionally bleak, and genuinely inspiring – and Helen McAlpine’s narration does it full justice across eight and a half hours.
I came to this one as an unabashed city dweller with limited knowledge of Border Collies and none whatsoever of sheep genetics, and I found myself completely absorbed from the first chapter. That’s the real test, and this book passes it easily.
About the Audiobook
Emma Gray shot to wider public recognition through the BBC Two series This Farming Life, but this audiobook – her second – stands entirely on its own merits. It picks up the story of Fallowlees Farm in Northumberland: the expansion of the cattle herd, the addition of horses, the Border Collies for which she has become one of the country’s most respected breeders and trainers. But it’s also, at its core, a story about recovery – from a relationship that ended badly, from a physical accident that threatened her ability to continue farming, and from the particular psychological challenge of working alone on land that provides precious little in the way of human company or external validation.
What Gray does so well is refuse the easy arc. She doesn’t pretend that farming is idyllic; she shows it as relentless, physically punishing, financially precarious, and uncertain in ways that those of us behind desks rarely have to contend with. The sections on Border Collie training are fascinating even if you’ve never owned a dog, because Gray is essentially describing the construction of a working relationship built on trust, precision, and mutual understanding. The chapters contributed by her partner Ewan, documenting his own farming experience on the Isle of Bute, add a welcome second perspective and a different quality of voice. Alan Titchmarsh called it “a heartwarming tale of life on the land,” and for once that kind of cover endorsement feels accurate rather than obligatory.
The book is written with warmth and a dry Northumbrian wit that surfaces at unexpected moments and prevents the harder passages from becoming overwhelming. Gray earned her happiness, and the reader feels every step of it.
The Narration
Helen McAlpine brings a warm, grounded quality to Gray’s voice – unpretentious and direct, with a dry humour that surfaces at just the right moments. She doesn’t overplay the emotional passages, which means they land with considerably more force than they might in more melodramatic hands. The Northumberland setting comes through in the pacing – there’s a quietness to the narration that suits the landscape without becoming sleepy. At eight hours and thirty-four minutes, it’s an easy listen to complete over a weekend, and one you’ll find yourself reluctant to put down.
What Readers Say
My Farming Life holds a 4.7 out of 5 from Audible UK listeners. Fans of the BBC series have been particularly enthusiastic: one reviewer said the book “adds on somehow – a bit more of their backstory and more of a sense of the obstacles that had to be overcome and the resilience it all needed.” Another, herself a farmer, offered perhaps the highest available compliment in the genre: “Emma is farming blood through and through and it shows in her writing. There are too many fake, plastic ‘shepherdesses’ writing books that have no substance or actual knowledge about farming.” A third reviewer enjoyed both books and is already hoping for a third, set on Bute. The returning readership says everything about the quality of what’s here.
Who Should Listen?
This is for readers of rural memoir and nature writing, for fans of This Farming Life, and for anyone who has ever wondered what it genuinely takes to work the land alone, without a safety net. It’s also particularly well suited to those who appreciate resilience narratives that don’t traffic in easy triumph or tidy resolution – Gray earns every good thing that comes to her, and the reader earns the satisfaction of witnessing it. Jimmy Doherty put it well: this will inspire any listener to look at the countryside “with newfound appreciation.”
Begin listening today – get My Farming Life on Audible UK.
