The Lie of the Land Book

Jane Reeves lives and works alone on a windswept Dartmoor farm. The BSE crisis and rising costs have resulted in crippling debts, and the bank is on her back to repay her loan. Selling the old barn is the only way to stave off financial ruin, but the farm has been in the family for generations and she is loath to share the land she grew up on with a stranger. Worse, it has always been her plan one day to convert the barn into a house for herself. Jane decides to move into the barn and sell the farmhouse instead, and for a while this seems to solve her problems. But a new neighbour can never remain silently in the background, especially an ex-city dweller, and slowly, very slowly, his presence invades Jane's treasured way of life. The strength of this story lies in its subtlety. Jane is a difficult character to get to know; fiercely independent, tough and determined. The terse prose reflects the raw beauty of Dartmoor and the harsh demands of farming, but allows us to understand the attachment both hold for Jane and her solitary lifestyle. The tension is less a direct conflict between rural traditions and the voracious appetite of capitalism than a delicate working of one woman's relationship with the landscape she loves. North has produced a simple yet powerful narrative of one woman's struggle to preserve the intangible beauty of the elements that make up her life, past and present. --Claire AllfreeRead More