The Sheep Stell

By: Janet White

Narrated by: Joan Walker

Length: 8 hrs and 26 mins

Publisher's Summary

'Every animal needs its own territory, and humans are no exception. My plans were clear at an early age. I intended to live somewhere wild and supremely beautiful.... I imagined searching the whole world for a place, high and remote as a sheep stell, quiet as a monastery, challenging and virginal, untouched and unknown.'

Over 20 years ago, well before the current trend for nature writing, Janet White wrote The Sheep Stell, a beautiful and evocative memoir about her life as a shepherdess. Throughout her life Janet has always tended sheep - first as a young woman in the Cheviot Hills, where she was treated with bewilderment by the other shepherds, before leaving Britain to live on an uninhabited island off the coast of New Zealand, with a bonfire as her only means of communication with the mainland and only her flock of 200 sheep for company.

After a brutal attack by an obsessed young man bent on her destruction, she was forced to leave her beloved island and return to England, where she married, became a smallholder in Sussex and finally bought a hill farm in Somerset where she still lives today. Her memoir tells the tale of a woman before her time, with incredible courage and determination, and wanting only peace and solitude in nature and a life with animals.

Underpinning The Sheep Stell is Janet's devotion to the land and her total commitment to combining the principles of conservation with successful farming. Janet White is a trailblazer in both her life and her work. The Sheep Stell is testament to that and homage to the nature we're so rapidly losing touch with. It is a true celebration of the pastoral and pure escapism to a simpler life.

©1992 Janet White (P)2018 Audible, Ltd

Excellent memoir

This is an excellent memoir with a great narrator. If you like nature or sheep, this book is for you. It is the best book I have read in a long time. It is a soothing balm to a weary heart.

Beautifully written, beautifully narrated

An English girl who knew from a young age that she would be a shepherd lives a life in which she will not be deterred from her dream. Janet White tells her story of a life of love of the natural world and its creatures with enormous grace. It is a book to see, to hear, to savor with unhindered senses. Highly recommended.

A wonderful read

The author describes her life as shepherd in Wales, the Cheviots, New Zealand, Sussex and Somerset, evoking the sights and sounds and smells so you feel you are there with her. This is not a sentimental idyll, sheep die and have to be skinned and violence invaded her island solitude, but the book is a delight.

Life envy

This is a beautiful book, beautifully read. Anyone who has ever longed to leave it all behind and live in harmony with nature will love this, and may actually be tipped into resigning and buying an island / farm!

Joan Walker is the Penelope Wilton of Audible. I’d happily listen to her read the phone book. If phone books were still a Thing.

A great find

This is a beautifully written & spoken book, what a wonderful life this lady has lived. It’s a great listen during these troubled times

Heaven on earth

I wish the whole world was full of Janet White! I lived and breathed everywhere out of her book and I’m so envious of her wonderful life with animals and nature even though I would not survive a day of her life! A truly wonderful read.

Inspirational

For anyone who thinks that they want to take a leap in the dark and live life to the full in harmony with nature - this is for you!

Real life escapism

I enjoyed this audiobook immensely. The writing was superb and I felt like I really was in NZ, Scotland and Surrey with all the animals. There was not a dull moment.