A Croft in the Hills

Name: A Croft in the Hills
Brand: Tantor Audio
Availability: InStock
Author: Katharine Stewart
ISBN: 9798765043387

Author: Katharine Stewart, Neil Gunn

Narrator: Ruth Urquhart

Unabridged: 5 hr 26 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Tantor Media

Published: 09/13/2022

Categories: Nonfiction, Biography & Autobiography, Historical Biography, Nature

Synopsis

A Croft in the Hills captures, in simple, moving descriptions, what it was really like trying to make a living out of a hill croft near Loch Ness fifty years ago. A couple and their young daughter, fresh from city life, immerse themselves in the practicalities of looking after sheep, cattle and hens, mending fences, baking bread, and surviving the worst that Scottish winters can throw at them.

Their neighbors are few, but among them they find the generosity and community spirit that has survived in the Highlands for generations. Working as a tight family unit, they learn to cope, and in time grow to love their little croft. As Neil Gunn writes in his Foreword, their lives gain extra dimensions that 'give the book its unusual quality, its brightness, and its wisdom'.

About Katharine Stewart

Katharine Stewart was born in 1914 in Reading. Following the Second World War and after a spell running a hotel in Edinburgh, she moved with her husband, Sam Stewart, and daughter Hilda, to the croft at Abriachan near Loch Ness, where she began her writing career with A Croft in the Hills. Later she trained as a teacher before, on the death of her husband, becoming the local postmistress at Abriachan. She died in 2013 and is survived by her daughter, Hilda.

Reviews

Goodreads review by Jessaka on November 06, 2020

Farm Life in Scotland Sometimes you can’t move forward in a book unless you know what is being talked about. In this case there were two words that came up for me early in the book. Croft: A small farm, and in this case, one in Scotland. Next came the word “scullery.” It is a pantry where food is sto......more

Goodreads review by Elinor on December 31, 2019

This is a charming, thoughtful and introspective true story about how a couple fled the city with their young daughter in 1960 and purchased a "croft," or small farm, in the Scottish Highlands. This was one of the original back-to-the-land experiences. Hard work, bitterly cold winters, and financial......more

Goodreads review by Jeanne on February 08, 2016

It was a humbling experience reading this memoir. I love reading about peoples passions. Reading about Katharine Stewarts passion and plunge into trying to make a living out of a hill croft (near Loch Ness) was wonderful. The joys, but also the hardships that she, her husband and their daughter went......more

Goodreads review by Kim on February 03, 2022

This is a delightful book full of life stories of the author’s crofting life in the beautiful and harsh Scottish Highlands in the 50s. Upon finishing I immediately ordered the omnibus containing her other similar books.......more