Memoir

The Cow Book: A Story of Life on an Irish Family Farm by John Connell (Granta)

John Connell, a young man from rural Longford, has returned home to the family farm after a decade or so travelling and working as a film-maker and journalist. But his roots are in the country, a place where he feels most at home, whether working the night shift, checking in on the sheep and lambs, or lugging lengths of cut trees onto a tractor. In fiction, John McGahern, a writer that Connell’s father would meet at Mohill mart, was a master of this world. With this work, Connell stakes his claim too with a book of beauty and empathy that is a memorable guide to life on a small Irish farm as well as how to live life itself.