ALL AMONG THE BARLEY
MELISSA HARRISON, BLOOMSBURY, £16.99 (HB)
“If you have ever done field-work of any kind you will know that it never leaves you; your body writes it into your muscles and bones.” 14-yearold Edie Mather, narrator of this moving story set in the fictional Suffolk village of Elmbourne in 1934, leaves us in no doubt that life on the land could be nasty, brutish and short. Yet there was a beauty too in the old ways, when kinship ties were strong and an agrarian existence still meant following natural rhythms dictated by the seasons.
All Among the Barley, the third novel by acclaimed nature writer Melissa Harrison, is a powerful evocation of a restless rural community at a crossroads, when reaping machines, tarmac roads, the wireless and other inventions were starting to challenge long-established ways of doing things. Change was often unwelcome: cheap imported wheat helped the urban poor but left struggling farmers on the breadline.
Harrison’s descriptions of traditional farming and household chores, humble farmsteads and village inns are exquisite, and she delights in unearthing customs such as burying ‘witch-bottles’ to ward off evil. Yet she never glosses over the drudgery, or the limited options open to women at the time.
The novel’s dramatic tension is provided by Constance FitzAllen, a sassy, older Londoner who turns up to document disappearing country lifestyles. Young Ellie falls under Connie’s spell, yet her bold new ideas upset the applecart, triggering a series of unforeseen and shocking events that end up involving the whole village. Ben Hoare, BBC Wildlife