Last Shepherds

by Charles Bowden

The Last Shepherds follows hill shepherds Dave Baxter and Stewart and Gwen Wallace through the cycle of hill farming in the Cheviot Hills of Northumberland—lambing in spring, haymaking, shearing in the summer, then autumn lamb sales and winter feeding. This engrossing book is an extraordinary record of a vanishing way of life on Britain's traditional hill farms.

272 pages, Paperback

First published September 1, 2004

About the author

Charles Bowden was an American non-fiction author, journalist and essayist based in Las Cruces, New Mexico.

His journalism appeared regularly in Harper’s GQ, and other national publications. He was the author of several books of nonfiction, including Down by the River.

In more than a dozen groundbreaking books and many articles, Charles Bowden blazed a trail of fire from the deserts of the Southwest to the centers of power where abstract ideas of human nature hold sway — and to the roiling places that give such ideas the lie. He claimed as his turf "our soul history, the germinal material, vast and brooding, that is always left out of more orthodox (all of them) books about America" (Jim Harrison, on Blood Orchid ).

Reviews

[David Rudin · Rating 3 out of 5]

Like The Last Horsemen, this book is meant to be an accompaniment to a television series not really a stand alone. The author, not to be confused with American Charles Bowden, chronicler of the US-Mexico border, is a British film producer. His writing is straight forward without any of the sense of drama that a professional writer brings.
My rating of the book thus reflects my interest in the subject matter rather than the writing skill. Again the author is to be commended for documenting the history and current status of this vanishing breed.

[Sheila · Rating 5 out of 5]

A very well written book I really enjoyed it