Till the Cows Come Home: A Lancashire Childhood

by Sara Cox

The bestselling Easter hit, the perfect gift for the bunny (or bull) in your life. 'Cox is a natural storyteller... she brings that authentic voice to bear in her memoir. The tone is so intimate, chatty and friendly, so you feel as though she could be sitting next to you' Hannah Beckerman, Daily Express 'endearing, engaging and very funny' Mirror 'Coxy's memoir about growing up on a farm is as funny as you'd expect, genuinely touching and has some excellent 80s and 90s details. Her love of animals is infectious' Alexandra Heminsley, Grazia 'The book is like a big warm hug , full of local characters and misadventures' Sophie Heawood, Observer 'I loved it!' Lynda La Plante Glorious springtime, haystacks and a herd of cows can all be found in this Sunday Times Bestseller A funny and heart-warming love letter to childhood, family and growing up.

Till the Cows Come Home is DJ and TV presenter Sara Cox's wonderfully written, funny coming of age memoir of growing up in 1980s Lancashire. The youngest of five siblings, Sara grew up on her father's cattle farm surrounded by dogs, cows, horses, fields and lots of 'cack'. The lanky kid sister - half girl, half forehead - a nuisance to the older kids, the farm was her very own dangerous adventure playground, 'a Bolton version of Narnia'. Her writing conjures up a time of wagon rides and haymaking and agricultural shows, alongside chain smoking pensioners, cabaret nights at the Conservative club and benign parenting. Sara's love of family, of the animals and the people around them shines through on every page. Unforgettable characters are lovingly and expertly drawn bringing to life a time and place. Sara later divided her childhood days between the beloved farm and the pub she lived above with her mother, these early experiences of freedom and adventure came to be the perfect training ground for later life. This funny, big-hearted and often moving telling of Sara Cox's semi rural upbringing is not what you'd expect from the original ladette, and one of radio's most enduring and well loved presenters.

Genres: Nonfiction, Biography, Memoir, Audiobook, Autobiography, Biography Memoir, Comedy

320 pages, Hardcover

First published March 7, 2019

About the author

Sara Cox is a British television presenter and radio host.

Librarian's note: There is more than one author in the Goodreads database with this name.

Reviews

[Stephen · Rating 4 out of 5]

easy going read about sarah cox growing up in Bolton Lancashire on her fathers farm and her mothers several pubs, enjoyed it and was an quick read

[Helen Marquis · Rating 4 out of 5]

I think Sara Cox has done enough to endear herself to the Great British public, that she's bordering on National Treasure status. If you read her childhood memoir, 'Till the Cows Come Home" it should easily tip the balance for any doubters. She wasn't born into a world of opportunities as the child of a celebrity, and had no subsequent shunt up the ladder of success, instead, she was born to a farmer and his wife on the outskirts of Bolton. Rags to riches? More like muck to magic, as she seamlessly transitions from Bolton farmgirl to Korean model in her own inimitable style.
This is less like reading a book, and more like spending a long night in the pub with Coxy, listening to her tell her tale, as it is written very much in her style of speaking - packed with jokes, self-deprecation and daftness. By the end of it, you feel like she's one of your friends.
A fascinating insight into a normal childhood and how it made the much-loved presenter we all know today. I wasn't a huge fan of her before, pigeon-holing her into that Zoe Ball / Claudia Winkelman / famous-parents-coat-tails bucket, but she really rises above it, and this book made me respect her an awful lot more for how she got where she is today. A great fun read.

[Kate Henderson · Rating 3 out of 5]

Listened to via audible.

I adore Sara Cox and feel like she’s so relatable and natural.
However I didn’t feel as engrossed in this book as I’d hoped. I hate rating autobiographies as it feels incredibly personal to give a review to, but this book was just ok.
I wasn’t loving it but I didn’t dislike it.

I loved that Sara narrated the audiobook herself! But none of the anecdotes were that incredible.

Enjoyed this book, read in one sitting. But nothing special.

[The Luna Librarian Jo R · Rating 3 out of 5]

I like Sara Cox. I used to enjoy listening to her on Radio 1. This book brings her presenting style to the written word... but for me it was a bit difficult to follow at times and jumped around more than I would have liked.

[Yin Wah · Rating 4 out of 5]

I was born in Wigan and grew up in the 80s/90s in Manchester, mostly in the areas of ancoats, prestwich, Bury, cheetham hill and salford. I didn't grow up on a farm but in a chippy so some of this that Sara Cox has grew up /gone through I can relate. I now lived in Bolton for last 20 years, things have definitely changed over the years. Definitely brought back some of my own memories. It's a nice easy read.

[Bridget Brooks · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a really enjoyable read about Sara Cox's life until the age of twenty or so. It is well-written, interesting, self-deprecating and fun with many memorable moments. Her family had its fair share of dramas as she says herself, but they clearly provided a loving foundation for her life. Her life had more than a few dramas too and I for one am looking forward to the next instalment! Highly recommended, particularly if you like Sarah Cox.

[Ginebra Lavao Lizcano · Rating 4 out of 5]

I don’t know who this woman is but she is funny

[Othniel · Rating 3 out of 5]

The first twenty years in the life of Boltonian radio/TV presenter and incipient national treasure Sara Cox.

Anyone familiar with the author's media persona will be aware of her wit, which is on full display in this vividly rendered tale of a warm, if not uncomplicated upbringing; in which a childhood on her father's farm is disrupted by divorce and marred by bullying, but culminates in triumph, as a career in modelling (although not at the highest level) starts her on the road to prominence.

The narrative itself verges on the mundane, but there are some highly amusing turns of phrase and some surprisingly elegant descriptive passages. The chapters are short and the tone is cheery - even given the occasional traumatic episode - making for an undemanding (in the best way) interlude in the company of a charming hostess.

[Nick Davies · Rating 3 out of 5]

Moderately enjoyable - this focussed mainly on the childhood years of the author (which is generally the part of autobiographies I enjoy most) and Cox being only four years my senior and also brought up in 'The North', I found plenty of common cultural ground which I appreciated. Cox's style is frank and straightforward, and very approachable, and this was an easy read. However on reflection I found it all a little underwhelming - gently humourous without being particularly witty or clever, relatable at the expense of having much of particular novelty or importance to say, even slightly dull in places. One of my closest friends really can't stand Sara Cox, and though reading this didn't make me dislike her, it didn't leave me feeling I'd warmed particularly to the DJ and presenter.

[Sharron Joy Reads · Rating 4 out of 5]

The autobiography of Sara’s life growing up between her father’s farm and her mother’s clubs and pubs mainly in and around Bolton in the 80’s s and 90’s. Told with her trademark humour, this is such a warm funny memoir of her life that had me chuckling.

[Alison Hill · Rating 5 out of 5]

A book written with humour openness and feeling. Just what you would expect from Sara Cox. I loved it

[Sharon · Rating 3 out of 5]

Quite an enjoyable read. I think Sara is very likeable.

[Beverley Watkins · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book reminded me so much of my own childhood and the crazy things that seemed normal at the time. Very funny, witty and brilliantly written.

[HM Yates · Rating 5 out of 5]

Funny, interesting and an easy read.

[Pippa · Rating 3 out of 5]

I loved how Sara rounded up the book as a dedication to her parents and specifically her mum.

[Jo C · Rating 4 out of 5]

Love listening to Sara Cox on the radio. This is a gentle read about her growing up in the north west for anyone who is curious about her younger days.

[Melanie · Rating 5 out of 5]

An unabridged Audible listen. Delightful, down to earth with many things from my own era to identify with. This was made all the better as the author recorded and read this herself making it so much more personal and full of warmth. Thoroughly recommend. A real feel good read/listen.

[Angela Leivesley · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is an entertaining memoir. It is a little episodic, but Sara Cox has an amusing line in similes which she employs to good effect.

[Sarah White · Rating 4 out of 5]

So I really like Sara Cox. I like listening to her on the radio with her random musings and anecdotes, which are charted in this book, her childhood memoir. I don't know if it's because I am also a similar age and a northerner (however, I didn't grow up on a small holding) but I really liked this book. It brought memories back of my own childhood that I had completely forgotten about; Spot the Ball Competions, Jubbleys (those weird triangular shaped ice pops- you know the ones!) And queing for up to an hour to get in to clubs on Blackpool Promenade (that I still remember). It begins with her life on the farm and ends as she lands the job on The Girly Show. It is open and honest and talks about some.of the tough times she had at high school at the hands of bullies. It's very much a trubute to her family, which many readers will be able to relate to. I liked it.

[Debbie · Rating 3 out of 5]

Loved this book, really funny, feel like you could have a good night out with her.

[Elisabeth · Rating 3 out of 5]

Cox's writing can be a little clunky at times but then she'll whip out a really clever and astute turn of phrase that will absolutely get her point across. I think that, for me, the main problem with the book was that for a lot of the time, nothing much happens. There are lots of descriptions of ponies, cows, dogs and neighbours and stories like going on holiday to Scotland and the car breaking down. I do really enjoy reading everyday life stories, especially as I am quite nosy ('interested in people '), but these anecdotes seemed lacking. There was a sort of assumption that they were funnier than they were.

I was also a bit irritated by the way the narrative jumped around within the main arc of being born to being twenty. One minute she was a sixteen-year-old barmaid in her mum's pub; the next she was a fifteen-year-old glass-collecter in the club her mum ran prior to that. A first pony story was suddenly introduced well into the latter part of the book. I don't know whether this was designed to sort of break up the farming-related chapters but it felt messy.

[Mark · Rating 4 out of 5]

I’ve been aware of Sara Cox from The Girlie Show onwards, though I didn’t really appreciate her talents until she moved to Radio 2 and now I’m a real fan. This memoir, covering the first twenty years of her life (ending, appropriately enough, at the audition for The Girlie Show), follows Sarah, the “youngest of five siblings, [who] grew up on her father's cattle farm surrounded by dogs, cows, horses, fields and lots of 'cack'. The lanky kid sister - half girl, half forehead - a nuisance to the older kids, the farm was her very own dangerous adventure playground, 'a Bolton version of Narnia'.” Written as if she was telling you the stories on the Drivetime show, this is often very funny, occasionally moving and never less than interesting. I’m the same age as her older sister, grew up in the Midlands, but lots of this struck chords with me and the pop culture references to the 70s and 80s were all spot on. If you like Sara on the radio, you’ll love this and I highly recommend it.

[Lynn Ashley · Rating 5 out of 5]

Loved it. Made me laugh out loud, not all the time, but definitely throughout. I feel there is going to be another though? Given where it got up to?? Am I right? Please say yes.
Highly recommended.

[Ape · Rating 3 out of 5]

Light and interesting autobiography, told in the unmistakable Lancashire tones of Sarah Cox about the first twenty odd years of her life. I really only know Sara Cox (and there's a reason why I left the h on in the first sentance - read to find out why) from the radio, first Radio 1, and these days with the drivetime slot on BBC Radio 2 (wish they'd given her the breakfast slot). Oh, and I'm sure I've seen her on a pottery competition on tv. Anyway...

Vaguely knew she had something to do with a farm, obviously she's from Lancashire. She's the decade before me as she's a 70s baby, so her childhood and especially her teenager hood seems very grown up to me, ha ha, as I was still very wee when she was off clubbing in Manchester to the Happy Mondays. Oh, and I can empathise with her head problem.

It's actually really nice to read about a normal, down-to-earth childhood, and not a case of mother was an actress, father was a BBC presenter, but you know, I got the gig at the BBC purely by chance and on my sheer raw talent, don't you know?? Her dad was a farmer and her mum was the second wife until Sarah was about six or something like that, and then they seperated. Her mum later married Ken, and together they ran pubs. Sarah says throughout the book that she was an utter daddy's girl, and you can see her idolising him as she grows up. But at the end she also realises who was her rock throughout all those years - mum. So if you're of the 70s or 80s, you're interested in Northern England at that time, or you're interested in farm tales, this could actually be an interesting book to read, even if you've never heard of Sara Cox. At the end it only gets on to the few years she worked as a model, and that's all as far as the limelight goes. There's a lot about life on the farm, as well as all the dogs they had, and all the ponies Sarah had dealings with. School years and the bullying she dealt with. I don't want to belittle it, because any is awful and it does shape how you are for the rest of your life, but on a bullying scale, it's not that bad. Although what the six form girls did to her at their closing "prom" (I don't think prom has really gotten into England at this stage. I'm younger than her and we didn't have anything like that) was at the very least heartless and spiteful. She's very brave in putting everything out there in a book for all to read. (And quite frankly, good on her for outing a school bully who had the nerve to phone into the radio and make out like they'd been best buddies!). I know she says the book is for her kids when they get older and interested in all this, but come on, I'm sure the publisher's suggestion and offer was also a big invencentive. =) =) Seriously though, worth the read, and makes the woman even more real and likeable.

[Sarah Smith · Rating 4 out of 5]

Sara Cox, Jo Whiley and Edith Bowman pretty much kept me company for my teenage years via their Radio One shows and now Sara Cox keeps me company via Radio Two (I know I’m getting old) so it wouldn’t be unfair to say I’ve grown up with her anecdotes and Bolton-ish ways. I don’t know if she qualifies as a national treasure yet but I imagine that’s only a matter of time, a consensus that could only been expedited by ‘Till the cows come home’ her memoir that details the first 20 years of her life.
I’ve read a few memoirs in my time, from Carrie Fisher to Anna Kendrick, Steve Jobs and Tina Fey and wee Coxys has been my favourite (except for Jeannette Walls, The Glass Castle which is a different sort of beast all together, and EVERYONE should read it post haste). Back in times of yore (the late 90s early 00s) a certain dickhole of a newspaper had Sara Cox written off as some sort of party girl, I think along with Zoe Ball the term ladettes was bandied about for a time, but she’s much more than that.
Her memoir tells of her upbringing between her Dad’s farm and in the houses attached to the bars her mum was a landlady in. She had a hard time with bullies, there wasn’t an abundance of money growing up, and there is many a close run with danger on account of the slightly more relaxed attitude to health and safety (that is to say, a complete disregard for it) in the 80s. She is very good at conjuring up a sense of time and place. There’s much in the way of wordplay, and she loves an odd simile; two things I very much enjoy. But mostly a sense of warmth pervades the novel along with the humour and wit I’ve always associated with her. It’s not a tale of filled with salacious gossip and celebrity tidbits, and that isn’t something I would have wanted, it’s just a book about this normal lass from the North of England, her family, a farm, and the dynamics of what holds all those things together. It isn’t groundbreaking but it is lovely. If you like Sara Cox read it, if you don’t then don’t, I’m sure she wouldn’t be too bothered.

[The Mare · Rating 3 out of 5]

Listening to Sarah Cox on my drive home every evening, and finding her witty anecdotes of various events brighten up an end to my working day, I decided to read her book hoping it would be just as comical. It is book Cox has written herself where she retells memories of growing up on a farm with her family, with stand out moments that she now looks back on with either guilt, fondness, cringing or sheer hilarity! The various stories she remembers and tells evokes different emotions for you as a reader, from her own use of language and emotions that clearly come through in her writing. There are moments in the book I'm sure we can all relate to at some point; family arguments, trying to wangle the odd day from school, childhood friendships, fashion faux pas and not least to mention trying to fit in at school whilst growing up, including sad tales of bullying. I would say if you were a child born during the 70's/early 80's then there are many parts to this book you will be able to relate to most probably more than some younger generations, having an understanding of the fashion and music scene of the 80's and 90's, not to mention technology - or lack of it. I found this an interesting read, being quite insightful into the life of Sarah Cox, and the various jobs she had before hitting our TV screens and now her much loved Radio shows. The main thing that came across was despite her celebrity fame, you can tell her feet and values are still firmly grounded, and no matter her fame or status now, family and friendships are everything to her, more than anything; something we're all reminded of during such times of lockdown. A very enjoyable read.

[Louise · Rating 5 out of 5]

Book number 50 of 2022.

My 50th book of 2022 deserved to be something special but never did I think It would be an autobiography as I’m not that keen. I had started a different paperback, but this came up on a search and I remembered a friend saying she’d enjoyed it and I loved it!

Sara Cox is Bolton born and bred and this is the story of her childhood with the book ending before she became the celebrity she is today.

I enjoyed recognising the places she mentioned and laughed at her joke reference to Little Lever as a ‘charming little hamlet’ and of course ‘the village’.

She brought back many memories of life in the eighties; talking about Hanburys shops, Jubblys, Body Shop Dewbury perfume, one chip wrapped in paper at the chippy and handed to children in the queue (my dad had a chippy and would do that!) and waiting up for the first showing of Michael Jackson’s Thriller video.

I laughed out loud at her parents tough love approach to accidents, how she called her mum’s friends auntie and uncle, the use of a pressure cooker (I definitely thought only my mum and dad used one of them!), having to buy holiday gifts for all and sundry and using clipper cards on the bus.

I could go on and on, I binge read it over a couple of days and I loved it. She’s funny and comes across in this book as authentic, honest and normal. I can’t wait to read her fiction novel Thrown!

[Joanne · Rating 5 out of 5]

Till The Cows Come home is Sara Cox's memoir of growing up in a farming family in Lancashire. Sara comes from a large blended, somewhat complicated family of five children – she is the youngest. Her first few years were spent on the family farm which is still owned and farmed by her dad. Even after her parents split up, she spent a lot of time at the farm and obviously has a lot of affection for it.

The book is a memoir of her younger years and is a fond look back at her childhood and teenage years and up until her first presenting job in television. There’s nothing particularly out of the ordinary happens when she’s a young girl, other than most of us don’t live on a farm of course, but it’s all told with great affection. Growing up in the 70s and 80s myself, the book brought back a lot of memories from the time of the kind of food we ate, the clothes we wore, the tv we watched and the music we listened to.

I listen to Sara Cox’s Drivetime show on Radio 2 most evenings and she comes across as a bubbly and friendly person who is genuinely interested in the things her listeners phone or text in to tell her. I could hear her voice in my head as I was reading. Till the Cows Come Home is warm, funny and easy to read and her obvious love for both her parents and the rest of her family comes through clearly. I thoroughly enjoyed it.

[Janet · Rating 4 out of 5]

I wouldn't say I'm a huge Sara Cox fan, although I do occasionally listen to her on R2, and I've enjoyed the Back in Time For... TV programmes that she has presented, but I liked the sound of this one when it came up as a Kindle deal, so I took a punt, and I'm glad I did. She talks at length about her time living on her parents' farm - and later, living and working with her mum and stepfather in various pubs and clubs, and also about her school days. She also reminisces about her modelling career. She was spotted by someone in Paris who told her to sign on with an agency, and after a slow start she had a successful career as a model, before going on to work in the music industry. From humble roots she is now quite a household name. The writing is maybe a little repetitive in places, but I liked her honesty and openness. I like the quote "Despite the stereotype of age supposedly bringing with it a 'stuck in their ways' mentality, I believe that as you get older you become more, not less, open-minded. I agree with this!

[Rach Crisp · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved this book! I remember Sara(h) Cox from when she was on The Girlie Show which was pretty ground breaking at the time. I was a teenager in the mid-late 90s, just as the era of the ladette/girl power was kicking in. Although I haven't always been Sara's biggest fan, I do enjoy reading autobiographies about people I admire.
There are so many wonderful stories in this book about her childhood, and it is written in such a way that makes them all feel very real. A lot of those little details which add to the depth of the experiences. It also feels very personal. A real insight into Sara's childhood where some of the lows as well as the highs are included. I like her down to earth attitude. She's a girl who calls a spade, a spade! Lovely to read her journey from baby hood to hitting her early twenties. Lots of adventures and experiences. The end result is a great read, with lots of (genuine) laughs, and I read the whole book as if Sara was reading it to me in her dulcit Bolton tones!