The Farmer's Wife: The Instant Sunday Times Bestseller

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The words in this book flowed out of me. I loved writing it. I am grateful to Louisa and the team at Faber for seeing the value in my story.’ She is particularly critical of the government’s trade agreements with non-EU countries that were supposed to create a new “global Britain” in which farmers and everyone else running businesses would thrive after Brexit. But such methods are not practical for everyone. “A lot of farmers are trapped in awful circumstances with huge debt and not enough staff,” she says. “It is no surprise the suicide rate is at an all-time high.” She recognises that we are in an economic climate with high mortgages and fuel bills where there are people who cannot afford food, but resents the idea that “it’s on farmers to make that work. The government’s importing of food is a travesty, an exploitation of our environmental footprint on to acres somewhere else in the world.” I've devoured both books by James Rebanks, husband to Helen Rebanks. So I was mightily curious to read 'The Farmer's Wife'.

In the middle of Matterdale there is a busy working family farm; at the centre of that farm is the farmhouse, and at the very heart of that farmhouse is the kitchen – the pulse and focal point around which everything revolves. It’s where farming decisions are made, where the business is run from, where family-life is lived – and most of all it’s where Helen Rebanks cooks the food that fuels the entire operation. A few years later, Grandma only came on Fridays, when she came to get her hair done by Mum. As Grandma leaned over the kitchen sink with a towel around her shoulders, Mum would pour jugs of water over her head from a basin and rub shampoo into her grey curly hair. OFFERMAN: When we do the good work right, that is us expressing our affection for one another and for Mother Nature's creation. When I read Helen's book, I was just astonished at her clarity of vision. She took what is pure and simple about her life and wrote it almost like a beautiful novel. Yes, it's full of recipes, but the recipes are so poignantly placed that she'll tell an anecdote about maybe a childbirth of her own, and then she'll hit you with a shortbread recipe... Come on, Floss, we’ll go and tag some lambs.’ She nudges my hand with her nose as I pull my boots on. I grab the medicines we’ll need from the fridge. James has brought the other dogs down from the shed, including Bess, who is ready for a break from her pups. James can remember which tup he put every ewe to, hundreds of them by sight, and has a photographic memory of them. We specialise in selling prime breeding tups in the autumn sales to other shepherds across the Lake District and beyond.

Helen holds up a blade of grass, “its own solar panel”. She does not have much leisure time in which to stand and stare but the beauty of this landscape enfolds her and she walks her dogs in it every day. The goodness of such a life, if you are able to lead it, is clear: the unwritten proof is all around us and in the grey-green curve of the hills, even on this overcast day. Helen confirms it with her every word: “It wasn’t until I started writing that I knew what was there,” she says.

As a rebellious, arty teen, Helen Rebanks pitied her grandmother and aunts – frayed, tired women who rarely ventured outside the farmhouse

Autumn is the perfect season to make these cosy recipes from best-selling author, Helen Rebanks

Nor does it help that Rebanks peppers her text with advice that occasionally falls into the camp of the bleeding obvious. When it comes to steak “choose the best steak you can afford from a farm or shop you trust”. We learn that free-range organic eggs “are a brilliant source of protein and are full of nutrients. They are a meal in themselves.” Serve with fresh greens like cabbage, beans or broccoli and some buttery mash or sweet potato mash. I also serve this with rice sometimes.