The Wolf Pit

Description

A brilliantly written, atmospheric memoir of landscape and family, set in the Yorkshire moors and the Australian outback, by an acclaimed nature writer. In 1966 Will Cohu's grandparents moved to Bramble Carr, a remote cottage on the Yorkshire moors. The summers and winters he spent there were full of freedom and light; only after childhood ended was he aware of the price the adults had paid for life in this most romantic of settings.Navigating family tensions and the trials of growing up, Will describes the close-knit community of North Yorkshire and his family's place within it- the shepherd probing the head-high snowdrifts for his flock; the pub landlord obsessed with military uniforms; the village doctor lost in his love for the purple moorland; Will's glamorous RAF parents; and, at the centre of the story, his beloved but enigmatic grandparents.The Wolf Pit is an enquiring love letter from Will Cohu to his family, and to a changing rural England that is passionate, frightening and funny.

Will Cohu was born in Yorkshire in 1964. Educated at Exeter College, Oxford, from 1992 he freelanced as writer, editor and journalist, mostly for the Daily Telegraph. His books include Urban Dog (2001) and Out of the Woods (2007).His stories Nothing But Grass, and East Coast-West Coast, were both short-listed for the Sunday Times EFG Private Bank Award. He lives in Lincolnshire.

A love letter to a family defined by a desire to make beauty and a gift for telling stories. The Wolf Pit has more quietly desperate heroism than any book I've ever read. -- Brian Morton * Sunday Herald * Persuasive, atmospheric writing. A love letter to a past world * Sunday Times * Bittersweet * The Times * The book takes on an existential desire to understand who we really are * Spectator *