The Running Hare: The Secret Life of Farmland (Paperback)

'He describes beautifully the changing of the seasons and the habits of animals such as the hares that make their home in his field. The book is a superb piece of nature writing.' - Ian Critchley, The Sunday Times 

'That John Lewis-Stempel is one of the best nature writers of his generation is undisputed.' - Country Life 

'Englightening and stylish...Readers who enjoyed the author's last book, Meadowland: The Private Life of an English Field, will find much in the same vein here: a mix of agricultural history, rural lore, topographical description and childhood memories. I learned a good deal.... Lewis-Stempel is a fine stylist, adroitly conjuring scenes in which "medieval mist hangs in the trees" or "frost clenches the ground"...' - Sara Wheeler, The Observer 

'A beautifully written paean to the countryside in all its rich diversity.' - PD Smith, The Guardian 

'A beautifully observed book, full of poetic descriptions. Brilliant and galvanising.' - The Sunday Express 

'Lewis-Stempel is a fourth-generation farmer gifted with an extraordinary ability to write prose that soars and sings, like a skylark over unspoiled fields. This wonderful book (a worthy follow-up to his brilliant Meadowland) is a hymn in praise of enlightened farming methods which reject lethal chemicals and allow insects, birds and flowers to thrive, as once they did. As an experiment Lewis-Stempel rents an ordinary arable field (his own property is a hill farm) to plough and manage in the old-fashioned way, transforming it into a traditional wheatfield to attract wildlife. Even - he hopes - hares. The work is back-breaking but the rewards are sublime. Like the hares, Lewis-Stempel's words dance.' - Bel Mooney, The Daily Mail 

'Fans of Lewis-Stempel's bestselling Meadowland will find here the same easy-reading prose fuelled by daft-as-a-brush enthusiasm and embellished with lyrical flourishes ... the mud-spattered details of a farming life lend The Running Hare a unique realness.' - The Mail on Sunday 

'A beautiful love letter ... to a wheat field [and] a pleasurable read' - BBC Countryfile 

'A stirring rural fantasia...Lewis-Stempel's heart and mind are absolutely in the right place. I salute him and I adored his appreciation of the quirky detail.' - The Times 

'This rather beautiful book is very much in the mould of the new nature writing, but it's also wondrously inspiring.' - Marcus Berkmann. The Daily Mail

'There's a quiet ferocity running through [The Running Hare], powerful yet subtle, refreshingly practical and quotidian ... There is a raw honesty to this book.' - TLS 

'Even better than Meadowland, The Running Hare is funny, erudite and a delight from start to finish. John Lewis-Stempel knows the land, loves it - and works it. He is a farmer, muddy-booted and diligent, who effortlessly recreates on the page the intimacy with the natural world that his daily rounds bring. But farming is also the enemy in his piece - the farming of the mega-tractor and the sprayer, the farming that has, during his lifetime, quietly destroyed the greater part of the country's flora and birdlife. The Running Hare is an important book, as richly layered and rewarding as the soil of an unimproved field.' - Philip Marsden

'A beautifully written paean to the countryside in all its rich diversity' - The Guardian