A Parrot in the Pepper Tree: A Sequel to Driving over Lemons (The Lemons Trilogy)

Product Information

Me. Yes. What is this about shearing sheep in the winter? You don't do that. They will They will freeze to death.

Stewart's publisher, Sort of Books, announced plans to release yet another Stewart memoir in 2009, this one focused on sailing, entitled Three Ways to Capsize a Boat: An Optimist Afloat. Following in the footsteps of his first book, here we have another delightful sojourn at El Valero, in the Las Alpujarras in Spain - at the eco friendly home of Chris, Ana and their five year old daughter Chloë..... also present are the dogs, the sheep – and their eccentric parakeet ‘Porka’. They start to laugh, but as they hear the bus chugging up the hill, their laughter gives away to panic, and stones are hurled at the offending corpse. It is to no avail. Chris makes a split-second decision and runs off down to the road to meet Chloe off the bus before it turns the fatal corner, thus sparing his daughter the gruesome sight.

Summary

This volume is the second book by Chris Stewart charting his continuing struggles after deciding to go and live a partly self-sufficient life in one of the more remote areas of Andalucia. With his wife Ana, and now his daughter Chloe, he lives in a traditional small farm called El Valero. In the first book in the series – Driving over Lemons – he introduced himself and something of his life. In book two, we find him more settled, continuing to develop the farm, and building his new life. Under the warm, funny and self-deprecating writing of Chris Stewart, there moves a man of granite. Life at El Valero ain’t for wossies. Whether he’s describing the climb to admire the fields of gentian flowers on the on the high slopes of the Mulhacén, or the rigours of enduring a deeply uncomfortable wet Christmas in a house and a valley designed for sunshine, it is obvious that he and his family are hugely stoic and enduring. They range from the sublime to the ridiculous, from the endearing tales of learning about adapting to a new culture to those that essentially rage at all things ‘foreign’, where you wonder why the author went to live abroad in the first place. I’ve read a few over the years, and some have been entertaining and thought-provoking.

In this book, he writes about life with his family on their remote Andalusian farm where a misanthropic parrot joins their home and WWOOFers (Willing Workers On Organic Farms) come to stay. I'm definitely not a fan of 'we escaped the rat race and bought a run down property' books but this is more than just one of those. Stewart has a fascinating past including a stint with a very early Genesis line up (which didn't last long). He dips into those early memories throughout the book and that works well. They range from the sublime to the ridiculous, from the endearing tales of learning about adapting to a new culture to those that essentially rage at all things 'foreign', where you wonder why the author went to live abroad in the first place. I've read a few over the years, and some have been entertaining and thought-provoking. A Parrot In The Pepper Tree” is what Stewart describes as a “sort of” sequel and it delves into — a little bit — about how “Driving Over Lemons” came into being; it also touches briefly on Stewart’s short tenure with the band, Genesis, as one of its founding members. His neighbours continue to delight: one day, while waiting for the school bus to arrive, Chris encounters Bernardo, a local farmer also waiting for his children, gazing forlornly up at a tree. In its branches, there's a small dead dog. "He died last night," Bernardo explains. "I didn't want the children to see him, so I swung him round and round... and then I let him go... but I think I got the timing wrong."I also like the way he doesn't try and write about his life as the perfect idyll. We hear about his worries and fears every bit as much as the lovelier side of living in such a beautiful part of rural Spain. And he also avoids the pitfall of making all the locals sound like colourful caricatures. When you read over his bio, you can’t help but be a little jealous because this is a guy who has really lived. He’s done all sorts of interesting things and he’s pretty good at writing about them.

Christopher 'Chris' Stewart (born 1951), was the original drummer and a founding member of Genesis. He is now a farmer and an author. A classmate of Tony Banks and Peter Gabriel at Charterhouse School, Stewart joined them in a school band called The Garden Wall, and they later formed another band with schoolmates Mike Rutherford and Anthony Phillips, called Anon. This band eventually became Genesis in January 1967. Stewart appears on the band's first two singles, "The Silent Sun"/"That's Me" and "A Winter's Tale"/"One-Eyed Hound." Although several demos from Stewart's time with Genesis appear on the Genesis Archive 1967-75 box set, he is not credited with playing on any of them. (Peter Gabriel seems to have played drums on a couple, and the Christopher 'Chris' Stewart (born 1951), was the original drummer and a founding member of Genesis. He is now a farmer and an author. A classmate of Tony Banks and Peter Gabriel at Charterhouse School, Stewart joined them in a school band called The Garden Wall, and they later formed another band with schoolmates Mike Rutherford and Anthony Phillips, called Anon. This band eventually became Genesis in January 1967. Stewart appears on the band's first two singles, "The Silent Sun"/"That's Me" and "A Winter's Tale"/"One-Eyed Hound." Although several demos from Stewart's time with Genesis appear on the Genesis Archive 1967-75 box set, he is not credited with playing on any of them. (Peter Gabriel seems to have played drums on a couple, and the rest do not feature drums.) Chris.I only shear them half way. They were getting top heavy and would fall down on the ground and not get up. So I had to cut half of their hair off. I mean. Wool. I read the first book in this trilogy years ago (Driving over lemons) and enjoyed it, so I am not really sure why it took me so long to read this second one. So, I just decided to take it as it was, Kind of. I mean, I really can't quit thinking about it. Maybe the sheep are a different breed that like the cold. Maybe he has a barn large enough for 300' sheep and he keeps it heated all winter.The parrot in the title is a miserable bright-green Quaker Parakeet, who flies in one day and promptly falls in love with Chris's long-suffering wife, Ana. They name him Lorca, but soon this is downgraded to Porca in view of the parrot's relentless greed. As these books go, this is pretty good. He is an engaging writer, and his life and adventures are interesting enough to be worth reading about. He tells us more about his past, and how he came to choose Spain as a destination. His relationship with the local population is generally very good – although some of them are actually incomers too – and they seem to have accepted him.