LoveReading4Kids Says
LoveReading4Kids Says
Tom Palmer Guest Editor Book of the Month
Chosen by Tom Palmer, Guest Editor for April 2024.
I’d like to recommend Top Thorn Farm by Denise Clarke as my book for this month. I read it recently and was struck by how the author – a former school librarian – chose to write it because the students at her secondary school wanted books that featured farming and tractors. But there were very few books that dealt with rural communities.
How was she going to encourage them to read for pleasure? She decided to write Top Thorn Farm. To fill that gap. To represent the community she knew. Top Thorn Farm is a great read.
Jamie is about to do his GCSEs, but there’s trouble on his father’s farm. Some of it of Jamie’s making. Jamie is at a crossroads in his life. What does he do after school? He can’t just work with his dad on the farm as he wants to. The book shows his journey from being lost to finding a path for himself. Thanks to friends, family, teachers and a school librarian. I have worked in hundreds of rural schools, from Cumbria where Top Thorn Farm is set, to Norfolk and everywhere in between. I’ll be recommending this to teachers and librarians and the students as I go. Starting with this review.
Top Thorn Farm by Denise Clarke is available to buy through Sam Read Bookseller, Grasmere at £7.99
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About
Top Thorn Farm Synopsis
Jamie Bouthwaite is in his last year at school and impatient to be driving tractors around on his family’s Lakeland farm. For him schoolwork has never figured high on his agenda and he’s always been happy to leave the academic stuff to his sister Sally.
But Top Thorn farm is struggling and there may not be a job for Jamie when he leaves school. After his father’s accident, an outbreak of bovine TB, and a damaging storm, he finds himself on a rollercoaster of stress, conflict and self-discovery - at school as well as at home.
Can he find a way through and achieve what he wants?
Top Thorn Farm by Denise Clarke is available to buy through Sam Read Bookseller, Grasmere at £7.99
About This Edition
| ISBN: |
9798869556936 |
| Publication date: |
28th November 2023 |
| Author: |
Denise Clarke |
| Publisher: |
Independently Published |
| Format: |
Paperback |
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Author
About Denise Clarke
I am fortunate to live in a beautiful part of Britain, the English Lake District, and take advantage of walking with my dogs in the stunning landscapes. I have enjoyed a career as a librarian in rural secondary schools, helping inspire love of reading for pleasure as well as providing resources to support learning.
Whilst I've always loved reading books of different genres, I've also enjoyed writing, especially for young people. Top Thorn Farm is my first published fiction book. The inspiration for this story comes from when I worked as a school librarian and was alerted by teenagers with a farming background, to the lack of contemporary fiction to which they could relate their own interests and experience.
At that time there was very little I could buy to satisfy them. I realised there was a substantial gap in the market that was just waiting to be filled. But it needed to be a short book that these busy, outdoor, sheep-loving, tractor enthusiasts would find time to read. I enjoyed creating the characters in Top Thorn Farm and could hardly bear to let them go. So yes, there will be sequel.
More About Denise Clarke
