HarperElement
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First published by HarperElement 2018
FIRST EDITION
Text © Suzanna Crampton 2018
Photographs © Suzanna Crampton, unless otherwise specified
Cover layout design © HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2018
Suzanna Crampton asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work
Cover photographs © Suzanna Crampton (cat, left sheep)/Shutterstock.com (background, right sheep)
A catalogue record of this book is available from the British Library
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Source ISBN: 9780008275853
Ebook Edition © June 2018 ISBN: 9780008275860
Version: 2018-05-21
To my parents, Julia and Richard Crampton
‘We abuse land because we see it as a commodity belonging to us. When we see land as a community to which we belong, we may begin to use it with love and respect.’
ALDO LEOPOLD
Contents
1. Egg-makers and Spring Flowers
3. Horses, Horses and More Horses
6. Lazy Days and Family Visits
11. Christmas at Black Sheep Farm
I am Bodacious, The Shepherd Cat, and this is my story. I wasn’t always called Bodacious. I must have been called something else in my kittenhood in the nearby city of Kilkenny, but it’s all a bit of a mystery to my human. As far as she’s concerned, I appeared one day and have never left. It’s a secret I plan to keep.
The Shepherd told me the story of how she found me so many times and added so many embellishments that it’s almost become a fairy ‘tail’. She walked into a Kilkenny flower shop one day in search of red ribbon for a friend’s birthday present, a clear-glass handblown goblet with herbs planted in it. She described it in great detail: about the herbs being green, the soil brown, and the ribbon a deep red. (The Shepherd gets very excited about this kind of thing.) The florist goes by the romantic name of Lamber de Bie and the shop is tucked away on a narrow cobbled street near Kilkenny Castle. The lady who worked there, Jaszia, told The Shepherd that because it was just after