Why a Booktrail?
2000s: An unexpected story of hope, love and new beginnings in the heart of the Welsh mountains.
Mist
What you need to know before your trail
Lark is a free spirit, who travels and then moves on to pastures new. She’s been doing this for years when she meets Matthew Williams on her way to her next temporary stopover and he offers her a lift.
Matthew is Canadian and has inherited a run-down hill farm in North Wales. He’s young and determined to make a go of things but he’s also headstrong and has little knowledge of farming. A city boy from Toronto, he’s got no experience of living in the countryside either.
Both Matthew and Lark soon find that the farm makes them want to stay for a while but then disaster strikes. Matthew’s father comes over from Canada to stay and no – one’s life will be the same again.
Travel Guide
“Biting, sleety rain blew across the mountainside , dousing the already soaked filled and refilling the half-frozen puddles in the muddy farmland. In the lower fields the sheep huddle miserably against the stone walls, half grown lambs pressed against their mothers, silently enduring the familiar climatic conditions, No other animal or bird had stirred on this Snowdonian afternoon.”
Welcome to Wales.
The mist which surrounds this story is the most ethereal setting we’ve come across in a long while. It enshrouds the mountains and encroaches on the land, it creates shades of shapes which could be sheep or something else entirely. It brings mystery to the mountain and the tale of a local legend adds to the fairylike quality of much of the setting.
But the mountains hide a farmhouse, one with a painful past, where demons of the family men live. And now Matthew is coming to make a go of the farm and to make a new life. When tragedy strikes John his father will also be forced to face his own
It’s no secret that farming is extremely hard work but Mist show us around the farm, shows the difficulty of keeping sheep, the need for good grazing conditions and good livestock proves to be something Matthew learns as we do. Farming is tough, backbreaking work but to experience it here is to also see its beauty.
At the centre of this hilltop farm tucked into the Welsh mountains, the farmhouse as dilapidated and abandoned as it is, becomes a home from home. Situated in the town of Llanfair (Llanfairpwllgwyngyll or Llanfiair PG) . The house called Cariad Elin (Darling Elin in Welsh) has a story to tell.
“The air was different up here and when he looked down at Cariad Elin he was entranced with the beauty of the view. The buildings shimmered in the evening light….”
Breathe in and smell the clean fresh Welsh air. Builds your lungs up it does. The weather here is also character – the sun ‘falls behind the mountain’ and heavy clouds bring ‘spiky rain’
Oh and those gorgeous sheep-
“In the lower fields the sheep huddled miserably agains the stone walls, half grown lambs pressed against their mothers silently enduring the familiar climatic conditions”
Lark – also a bird with a free spirit – is free here and the Welsh mountains share her love of open space, the sense of freedom and the hardy approach to life. She feels the most akin to Wales – for they share the same qualities. This is a novel about family love and family demons yet it’s also a story about finding love in the most unexpected places and in the most unexpected way.
Where Next?
