Cricket By Candlelight: a synopsis.

This is my first book.

It chronicles the progress of me, my wife, Laura, and our pets, from a luxurious and complicated, stress-laden life in the city of Glasgow to our new home in the depths of rural New Zealand.

I trained as a dentist in Scotland and, as the book begins, I am in the process of coming to terms with the notion that our life is too expensive and the stresses too immediate to be sustainable. We decide to sell everything we own and move to a more pastoral life elsewhere.

The decision made, and the destination for our new life chosen almost at random, the location moves swiftly to our new home in the subtropical north of New Zealand, where, with a combination of determination, hard work and a healthy dose of naivety, our new life develops.

Gradually, we make new friends and acquaintances, meet some very unusual and interesting characters, and grow to love the once unfamiliar surroundings, until we can truly call our tiny farm a home.

As each chapter unfolds, the novelties of our antipodean life become normal, and the contrasts between our old stresses and our new leisure become clearer.

As the book draws to a close, we’ve come to terms with life on the farm, and the delights and tribulations of living in one of the most beautiful and abundant regions of the world, and can look back with contentment on the choices we made that led us here.