A Parrot in the Pepper Tree: A Sequel to Driving over Lemons (Lemons Trilogy Book 2)

Product Information

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.) 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."

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. 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.) It’s at least 10 years ago, probably nearer 15, that I read Driving over Lemons, the first in Stewart’s eventual trilogy about buying an isolated farm in Andalusia. His books are in the Peter Mayle vein, low-key and humorous: an Englishman finds the good life abroad and tells amusing anecdotes about the locals and his own mishaps.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. He is now better known for his autobiographical books, Driving Over Lemons: An Optimist in Andalucia (1999, ISBN 0-9535227-0-9) and the sequels, A Parrot In The Pepper Tree (ISBN 0-9535227-5-X) and The Almond Blossom Appreciation Society (2006, ISBN 0-9548995-0-4), about his work farming in Spain. All three are also available as audiobooks (Lemons ISBN 0-14-180143-3; Parrot ISBN 0-14-180402-5), and Almond ISBN 0-7528-8597-9, narrated by Stewart. 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. 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.

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.

Search

Then, when I finish the book of this author's adventures on his own farm in Spain, I bought his 2 other books. 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. 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.

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. 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. His fans will recognise the same wry, self-deprecating humour. It's one of the reasons that Driving Over Lemons became such a phenomenal success. You just can't fail to like him and the world he spreads out for you: wayward sheep, eccentric ex-pats, hospitable - and slightly barmy - neighbours, all existing in the awesome scenery of southern Spain's Alpujarras mountains.

Summary

To start with, they were really very isolated, such that getting a telephone line put in revolutionized their lives. By this time, his first book had become something of a literary sensation, so he reflects on its composition and early reception, remembering when the Mail sent a clueless reporter out to find him. Spanish bureaucracy becomes a key element, especially when it looks like their land might be flooded by the building of a dam. Despite that vague sense of dread, this was good fun. What marks Stewart out from similar writers is that this is not the life of an Englishman remaining English abroad, as in the Provence of Peter Mayle, but that of an intrepid man having to survive in a primitive part of Spain where making a living is a struggle. Hence the need to supplement his erratic income with trips to snowy Sweden to shear sheep. Me. Yes. What is this about shearing sheep in the winter? You don't do that. They will They will freeze to death. http://imonbinning.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/Parrot-in-pepper-tree.m4a A Parrot in the Pepper Tree by Chris Stewart 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.