Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for the chance to read this book!

I did enjoy this story, and I did enjoy the writing. You can hear the BUT, can't you? It's because the set up for the Kindle book is atrocious. Basically the pictures are either not loaded correctly into the book and the writing is interrupted by a number or the author's name, or the picture is put into the text, so that you're reading a line and then hit the picture with the story about the picture below it. By the time you've read the accompanying text, you've forgotten the original thing you were reading and have to go back. It is super frustrating as a reader to be constantly thrown from the narrative. what works in a book (where you can skip the pictures and go back at the end of a chapter/or the book) just doesn't work on Kindle.

The real shame in all this is the distraction from the often beautiful and lyrical writing. There is a real sense of peace and acceptance in this book that makes you long to make enough money to spend days at a farm with a small flock of your own. Having only known one pet sheep in my life, the idea of a whole flock was delightful.

Following this narrative of time is the gradual decline of Carole's father, and his calm accepting of time and fate. There are no real regrets in a life of gentle poetry and good wine, and it made me long for the same kind of relationship with my own father (yeah, not going to happen)

All in all this is a beautiful book that I would love to get a physical copy of, to compare how different it is not to be held back by poor format (I get that it is not the author's fault, however I must review the edition I have and that's that) Three stars!

I received an advanced reading copy of this book from NetGalley, St. Martin's Press and Thomas Dunne Books. Thanks!

What a lovely book. It is the story of a woman who moves to a farm in Virginia, and purchases 13 karakul lambs to live on the farm as pets. The book really relates the time that this woman spent on the farm, interacting with the lambs and her elderly father who visits regularly.

There is a familiar genre of books about city dwellers who leave their lives behind and move to a rural environment. Frequently, those books will tell humorous stories about how they learned new skills the hard way, and often have an specific political point of view about food production, or the damage that humans are wreaking on the environment.

This book is nothing like that. Instead, the author simply tells her readers about the time she spent with the sheep and her father, shares a bit about the history of the karakul breed and its middle eastern roots, and her observations of both her father and the sheep as they aged and eventually die.

There is a picture towards the end of the book that shows the author lying on the grass with her two surviving sheep, all sleeping peacefully together. For me, that image is evocative of the entire book. It is quiet and simple, and just seeks to share the lovely feeling of connection she and her father had with these animals.

What a beautiful book - it describes a compassionate, understanding relationship with nature in an insightful and uplifting way. I enjoyed very much reading about the different lambs. A gentle yet engrossing book for me.
My thanks to NetGalley for providing me with an eARC in exchange for my honest review.

The Lambs sounded, from the brief blurb, like it would be an interesting read. I struggled to finish it. The author gets a flock of sheep and they become her support animals. She names them and mourns when they sicken and die. She buildt them a special barn for her flock and pampered her sheep. I just couldn't connect with the story.