cover image Trafficking in Sheep: A Memoir

Trafficking in Sheep: A Memoir

Anne Barclay Priest, . . Countryman, $19.95 (253pp) ISBN 978-0-88150-636-5

Priest, an actor turned shepherd, ambles through the story of her part-time renunciation of Cape Cod summering and New York City loft living to settle in remote, idyllic Nova Scotia in the 1970s—a change that brought "richness and beauty" to her life. Prompted by nostalgia for her cozy childhood home, she makes a fateful series of impulse purchases in Nova Scotia: a 200-year-old house and then an entire island. A craggy wilderness of alders and brambles, Blue Island wears a menacing air, reflected in topographic titles like the gulch named Hell Hole. Priest, undaunted, plunges deeper into the pastoral archetype to populate the island with a flock of sheep, learning the finer points of shearing and worming as she rears them for the butcher. She warms to the frigid clime by virtue of gruff but friendly neighbors on nearby islands, who pitch in to school her in the agrarian ways. Priest's humor appears in flashes, as when she unleashes an amorous ram upon her flock. But her narrative, lacking focus, too often meanders into more ponderous city affairs, distracting readers from immersing themselves in island life. (Apr.)