Graham Lord (1943–2015)

It's possible I'm being too harsh on this book for the rating, but by the end, I became extremely annoyed with the author and his suppositions and assumptions. It seemed to me that if he couldn't comprehend something, then it couldn't be so, and he obsessed about little things. I can't tell you how tired I became reading about what the occupation of Alf Wight's father might have been. It also seemed repetitive.

Now, aside from those flaws, the book was very interesting. I was fascinated by show more the fact that much of the Herriot lore was fiction so to speak, just as the Laura Ingalls Wilder books are. Does that bother me? I'm not sure that it does. I think these books, just as Wilder's, tell a bigger story than that of the author. They encompass a time, a place and a people and make them live for us. So whether or not some of the details and events are switched around or played with doesn't really matter because the essence is there. show less

Really interesting book - found it interesting to see what was fact and fiction in the James Herriot novels.

Liked reading about familiar places: Glasgow, Yoker, North Yorkshire.

Really sad at the end, especially regarding Donald Sinclair, such a shame.

He sounded like a lovely man, exactly the sort of author readers want to meet.

Who knew what the real James Herriot was like? Well, the real man was called Alf Wight. The Life of a Country Vet is an interesting foray into the life of a private man who wrote for millions.

Being a fan of John Mortimer, I was amazed at the yellow journalism in this book. I can see that anyone with a talent for words could slant anything to fit his mind set. I could not finish this book. I wonder why Lord was so vicious in his accounts of Mortimer.