Diddly Squat

Brought to you by Penguin.

Welcome to Jeremy's farm. It's an idyllic spot, offering picturesque views across the Cotswolds, bustling hedgerows, woodlands and natural springs. Jeremy always liked the idea of being a farmer. But, while he was barrelling around the world having more fun with cars than was entirely reasonable, it seemed obvious that the actual, you know, farming was much better left to someone else.

Then one day he decided he would do the farming himself.

After all, how hard could it be?

Well...

Faced with suffocating red tape, biblical weather, local objections, a global pandemic and his own frankly staggering ignorance of how to 'do farming', Jeremy soon realises that turning the farm around is going to take more than splashing out on a massive tractor.

Fortunately, there's help at hand from a large and (mostly) willing team, including girlfriend Lisa, Kaleb the tractor driver, cheerful Charlie, Ellen the shepherd and Gerald, his head of security and dry stone waller. Between them they enthusiastically cultivate crops, rear livestock and hens, keep bees, bottle spring water and open a farm shop. But profits remain elusive.

And yet, while the farm may be called Diddly Squat for good reason, Jeremy soon begins to understand that it's worth a whole lot more to him than pounds, shillings and pence....