STROUD poet Adam Horovitz’s book about pasture farming, The Soil Never Sleeps, has just been released in a second, expanded edition.

Originally commissioned by the Pasture-fed Livestock Association to write about four of the association’s farms around England and Wales, the book (published in January 2018) sparked the interest of the Exmoor National Park Authority and the Exmoor Society.

Soon after, Horovitz was invited to stay on two farms in Exmoor and write about them for a new section of the book that examines life on the national park as part of the 70th anniversary of the creation of National Parks.

“It was an unexpected joy to be able to revisit the farming life so soon after finishing the original book,” said Adam.

“And to get a chance to explore a part of this island I’d never really known before.

“Writing the first edition of the book was a steep learning curve; I found out so much about good practice in farming, soil science and the people who work the land.

"That gave me the freedom to throw myself into the more practical sides of the book’s research - rather inexpertly when it came to wrangling rams – much to the farmers’ amusement - and allowed the writing to come more quickly.”

The new edition, which has 30 new pages of poems, also comes with a new illustration by the book’s Stroud-based original illustrator, Jo Sanders.

Published by Palewell Press, it is £9.99 and is available from Stroud Bookshop now.