Amy & Lan

March 1, 2022

On a farm in southwest England presided over by three sets of parents, best friends Amy and Lan frolic with the other children, plus chickens, goats, dogs, and a calf named Gabriella Christmas. Theirs is a carefree, even wild childhood that's about to be disrupted by something stirring between Lan's mother and Amy's father. With a 25,000-copy first printing; check it out, as Jones's novels range from The Outcast, a Costa First Novel Award winner, to 2019's LJ-starred The Snakes.

Copyright 2022 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

July 1, 2022
Award-winning novelist Jones (The Snakes, 2019) begins her latest novel with a pair of children, seven-year-old Lachlan (Lan) and his companion Amy, who have lived their entire lives on a communal farm in southwestern England. Frith is a sanctuary to a parade of people, from the titular children and their families, to friends "from before," two rescued lost souls, and various renters in the farm's B&B. In alternating chapters, Amy and Lan share the workings of their idyllic farm life, infused with sights, sounds, and smells and filled with contented joy. They revel in their freedom to explore, the animals they raise, and their own fellowship. Over the next five years, the illusion begins to tarnish as the children notice new concerns: arguments about money, disagreements over parenting and farming methods, regrets about leaving the city, and fraying relationships. Dangers Amy and Lan once scoffed at now loom near and threaten their existence. Jones' skillfully rendered, character-driven coming-of-age work is a bittersweet delight for fans of Beryl Bainbridge and Elizabeth Gill.

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August 1, 2022
Jones (The Outcast) offers a delightful story of life on an English farm co-op from the perspective of two children. Frith, the farm’s name, is a sanctuary from city life for three families, the Honeys, Connells, and Hodges, plus a divorcée named Em and Finbar, who is bipolar. At seven, in 2005, friends Amy Connell and Lan Honey deal with the dilemma of eating Virginia, the turkey that had been raised for Christmas dinner. Amy’s failed-actor father, Adam, emboldened by the growing popularity of his blog, Exit, Pursued by a Goat, starts pushing to open a bed and breakfast, despite resistance from the others. By 2008, Adam gets support from Lan’s witchy mother, Gail, for the B&B venture. Gail shares with Adam an aversion to the dirty farm work, such as butchering the animals—Gail would rather focus on making potions for various ailments—thus heralding an end to the others’ heretofore tranquility. An extramarital affair adds more tension to the farm, but in the eyes of the children, everything will turn out okay (“Dangerous things are always fine if you’re clever like we are, and cool like us,” narrates Lan). Jones does a solid job showing how Amy and Lan, despite their naivety, perceive the truth of the adults’ conflicts. This is great fun.

July 8, 2022

Amy Connell and Lan Honey have known each other all of their lives. They were born within days of each other to parents who lived together communally. Growing up the eldest children in a compound "family," they are best friends, more like siblings. Three couples have bought a 78-acre farm in rural England in an effort to return to nature, work the land, and raise their children together. Six other kids, and two additional adults, round out the family. Everyone shares in the childcare and chores. Beginning when they are seven, Amy and Lan alternate narrating their idyllic childhood. They love the animals on the farm and marvel at the intelligence and miracle of life. After Amy plays a particularly unkind prank on an adult, their minder tells them that they are the barometers of the compound. They see whatever is going on around the farm. They see more than the adults would like sometimes, although they do not always understand what they are seeing such as a mental breakdown and adultery. VERDICT Though difficult to follow at times, Jones's (Uninvited Guests) novel will be of interest to adults who enjoy coming-of-age stories told from the children's point of view.--Elizabeth Masterson

Copyright 2022 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.