Susie Kelly & her husband Terry had long dreamed of owning a home in France, but ironically it wasn't until they were facing homeless penury in England that they realized their dream. With five dogs, two parrots & their elderly horses, they moved to an old farmhouse in the Poitou-Charentes region with dirt floors, no water & a primitive electricity supply.
While Terry was back in England trying to support them all, Susie Kelly contended with a homicidal gas cooker at the bottom of the garden, burst pipes, a guinea fowl that turned somersaults & bit people on the shin & a constant stream of people turning up at her door with needs of their own. Sometimes the enormity of renovating a house with insufficient funds & little help seemed overwhelming. She saw her husband infrequently. Their English neighbour was imprisoned on drug-smuggling charges. & when Terry developed a condition that brought him close to death, the dream threatened to turn into a nightmare.
There were times when Susie & Terry seemed to be taking two steps backward, but the kindness of the local community & the tranquillity of the landscape inspired them to make a new life for themselves & their animals in the place they now called home.