Jemima The Pig and the 127 Acorns WBD 2022

“You’re farmers for a week, so you’ll be busy. There’ll be no time to miss home. You’ll eat like kings and queens, sleep like logs, and you’ll hardly be out of your wellies, except in bed.”

When a young boy goes from the city to stay on the farm, he discovers a world he never knew existed – a world of vegetable gardens, ducks and geese, where the milking cows and the sheep graze in the fields, where the apples and pears grow in the orchard.

He also meets Jemima the pig: she smells and she slobbers, she breaks out of her pen to steal potatoes, and she’s the undisputed Queen of the farm.

Soon, he’s hiding acorns in his pockets to feed to her every time he sees her. But then, Jemima starts to feel ill. Could she have eaten too many acorns? Or does this Queen of a pig have a secret?

And now that the boy has grown up, and his daughter Amy is going to the farm, just like he did, what surprises will she find there…?

From Master Storyteller Michael Morpurgo, co-founder of the charity Farms for City Children, this charming story evokes all the wonder, muck and magic of a week on the farm – the hard work and the sad moments, alongside the startling jolts of joy that have inspired whole lifetimes. The first of many Farm Tales to come, it is a timeless window onto the working world of the countryside, and the way its landscape and animals can leave an impression on a child’s heart forever.