[.ca] Driving Over Lemons: An Optimist in Spain (ISBN 0375709150)

From Amazon.com:
When English sheep shearer Chris Stewart (once a drummer for Genesis) bought an isolated farmhouse in the mountains outside of Granada, Spain, he was fully aware that it didn't have electricity, running water, or access to roads. But he had little idea of the headaches and hilarity that would follow (including scorpions, runaway sheep, and the former owner who won't budge). He also had no idea that his memoir about southern Spain would set a standard for literary travel writing. This rip-roaringly funny book about seeking a place in an earthy community of peasants and shepherds gives a realistic sense of the hassles and rewards of foreign relocation. Part of its allure stems from the absence of rose-colored glasses, mainly Stewart's refusal to merely coo about the piece of heaven he's found or to portray all residents as angels. Stewart's hilarious and beautifully written passages are deep in their honest perceptions of the place and the sometimes xenophobic natives, whose reception of the newcomers ranges from warm to gruff. After reading about struggles with dialects, animal husbandry, droughts, flooding, and such local rituals as pig slaughters and the rebuilding of bridges, you may not wish to live Chris Stewart's life. But you can't help but admire him and his wife, Ana, for digging out a niche in these far-flung mountains, for successfully befriending the denizens, and for so eloquently and comically telling the truth. The rich, vibrant, and unromanticized candor of Driving over Lemons makes it a laudable standout in a genre too often typified by laughable naiveté. --Melissa Rossi

Lemonade:
Chris Stewart is a surprisingly good writer. He is also an engaging character, able to cope with the crisis of moving countries and careers with grace under pressure. This book is the diary of Stewart and his wife buying and running a small farm in Andalucia. They live in a rustuic farmhouse, get to know their neighbours, live through various natural and unnatural disasters and the birth of thier daughter. This is a unique view of Spain from an outsider but not a tourist, and an interesting meditation on consumerism, community, and lifestyle, all writter with humour and style. While not hiding the hardships, Stewart makes one want to abandon the city and strike out as a sheppard in a foreign country.

Sweet with a few drops of lemon...:
This book truly captures some of the essence of Spanish culture, especially in Andalucia. However, if you are looking for a book with a plot, this does not contain it. It reads more like a journal, each chapter sharing some part of Chris and family's life. A great bed-time reader, give it a chapter or two a night and its a quick read.

Really quite boring:
I read this book about 1 year after i visited the same town that is depicted in this book. I stayed in a small house outside of town with a lemon orchard and olive trees that had been bought and was in the process of being fixed up by an English couple. So, i was excited when i saw this book. I expected to read wonderful descriptions of the surrounding mountains and the town... unfortunately, the couple in the story have such uninteresting observations about their surroundings, it made the entire book quite bland. I wish i hadn't read it, so that my own vibrant memories of that place could have remained untainted.

Not a Lemon:
This is usual fare of local landscape, climate, customs, folklore and a series of big and small endeavors and adventures of various sorts, rendered with a lucid style of writing and the English humor. It was fun reading and you vicariously enjoy the charmed life in a peasant farm nestled in the hills of the Spanish Andalucia. I wish there had been a warning at the beginning of the chapter entitled "The Time of Matanzas" which contained a ghastly depiction of the killing of pigs that was a local custom. Although the description was but a few sentences, being of the faint of heart, I wish I had not read it. Another could-have-been-better is that the book has reproductions of some interesting photographs but in pitifully small formats - typically with a short side of only 3.5 cm. All in all, this is one of the best travel memoirs around. Despite my petty complaints, I recommend it highly.

A Fun Read ...but better without the last chapter:
I enjoyed reading this account of life in Spain ....all the way thru the second to the last chapter. The last chapter - after the baptism of his daughter - didn't add-up to much.