'A Place in the Country' describes Cunningham's transformation from urban dweller to country sophisticate and takes you from the cramped spaces of her Bronx youth to the rolling greenery of the upstate New York farm she eventually settles on.
Cunningham's negotiations with the land, the local gentry (English aristocrats, a swami and his followers, and dairy farmers, among others), and the wildlife (holsteins, deer, chickens, geese, snakes and pigs) are related with acuity, novelistic grace, and wry humour. Along the way, we revel in some of the most evocative writing about place in recent memory. 'A Place in the Country' is an immensely satisfying book that at once captures the rustic dreams of every city child and the poignant passing of the old-fashioned pastoral life.