{"id":52038,"date":"2021-08-14T10:40:26","date_gmt":"2021-08-14T09:40:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/khla.co.uk\/?page_id=52038"},"modified":"2025-11-26T12:39:50","modified_gmt":"2025-11-26T12:39:50","slug":"nicola-chester","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/khla.co.uk\/index.php\/nicola-chester\/","title":{"rendered":"Nicola Chester"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Nicola Chester<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Agent: Anne Williams<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Nicola Chester won BBC Wildlife<\/em> magazine’s Nature Writer of the Year Award in 2003 and has written a regular column for the RSPB members\u2019 magazine Nature\u2019s Home<\/em> (formerly Birds<\/em>) for over 13 years. She grew up alongside the internationally known environmental and political battlegrounds of Greenham Common and the Newbury Bypass protests, in which in her twenties she became involved, returning to live in a tied cottage on the nearby Highclere Estate (now famous as the setting for \u2018Downton Abbey\u2019) during her early married life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Part memoir, part nature writing, ON GALLOWS DOWN: Place, Protest and Belonging<\/em> is the story of a life shaped by landscape, by an enduring love of nature and the fierce desire to protect, honour and celebrate it. Published in 2021 by Chelsea Green, it was shortlisted and highly commended for the Wainwright Prize and won the Richard Jefferies Award for the most outstanding naturewriting book of the year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nicola lives in North Wessex with her husband and three children.   Her new book, GHOSTS OF THE FARM: Two Women’s Journeys Through Time, Land and Community <\/em>was published in hardback by Chelsea Green on 30 September 2025.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

 @nicolawriting<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Praise for ON GALLOWS DOWN<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAn evocative and inspiring memoir which touches on environmental protest, family, motherhood, and most importantly, nature\u201d
Claire Fuller, author of Unsettled Ground<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cCharged with love and fire, ON GALLOWS DOWN is a beautiful exploration of a much-mapped, multi-faceted landscape\u201d
Katharine Norbury, author of The Fish Ladder<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cPowerful, enlightening, dazzling, hopeful, ON GALLOWS DOWN is a rare and precious gem \u2013 to be savoured, not rushed, and returned to again and again\u201d
Brigit Strawbridge Howard, author of Dancing with Bees<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Praise for GHOSTS OF THE FARM<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Nicola Chester is the John Clare of our time”  Guy Shrubsole, author of The Lost Rainforests of Britain<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

“A wonderfully evocative account of a fascinating and until now untold story”  Stephen Moss, author of Ten Birds That Changed the World<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

“This captivating dual-stranded memoir puts rural women firmly in their place: right at the heart of the farm. Nicola Chester and her indomitable predecessor Miss Julia White are unforgettable guides to a changed and changing countryside”  Melissa Harrison, author of All Among the Barley<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

“A heartening, haunted and beautifully written book that is a powerful paean to rural life and working the land”  Rob Cowen, author of The North Road<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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