TouchWood Editions
Autobiography/essays
ISBN 10: 1-894898-49-4
ISBN 13: 978-1-894898-49-2
5.5" x 7.5", 192 pages, b/w photos
and colour illustrations
$19.95, softcover
Available October

Home and Away
More Tales of a Heritage Farm
Anny Scoones

In her best-selling first book, Home: Tales of a Heritage Farm (2005), Anny Scoones introduced readers to historic Glamorgan Farm. In Home and Away, Anny presents more stories about the joys and sorrows, excitements and mishaps, of living on the farm. But she also takes readers farther afield, sharing with them her travels to other parts of Canada, to New York and to such places as Malaysia and Belarus. Her travel tales offer not only her keen observations on what she sees and experiences while away, but also her perspective from afar on the importance of having a place to return to that truly is home. 

Anny has owned Glamorgan Farm since 2000. Located in North Saanich, B.C., it's one of the original farms and homesteads on Vancouver Island, established in 1870 by Richard John. She is restoring the historic structures and raising heritage breeds of livestock. The front meadows are gardened by an herb gardener and a group of mentally challenged adults who grow organic, heirloom varieties of flowers and produce. 

Anny writes candidly and colourfully about real things, from visits with her family-she is the daughter of internationally acclaimed artists Molly Lamb Bobak and Bruno Bobak-to simple pleasures like arranging bowls of pears and hearing the owls in the woods at dusk. She writes about making bonfires, sitting with a dying horse, playing with a 700-pound sow and visiting the SPCA. Some of her tales are told with humour, some in sadness, but all tell the truth about living, observing and creating, whether at home or away.

Anny Scoones is a second-term councillor for the District of North Saanich, B.C., with a special interest in heritage and agriculture preservation; parks, trails and cycling paths; and architectural design and planning. She has a B.Ed. in history from the University of Victoria and a Diploma of Humanities in philosophy. At the time of writing, Anny had seven cats and four dogs, all from the SPCA. She continues to ride her Russian woolly horse, raise rare Gloucester Old Spot pigs and collect eggs from her many breeds of hens.