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All Things Bright and Beautiful (All Creatures Great and Small #2)

4.34 of 5 stars 4.34 · rating details · 27,577 ratings · 405 reviews

Two years ago when we published James Herriot's All Creatures Great and Small, we called it a "miracle between covers." In the first major review of the book, Alfred Ames said: "If there is any justice, All Creatures Great and Small will become a classic of its kind. The publishers call it a miracle-- not too strong a word for a book that offers something for everyone: gus...more

Hardcover, 378 pages

Published August 15th 1974 by St. Martin's Press (first published 1973)

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Mar 12, 2007 Melissa rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

In fact it set me to thinking about the big question of how girls might be expected to behave after marriage. One old farmer giving me advice about choosing a wife once said; "Have a bloody good look at the mother first, lad. " and I am sure he had a point. But if I may throw in my own little word of counsel it would be to have a passing glance at how she acts towards her father.

Watching her now as she got down and started to serve my breakfast the warm knowledge flowed through me as it did so...more In fact it set me to thinking about the big question of how girls might be expected to behave after marriage. One old farmer giving me advice about choosing a wife once said; "Have a bloody good look at the mother first, lad. " and I am sure he had a point. But if I may throw in my own little word of counsel it would be to have a passing glance at how she acts towards her father.

Watching her now as she got down and started to serve my breakfast the warm knowledge flowed through me as it did so often that my wife was the sort who just liked looking after a man and I was so very lucky.

All Things Bright and Beautiful, James Herriot 1974 regarding his life in the thirties.

I realize now that many do not know James Herriot. He was a country veterinarian in England. After he retired he wrote about his practice. Often the tales are hysterically funny (exploding cows, anyone?). Sometimes they are sad. What unites everything he writes is a genuine love and compassion for both people and animals. He writes with great compassion about the foibles and foolishness of his patients and their owners.

Years ago when I worked, I commuted a fair distance. I had an audio book of some of his animal stories. I would often sit it in the car after I got to work so I could finish a story (I was the kind of person who often arrived an hour to half an hour early). Some of his stories would make me laugh so hard I would almost wet my pants.

So his books are certainly endorsed by me.

A wave to Sarah. Yes we did have the BBC series my parents and us children used to watch them on Sunday afternoons. It was one of the few shows I deigned to watch with my parents when I was in HS. They were delightful. In fact, I think I would like to find them on DVD when the girls get bigger.

Also, I've discovered that the audio book I had was narrated by the fellow who played him on the series and that he has narrated most of the books written by Herriot. I should think they will be on my Christmas list at the end of the year.(less)

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Sep 05, 2011 Valerie added it · review of another edition

The titles of these books were different in Britain, and so the books are somewhat out of order for Americans. The American editions have the text of the hymn in the front. It's such a beautiful poem that I wondered why I hadn't ever heard the hymn before. Then I heard it...and it's AWFUL. Somebody would be doing the lyrics a significant favor to reset them to different music. If even my cousin, who consistently won audiences with his dynamite Al Jolson impression couldn't make it sound good...

H...more The titles of these books were different in Britain, and so the books are somewhat out of order for Americans. The American editions have the text of the hymn in the front. It's such a beautiful poem that I wondered why I hadn't ever heard the hymn before. Then I heard it...and it's AWFUL. Somebody would be doing the lyrics a significant favor to reset them to different music. If even my cousin, who consistently won audiences with his dynamite Al Jolson impression couldn't make it sound good...

Herriot made it clear from the beginning that he didn't want to discuss World War II in his books, and that makes this second volume a bit jumpy, since he kept casting back, forth, and sideways, trying to avoid the subject. If you do the math, you'll realize that he was married in 1939--so the bear in the room was hard to evade. The later book in which he DID discuss his war experiences begins to explain why he didn't want to discuss it. Here I'll just note that he didn't.

There are many points that even the genial Herriot has difficulty passing off lightly. The tendency to sell diseased meat from the knacker yards for animal feed should shock people more than it did. People don't even seem to recognize the process that was a major contributor to the BSE ('mad cow' disease) epidemic as shocking and dangerous. Herriot clucks his tongue mildly at the practice, but doesn't really campaign against it (as he does against poisoning dogs, for example).

Furthermore, Herriot recognizes the tragic effects of the consolodation of the smallholdings into large factory farms, and of the tendency to replace the varied breeds of moor cattle with 'pedigreed' creatures of only one or two breeds that can't survive a winter in the open. He understands the dangers of creatures that are so inbred that they're all susceptible to the same diseases. He also complains that the animals are being butchered at such young ages that only the dairy animals are allowed to live long enough to reproduce, by and large. He greets all these problems with resignation. Sometimes I wish he'd just speak up, and (like the Prince of Wales, for example), chide people for insisting on eating lamb instead of mutton.

One thing he DOESN'T note is the tendency to 'doctor' animals by consistently drugging them with antibiotics and growth hormones. He does mention antibiotics, but not as a regular part of treatment. In the 30s, even the sulfa drugs were very new, and their effects were often miraculous--because bacteria, never having been exposed to them, had no immunity to them. As for growth hormones, there WAS experimentation with hormones at the time (cf Dorothy L Sayers' discussion of 'glands' as the new miracle treatments in current discussion), but the routine administration of growth hormones was probably quite a bit later.

On reflection, I'm amazed that Herriot never managed to kill or severely injure himself or someone else. It's not so much driving drunk (he only seems to have done that once or twice). It's the sonambulistic state he describes himself as being in on night calls. Why one of the three vets in the books doesn't get assigned to only night calls is beyond me. In rotation, if necessary. But the practice of working both day and night calls could have been very dangerous--and possibly even deadly.

As for the descriptions of food, they give the lie to nutritionists who argue that present-day people eat a uniquely large junk-food diet. Check out the description of the 'tea' early in the book, for example. Only six people (James, Helen, her father, her aunt, and her two child siblings) put away a tableful of food (a 'groaning board', and no mistake)--but though this is a Sunday tea, the evidence is that other meals were not much smaller. The heavy farm work in the open air with little mechanized aid probably helped work off a lot of the calories--but still, the amount of food is incredible compared to present 'servings'.

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Jun 01, 2012 Jason Koivu rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Dogs, cows, horses, sheep and more get the "All Things..." treatment in this continuation of the series which follows the life of a vet in the Yorkshire Dales of Northern England. If the chapters sometimes seem like short stories, it's because they essentially are. Some are true, some are fabricated for sheer pleasure, and all are based on James Herriot's (pen name) career. There is a general storyline that vaguely keeps the narrative going, but this is mainly a collection of often humorous, occ...more

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Jan 16, 2013 Eligah Boykin jr. rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I enjoyed this book because it is essentially about work and how to make your work a career you can be proud to remember in your retirement. Newly married and yet still subject to calls at all hours of the day and night, Herriot has the slightly world weary amusement of a country veterinarian. This book is great because you get to meet animals with personalities as eccentric as their owners and appreciate what it is like to deal with pregnant horses, cows, pigs and goats. The author also has a g...more

I enjoyed this book because it is essentially about work and how to make your work a career you can be proud to remember in your retirement. Newly married and yet still subject to calls at all hours of the day and night, Herriot has the slightly world weary amusement of a country veterinarian. This book is great because you get to meet animals with personalities as eccentric as their owners and appreciate what it is like to deal with pregnant horses, cows, pigs and goats. The author also has a great sense and feel for the land and his eating and drinking binges with fellow vet Granville Bennett are the stuff of legend.

Most men don't become champion athletes, movie stars or military heroes. But Herriot makes you feel that any man can be an everyday hero simply by meeting the rigors and challenges of his profession with a reliable intelligence and dogged responsibility. Through his chronicles you feel you are in the hands of a man who has 'been around', but in a good way. Herriot comes across as a person who knows his community and the people in it and how to deal with both of them.

This isn't the first book in the series, but I am reviewing it first because I like the way the song goes:

All things bright and beautiful,
All creatures great and small,
All things wise and wonderful,
The Lord made them all.

Cecil Frances Alexander 1818 - 1895

Most men dream of being tough guys or macho men, but Herriot comes across as something a little more than that. He is a man who does his job in a good and sometimes excellent way, and goes home to his wife knowing he is earning the love and respect of his community one day at a time. He weathers the small defeats and disappointments of his career with foreboding and humor and treasures the temporary victories inside a glowing heart.

I needed a good dictionary to clear up many of the veterinary terms he used about animal diseases and the tools of his trade, but this process and activity made me feel I was learning something and entering into a deeper understanding of his world. I love this book because it shows that outside the world of Comic Books and Action Heroes of Blockbuster Movies there is still plenty of adventure to be had for the rough and ready working man. (less)

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Sep 28, 2012 Hava rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: animal-stories, autobiographical, nonfiction-books

I cannot more highly recommend this series - I really can't. I know that when I'm listening to them, that he most likely stretched the facts somewhat to fit into his books a little better, but I can't help but excuse him for it. This isn't a textbook, teaching me important facts that I have to know to a T, but instead more of his memoirs, and isn't that almost the definition of a memoir - the broad story is true, but the occasional fact gets forgotten and/or rewritten? You just can't hold it aga...more

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Mar 21, 2013 Nathan Dilly rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: religious-groups

"All Things Bright and Beautiful" is a wonderful book about creation from a Christian perspective. The illustrations in this book are incredible paintings of different plants, animals, and other features of our planet. The illustrations take up the entire page and are filled with tremendous detail and color. It is a very unique style that mixes dot painting with stroke painting. This creates a stunning artistic texture. I also enjoyed the simplicity of the text in this story. The text does rhyme...more

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May 04, 2011 Brittany rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: history, sciencewriting

All Things Bright and Beautiful picks up where All Creatures Great and Small leaves off: with Jim's wedding to Helen. (I remember as a kid it confused the heck out of me that the books didn't go in the same order as the lines in the hymn did.) However, the book is not strictly chronological. One of the things that makes it such a leisurely, wonderful read is that the chapters are mostly self-contained.

This is a wonderful book to listen to on a road trip because the chapters read a bit like shor...more

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May 15, 2008 Nate rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This series - of which I have now read the first two - is the most fun you can have reading books. They make you want to go to Scotland, hole up in a cottage, drink tea and read some more James Herriot. I don't want these books to ever end. As an aside, this isn't a novel, rather its a collection of short stories, each one just the right length for before bed.

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Dec 26, 2008 Elizabeth McDonald rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: animal lovers, people wanting to feel a little better about the world

Shelves: british, biography

I always enjoy rereading James Herriot's memoirs of his experiences as a veterinarian in Yorkshire in the first half of the previous century. His tales of treating farm animals and household pets, and of the human characters he met along the way, are what I have to describe as "heart-warming". They're not saccharine, though, I promise. He's funny, too. Even though I've read his stories multiple times since middle school, I find myself laughing aloud.

This book comes second in the standard sequenc...more

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Oct 21, 2011 Tiffeny rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

My good neighbor got me into these books and I love them. This is the 2nd in his series. At the end of the last, he and Helen had just gotten married, and this one continues with their life. But it's still mostly his life as a veterinary surgeon in a small town in England. The stories are funny, heart-felt, sometimes sad, mostly heart-warming. I love these books and can't recommend them enough.

There isn't as much in this book about Herriot's eccentric, sometimes crazy partner Sigfried, his caref...more

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Sep 27, 2010 Jelinas rated it 4 of 5 stars

All Things Bright and Beautiful is James Herriot's follow-up to All Creatures Great and Small and, much like his debut effort, this volume is filled with touching stories, rip-roaring humor, and, saturating everything else, a strong taste of the Yorkshire Dales. Herriot regales us with more tales from his experiences as a vet in rural Northern England.

He also arevisits his courtship of his wife and some of his misadventures along the way to marriage. And, of course, his good friends and colleagu...more

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Aug 26, 2012 Becca rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: Those interested in history of medicine and/ or humor

Shelves: favorites, winter, aww-a-warm-fuzzy-story, humor

A series of short stories on life as a rural vet in early 20th century Europe. My favorite moments are about the amazing effects penicillin had when it was first introduced. His descriptions of the animals and the people had me laughing. His boss Siegfried and Siegfried's brother, Tristan figure in to quite a few stories and are a hoot. I'm crying in one story and laughing in the next. He may be writing about animals but he is also writing about people. He manages to capture the comedy and the t...more

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Feb 06, 2009 Michael rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

There are some books you read where you just wish you could live in the world the writer portrays. James Herriot is like that for me. His stories of 30s rural Yorkshire life as a vet are warm and engaging, funny and lively. He has the ability to stir the soul, as when he writes about treating the last plow horse before tractors take over farmwork, and the funnybone, as when he describes his dealing with his crazy boss, Sigfreid.

This is another book of short stories, loosely held together as one...more

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Dec 06, 2008 Rhonda rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: Sarah McElhaney

This is the sequel to All Creatures Great and Small. The classic story based on the real life experience of a veterinarian in Yorkshire, England. James Herriot cotinues to live in Darrowby after his marraige to Helen Alderson. This book continues the stories of a country veterinarian and includes many small animal stories aw well.

We see less of his associates in this book. His partner (and boss), Siegfried Farnon, still frequently contradicts himself. Siegfried's brother, Tristan Farnon, passes...more

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Feb 20, 2009 Rebecca rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

So sweet and fun. Great charming characters, intriguing veterinary problems, and a cool endearing narrator witnessing history from the Yorkshire Dales. I can't wait to read the rest.

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Feb 13, 2011 Terri rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Maybe I give 5 star ratings too liberally, but this book was just as wonderful as Herriot's first memoir, All Creatures Great and Small. Delightful, hilarious writing with lots of little life lessons, vignettes about a large variety of people and animals, and so much understanding and empathy. Reading this second novel felt like coming home because of how much I enjoyed the first.

I did feel there was a bit more "gore" in this one...he is after all an animal doctor and surgeon, so be warned if m...more

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Apr 06, 2011 Carol rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I have loved these books from the first one I picked up. If I wasn't laughing out loud in a room all by myself, I was mopping up the tears from a very touching experience I read about. I'm a succor for a fun and loving animal story. This is an absolutely delightful James Herriot. He's a master storyteller. This book is just a collection of experiences from when he was a vet, and it was interesting as well as hilarious. My husband and I just started watching the BBC Series provided by Netflix. Th...more

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Aug 02, 2011 Dianne Happel DiFrisco rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I am not interested in farm animals. Which proves that James Herriot (Al White) is a great writer because I devoured all of his books.

He creates believable, lovably odd characters. He uses a lot of self-deprecating humor, especially in his descriptions of his bumbling wooing of Helen.

My favorite story is when a farmer phones James, the "Vetnery," because his sow has just had a dozen piglets and she's madly trying to kill them. By the time James drives up the dales to the farm, the pig is lying...more

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May 07, 2013 Samantha rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: favorites

I'm currently reading this one aloud to my husband. We finished "All Creatures Great and Small," and he loved it!

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Nov 25, 2008 Dave rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Delightful book! I read it when I was a medical student and it was one of the very few books that have made me laugh out loud even though I was all alone. It was funny to think of my experiences and compare them to the author who was a veterinarian student. I went on to read some of his other books and loved them as well. Each chapter is about a specific experience or type of experience (e.g. house calls or night deliveries). When we were stationed in Holland I wanted to go over to Scotland and...more

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Jun 30, 2009 Helynne rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Our book club assignment one month was to choose "anything by James Herriot." I checked out this volume, one in his four-part series--each book with one of the four lines of the little song, "All Things Bright and Beautiful, All Creatures Great and Small, All Things Wise and Wonderful, The Lord God Made Them All." (The first book is called All Creatures Great and Small and the second is this one All Things Brighan and Beautiful . Herriot chronologically mixed up the first two lines of the song)...more

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Dec 15, 2012 Wendy rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

It's a wonder that it took me until 2012 to read anything by Herriot. I did love it, mostly because of the sheep. Herriot documents some important stuff here: caring for the last generation of plow horses from the Edwardian era, the emphasis in his education on care of horses (at the end of use of horses as a prime means of transportation for humans), the use of anesthesia in veterinary practice, the introduction of sulfa drugs into veterinary practice to fight infection, the beginnings of serio...more

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May 26, 2011 Tanya W rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: non-fiction

I adore James Herriot. Few authors are so naturally gifted in telling their stories. He has the ability to make me laugh out loud as well as feel a spectrum of emotions. I usually note that while reading James Herriot I either feel very at peace or I have a big smile on my face.

His stories about being a country vet in Scotland are wonderful. This is the second book I have read and I can't wait to read the other two (or more?). No wonder all his books have been bestsellers (selling millions of c...more

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Jan 18, 2013 Joanne rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

The second volume in a 5 volume set, All Things Bright and Beautiful takes up the tale of country vet James Herriot, at last married to the love of his life and Darrowby's most eligible young lady, Helen Alderson. Episodic but remarkably cohesive, this volumes weaves a picture of the couple's life on "the rooftop of England," aka the Yorkshire Dales. Mr. Herriot's official duties involve tending to the 4-legged stock, but his daily life is just as embroiled in caring for his neighbors of the 2-l...more

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Jun 26, 2012 Emily Collins rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Another Herriot book, they're just so.. soothing to read. I mean, nothing much really seems to happen. You don't ever hang on the edge of your seat because of the suspense, it's just... pleasant. Here, let me tell you about these wonderful animals I once treated in a nice farm out in Yorkshire. That's all this book is somehow, and yet I love it! It's wonderful!
Of course, it helped that I was reading this while on holiday in Britain, so I was going to all these places mentioned in the book, which...more

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Jul 03, 2012 Gene rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This book that I have is a strange Taiwan pirated edition that says it is Bantam Books, but the number of pages fits a different publisher. Regardless of that, I must say I was pleasantly surprised by the book. At first I thought it was fiction, and after a bit I noticed it was biographical. Some of Herriot's stories are just too good, and I wonder if a little embellishment wasn't employed. Nevertheless, each chapter makes for one good quick story, though a few chapters link together into mult-e...more

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Aug 14, 2010 Dan rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I continue to be impressed by the books in this series. They are very well written. The stories are a perfect length for a bit of casual reading before bed. One of the things that I really enjoy about them is that although there is a wonderful amount of humor in them, there are also a lot of entries that are more serious as well. Mr. Wight (James Herriot) is an impressively humble man. It's nice to read about his frustrations, as well as his successes. It's also nice to see little bits of humani...more

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Apr 14, 2008 Dale rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. After I finished All Creatures Great and Small I knew for a fact that I would end up reading all of Herriot's books. So it was an abstract intellectual curiosity that had me wondering how he would be able to duplicate the formula of the first book, which was about 75% stories of learning how to be a country veterinarian and 25% stories of his hilariously inept wooing of the woman who, by the end of ACGAS, became his wife. All of which is well and good for a first novel, but where do you go from...more

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Mar 26, 2007 Justin Gerhardstein rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This book gives you warm fuzzy feelings at times, and also can make you want to vomit. I believe this is the personal narrative of James Harriot, though I could be mistaken. At any rate, the book is a compilation of stories that are told by a veterenarian in the 50s and earlier, when the medical practices were very different than they are today. There are some gross stories about pulling steaming calves out of a mother cow in the dead of winter (which for some reason is in great detail) but ther...more

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Apr 14, 2013 Cara Lynn rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

It took me years to pick up this series and, when I did, I couldn't believe the depth of heart-warming and heart-breaking stories I'd been allowing myself to miss out on. I read this second book in the series first (happily due to finding a penny copy at Goodwill) and it had me laughing uncontrollably (in public) one moment and sobbing (same public) the next. It is about the local people as much as it is about the animals and even about a vanishing(ed) way of life.

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About James Herriot

James Herriot is the pen name of James Alfred Wight, OBE, FRCVS also known as Alf Wight, an English veterinary surgeon and writer. Wight is best known for his semi-autobiographical stories, often referred to collectively as All Creatures Great and Small, a title used in some editions and in film and television adaptations.

In 1939, at the age of 23, he qualified as a veterinary surgeon with Glasgow...more James Herriot is the pen name of James Alfred Wight, OBE, FRCVS also known as Alf Wight, an English veterinary surgeon and writer. Wight is best known for his semi-autobiographical stories, often referred to collectively as All Creatures Great and Small, a title used in some editions and in film and television adaptations.

In 1939, at the age of 23, he qualified as a veterinary surgeon with Glasgow Veterinary College. In January 1940, he took a brief job at a veterinary practice in Sunderland, but moved in July to work in a rural practice based in the town of Thirsk, Yorkshire, close to the Yorkshire Dales and North York Moors, where he was to remain for the rest of his life. The original practice is now a museum, "The World of James Herriot".

Wight intended for years to write a book, but with most of his time consumed by veterinary practice and family, his writing ambition went nowhere. Challenged by his wife, in 1966 (at the age of 50), he began writing. In 1969 Wight wrote If Only They Could Talk, the first of the now-famous series based on his life working as a vet and his training in the Royal Air Force during the Second World War. Owing in part to professional etiquette which at that time frowned on veterinary surgeons and other professionals from advertising their services, he took a pen name, choosing "James Herriot". If Only They Could Talk was published in the United Kingdom in 1970 by Michael Joseph Ltd, but sales were slow until Thomas McCormack, of St. Martin's Press in New York City, received a copy and arranged to have the first two books published as a single volume in the United States. The resulting book, titled All Creatures Great and Small, was an overnight success, spawning numerous sequels, movies, and a successful television adaptation.

In his books, Wight calls the town where he lives and works Darrowby, which he based largely on the towns of Thirsk and Sowerby. He also renamed Donald Sinclair and his brother Brian Sinclair as Siegfried and Tristan Farnon, respectively. Wight's books are only partially autobiographical. Many of the stories are only loosely based on real events or people, and thus can be considered primarily fiction.

The Herriot books are often described as "animal stories" (Wight himself was known to refer to them as his "little cat-and-dog stories"), and given that they are about the life of a country veterinarian, animals certainly play a significant role in most of the stories. Yet animals play a lesser, sometimes even a negligible role in many of Wight's tales: the overall theme of his stories is Yorkshire country life, with its people and their animals primary elements that provide its distinct character. Further, it is Wight's shrewd observations of persons, animals, and their close inter-relationship, which give his writing much of its savour. Wight was just as interested in their owners as he was in his patients, and his writing is, at root, an amiable but keen comment on the human condition. The Yorkshire animals provide the element of pain and drama; the role of their owners is to feel and express joy, sadness, sometimes triumph. The animal characters also prevent Wight's stories from becoming twee or melodramatic — animals, unlike some humans, do not pretend to be ailing, nor have they imaginary complaints and needless fears. Their ill-health is real, not the result of flaws in their character which they avoid mending. In an age of social uncertainties, when there seem to be no remedies for anything, Wight's stories of resolute grappling with mysterious bacterial foes or severe injuries have an almost heroic quality, giving the reader a sense of assurance, even hope. Best of all, James Herriot has an abundant humour about himself and his difficulties. He never feels superior to any living thing, and is ever eager to learn — about animal doctoring, and about his fellow human creature.

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All Creatures Great and Small; And, All Things Bright and Beautiful

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