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 short stories, and the whole of the book is wonderful, rewarding, and funny. It's also steeped in all the heartbreak and worry of a country vet's life in the 1930s, but Herriot's natural compassion for animals and humans both and his gift for characterization, make this a truly remarkable book.

I wish there were more memoirs like this written by vets, but Herriot seems to be unmatched in his talent for distilling his life and practice into meaningful anecdotes. I get the feeling that the stories may not all be strictly factual, or adhere to the timetable recorded in a case book, but he has a marvelous gift for drawing truth and meaning out of his recollections.

This book includes the episode of Gyp ("Only One Woof") and introduces Magnus the vengeful dachshund.