“After the first Olive Farm book was published, in 2001 I got a three-book deal with Orion for a large sum of money. Obviously it did not come all at once, but it made the difference to living here on a shoestring to being able to turn the whole place around.”

British actress, writer and filmmaker

Carol Drinkwater is a British actress, writer and filmmaker who lives in France. She is best known for playing Helen Herriot in the television adaptation of James Herriot’s All Creatures Great and Small, and for her work as an author and filmmaker. Her role in that series brought wider attention, and she received the Variety Club Television Personality of the Year award in 1985. Beyond acting, her career spans writing and filmmaking, reflecting a creative life across several forms of storytelling.