The House on the Hill

"Too isolated to live in," said the neighbours of the dilapidated farmhouse Joy Baker made into a home. Yet within its crumbling walls, and under her pen name Frances Wilding, she nurtured a vision of childhood that rejected desks, timetables, and the compulsory march to school. Instead, her seven children learned from the rhythms of daily life-caring for animals, planting gardens, facing hardship, and discovering joy in the ordinary.

In The House on the Hill, Baker shares this remarkable season of family life with warmth and candour. At once a memoir of resilience and a quiet manifesto for freedom in education, it remains a powerful reminder that learning flourishes best where love and curiosity lead the way.