A candid, sometimes raw and often humorous auto-biographical account of Léonard Lassalle's life written from a child's perspective as he develops into adulthood. The book begins with his birth in Nice in 1937 and the early years growing up on a small wild naturist island in the Mediterranean. He and his family move to the village of Dieulefit in Provence during World War II, where his mother made rabbit stew for the French resistance. Léonard then recounts his teenage years spent at the progressive Summerhill School where he finds self confidence, learns about girls and discovers 'English culture'. Art-student life follows in the 1950s in Paris and then in London where he meets a life model who becomes his wife.

Walnuts & Goat Cheese is the first part of Léonard's autobiography. The story continues in the book Source of Life where Léonard shares the unusual experiences that wove through his life after starting a spiritual training when he was 19 years old, and how that dramatically changed his life.