The Best, The Good and The ???

Today I look at a trio of non-fiction books that fall into the best, good and questionable categories for farm or suburban homesteading.

Anyone who reads books that deal with survival after an apocalyptic event knows that life will be hard and will require skills that most of us don’t have – gardening, hunting, building, weaving, medical, etc.  These books cover, in varying degrees, those skill sets.  Two are definite keepers; the third is pretty but questionable.  One is jammed pack with information, one is about how to live with little or no money, and one is…pretty. 

______________________________________________________________________________

Review

Title:  The Encyclopedia of Country Living – 10^th Edition

Author:  Carla Emery

Copyright:  1994 - 2008

ISBN #10-57061-553-5 & 13-978-57061-553-5

Covering a thirty-two year period of constant updates, this book covers everything - from how to cook on a wood stove, gardening, pruning trees, logging, and bee keeping, candle making, home remedies and on and on.   It’s no wonder that among the back to the landers and homesteaders, The Encyclopedia of Country Living is considered their bible. 

Written in a no-nonsense style, the book is filled with information, instructions, illustrations, anecdotes and recipes.  It is HUGH, covering 921 pages, including the index.  If you want to know about a subject, it is probably in The Encyclopedia of Country Living.

I don’t recommend that you try to read this book as you would a novel.  It is simply too big and detailed.  You have to break it up into smaller pieces or you can get overwhelmed with the amount of information Ms. Emery provides.  I found that flipping through and finding a single subject I wanted to learn about worked best.

Parts of the book were very nostalgic for me.  I lived on a farm for five years when I was a teenager, and reading about cutting and hauling wood, milking a cow and planting a country garden brought back memories – not all of them good.  Many people dream about living the “simple life” on a farm.  Let me tell you, it is not simple and it is not easy, a fact that this book illustrates very well.  So if you are considering living on a farm, you really need to look at this book first.

What I liked about this book was how comprehensive it is.  It simply covers everything.  Whether you have never lived on a farm or if you lived on one all your life, this book is one you need on your bookshelf.

What I didn’t like about the book was the extremely small print.  I understand the reason for it – a larger print would have required more pages and a large price.  But it does make the book a little hard to read.

This book was written for the adult non-fiction market but can be read by anyone.
I heartily recommend this book to anyone considering a country life or even just dreaming of one.  In fact, if you can afford only one farm reference book, splurge on this one.  You will not find this amount of information in ten books, so why not just have it all in one handy place.  This book is a keeper of the first magnitude.

____________________________________________________________________________

Review

Title:  Possum Living – How to Live Well Without a Job and With (Almost) No Money

Author:  Dolly Freed

Copyright:  1978

ISBN #978-0-9820539-3-5

While not exactly an Apocalypse Book, Possum Living is a classic in living on almost nothing – which is exactly what would be required if the we are faced with an “end of the world as we know it” scenario.

Written in an honest and folksy style, Possum Living recounts the life of Dolly Freed and her father (who she refers to as “the Old Fool).  Dolly fully subscribes to her father’s philosophy that it is easier to learn to live without something that it is to earn the money to buy it.  So they turn their suburban Philadelphia house into a rabbit raising, chicken raising, gardening, hunting and fishing extravaganza.  The rabbits and chickens are in the basement.  The garden is kept fertilized by the most efficient compost maker Dolly has found – the rabbits.  She feeds them table scraps, they give her compost.

There were parts of this book where I laughed out loud.  In other parts I cringed.  The smell of chicken and rabbit poop wafting up from the basement is not something I could live with – let alone the smell of the basement itself.

Do you want to learn to live without a regular job?  If so, read this book, it will show you how.  Dolly and her dad lived on $700 per year.  Of course that was in 1978 – I don’t know what the equivalent in 2012 dollars would be, but it would be a lot less than the current poverty level.
What I like about this book was the style of writing, the anecdotes and the information.  I mean, she tells you how to butcher a rabbit – I didn’t expect that when I bought the book.  Dolly is someone I would like to meet and discuss life with over a cup of tea (homegrown, of course). 

What I didn’t like about the book was – nothing.  It was fresh, interesting and captivating.
This book was written for the adult non-fiction market but can be read by anyone.

I would recommend this book to anyone who is interested a free lifestyle – or just wants a good read.  It is definitely a keeper.
______________________________________________________________________________

Review

Title:  Farm Anatomy – The Curious Parts & Pieces of Country Life

Author:  Julia Rothman

Copyright:  2011

ISBN # None Listed

Ok, let’s face it – I’m a sucker for pretty, brightly illustrated books and Farm Anatomy falls right in there with the best of that category.  It is a very colorful, attractive book with lots of illustrations on every page that covers everything from types of livestock to knots that are useful in farm life.  Ms. Rothman even has simple instructions on how to make cheese.

This is not a comprehensive book.  It skims over the subjects in one or two pages, albeit with the above mentioned colorful (and cute) pictures of different types of cattle, sheep, goats, gardening hints, farm vehicles, etc. 

The writing style is simple and clear and the subjects flow from one to the other easily.  It’s not really a book that you want to read front to back.  It’s more like a pretty coffee table book that you leaf through and stop when a picture or subject catches your eye.

What I liked about this book was, of course, the colorful illustrations and the simple explanations that went along with them.  I also liked that the author addressed subjects that are not usually included in books of this type, such as quilting, rug making and cheese making. 

What I didn’t like about the book was that the subjects were glossed over.  With a little more information, this could be a very useful reference book.

This book was written for the adult non-fiction market but can be read by anyone.

I would recommend this book for anyone considering purchasing a farm as it does give an overview of what farm life entails.  It would also be great for a child or teen who was interested in farm life.