I appreciated the author’s voice as a farmer speaking from experience and from the heart. Writing from his tiny farm, Fukuoka pushes back with flair against emerging agro-food paradigms.

I also found this book to be a window into mid-20th century Japan, a culture and period I simply did not know much about. Perhaps the best part of the book is the author's withering rants against industrial, modern agriculture. 

Rosalind Creasy is one of my heroes. It was she who first turned me on to heirloom fruits and vegetables over 30 years ago, when I read her newly published Cooking from the Garden. That seminal tome celebrates the food garden’s bounty and uses in cookery. 

Creasy is best known as a pioneer in the field of edible landscaping aka foodscaping: the practice of integrating edible plants into the landscape for beauty and sustenance. Think yummy delicious arbors, allées, groundcovers, borders, hedges, espaliers, foundation plantings, and potted plants. She spells out all the how-to’s, wheres, and whyfors in her first book, The Complete Book of Edible Landscaping; and updates it all in the second edition, Edible Landscaping. If you’re looking for practical advice, detailed instructions, design schemes, and recommended plants to feed body and soul, then allow me to point you in Ros’s direction.

Many garden books are structured in a classic four-seasons pattern, but this one goes beyond, by delineating the gardening year as steps in the essence of all living beings—from conception in January, adulthood in July and August, to death in December. This clever and thoughtful approach celebrates the fact that we are all woven into the fabric of the natural world. Add to that the author’s lifetime of good gardening experience and advice, and this book shows readers in intimate detail how to work with nature, not against her. 

Here’s a fantastic book for anyone who eats food. Humble and kind, Gabe has led thousands of us farmers to change our ways through the story of his transformation. His book showcases how hard farming can be when you rely on subsidies, rob your soil of life, and sell into heartless and corrupt commodity markets.

Gabe reveals what transformation looks like with a mindset and a management change… and just how rich and rewarding farm life is when you listen to and partner with Mother Nature. And how health and community grow around you. He’s my tractor-driving trail-blazing hero. 

If you only grow from the last frost to the first frost, your gardening season is extremely short. But a few simple season-extension techniques can mean you harvest fresh food nearly every day of the year. I've used Eliot Coleman's crop suggestions and his quick hoops and can say from experience that they make all the difference during the cold season.

I don’t think there’s anything as hopeful as patience, and it is patience that supports poet and farmer Scott Chaskey’s reflections on leaving England for a small Long Island land trust and helping it grow into one of the first community-supported agriculture (CSA) farms in the United States.

Seasons, patience, and a love of land and words have created a fertile farm and a thriving human community alongside an abundance of birds and wildlife. I return to this book every decade or so (I’ve had it for that long), when I think I know my life but what I truly need is to be re-enchanted by Chaskey’s poetry and food-growing, his life-long apprenticeship to the beauty alongside us.

He wrote: "The agriculturalist must obey Nature's rules,” which was radical in the 1940s! He started as an agricultural chemist but came to distrust synthetic fertilisers and pesticides. He valued and explains the importance of compost and mycorrhizal fungi, and coined a phrase that has become a mantra: ”Feed the soil not the plant”. I value his sincerity which shines throughout his books – they read as well now as when published, because these truths are universal.

I’m obsessed with the theme of living your calling to pay your bills, rather than exclusively chasing money. When I write books, I write to shift readers, rather than writing according to formulas that could sell more copies. So, I love Masumoto’s book on growing peaches that burst with flavor and sensual magic, even when others suggest he grow peaches that offer more sturdy shelf life. An artist-farmer, he takes the stand for one-of-a-kind quality and reveals a truly abundant life. Taking us directly into his intimate thoughts and decisions, this book is about living your destiny, choosing to work with natural forces, being insanely tenacious, and transforming your own life in the process. He “listens to his farm” and his writing is so beautiful we listen to it, too.  

I loved this book because it is about 3 strong women who overcome their fears and pain to make beautiful lives for themselves.

I have also done this. I left an abusive, life-sucking marriage after 20 years, became a domestic violence advocate, wrote books about emotional abuse to help others, then decided to become a counselor – which necessitated getting a master’s degree. Now I counsel other DV survivors and watching them make beauty from ashes in their lives is the most thrilling adventure I can imagine.

In this book, one woman leaves a life-sucking marriage, another heals from the premature death of her husband, and a third finds family where she had none. What a great story of redemption. 

I first got acquainted with John Seymour through the original version of this book, The Self-Sufficient Gardener. I was charmed by his earthy lore and practical tips – an author who truly knew his stuff. A plus was the beautiful illustrations in the book. Its new permutation, The Self-Sufficient Life and How to Live It was been expanded to cover everything from micro-urban gardens to 5-acre homesteads. While gardening is the focus, the book includes plenty of information on butchering, brewing, canning—even spinning flax. What the book doesn’t include are plans and step-by-step photos for building structures, though it does include rudimentary information on metalworking and carpentry. Most importantly, Seymour has a lifetime of gardening and farming experience to draw upon. The reader reaps the benefit.