Coop: A Family, a Farm, and the Pursuit of One Good Egg
Coop: A Family, a Farm, and the Pursuit of One Good Egg
by Michael Perry (Author of Population: 485)
Michael Perry is just one of those authors, one of those gifted few, who after you read a couple of pages you feel like you are curled by the fire listening to a master storyteller that you could listen to all night long. His narration is honest, thoughtful- interlaced with humor and always well written anecdotes that make you think about how the world is and how it ought to be.
Coop is an excellent book, split between memories in which Perry tells of how life was during his rural childhood and the other half is a modern day city peeps meet rural narration, or what he is living currently. The reason the childhood memories are triggered is that Perry is a country boy gone citified and then he and his family move back out to the country all the memories of life as a farm boy emerge. I loved both narratives, I enjoyed them each for their own reasons. I admired his parents, who had more children staying with them than the old woman in the shoe! They had natural children, adopted others and took in many (MANY) foster children a high portion of which were handicapped in some way and required a lot of care. So they captured me by their simple and very generous nature. The current day storyline of Perry and his wife in so many ways they reminded me of The Husband and I that I just couldn't not completely love it. He is tender and honest in his rendering of his life living with a woman who longs to embrace life as it comes-naturally (even if he doesn't). His humor reminded me of how The Husband writes about me and it endeared me completely to them as a couple.
As much as this book is a rich narrative about chickens, pigs, cows, and country chores it is much more an honest approach to purpose and life. Perry takes the reader easily word by word gliding on hard work, pure talent, and a voice that rises off the print to help you pull up a chair and get comfy. Coop has become that one book I mention everywhere I go and am not embarrassed to be a shameless promoter of. Michael Perry is a literary ROCKSTAR!! (although I hear he ain't too bad at keeping a tune either!) Coop is a blessing to read no matter who you are, or where you are in life- it will shed new light on your earthy travels for sure. Entirely 100% recommended- it even gets my stellar five chicken book award. Ya just gotta read it, I tell ya!
Michael Perry will be on Blog Talk Radio with Book Club Girl on Monday, June 7th at 7pm EST
Michael Perry's website: Sneezing Cow
ISBN: 9780061240447
Subtitle: A Family, a Farm, and the Pursuit of One Good Egg
Author: Perry, Michael
Publisher: Harper Perennial
Subject: Memoirs, Non-Fiction
Publication Date: May 2010
Pages: 384
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Made from Scratch: Discovering the Pleasures of a Handmade Life
Made from Scratch: Discovering the Pleasures of a Handmade Life
This is a type of info/memoir by and about Jenna Woginrich. Made from Scratch covers beekeeping, chicken raising, antique hunting, bread making and many other rituals of the not-so-urban dwellers. Her book is set up well and there are sections of it that are extremely helpful and smart.
Many times however, I was turned off by the attempt to cover up poor writing by and addition of overly flowered and emotional prose. It was just way too loaded for me. She got emotional and excited because some friends from college were to join her at her house and so she went out of her way to make it a complete hassle-free weekend for them. She goes on to speak of how blessed she is that as she sees her friend falling asleep on the couch she knows that the food that is going through his body is from her very own farm. Cheesy! I have chickens in my backyard and I have never sat and thought that, yes I am delighted the boys get fresh eggs, and delighted that we aren't paying into the insanely hideous picture of all those caged birds laying eggs onto a conveyor belt for their whole lives while never to set foot on grass. Yes I am! But it seems to me Jenna goes a little overboard with her pleasure of the food that is in her friends digestive system. It isn't just that passage either- there are more.
Besides the emotional aspect of this book (which seems to be written by someone either PMSing or enduring Menopause) I did enjoy the farming insight and tips. Although I am not quite ready to dive into bee-keeping (the neighbors probably wouldn't like it either) I liked reading what she learned from both her mistakes and successes. I learn from other people's mistakes when it comes to farming, gardening and such- it is way to expensive not to! Overall this was an average short and light read. It could have been so much better without the melodrama, but there were enough tidbits in it to keep me somewhat content.
If you could own one kind of farm animal (without worrying about land space, or your neighbors) what would it be? The latest one that I want...Angora rabbits! I really want me a pair.
- ISBN: 9781603420860
- Subtitle: Discovering the Pleasures of a Handmade Life
- Author: Woginrich, Jenna
- Publisher: Storey Publishing
- Subject: Do-It-Yourself - General
- Personal Memoirs
- Country life
- Urban homesteading.
- Farmers & Ranchers
- Self-reliant living
- Publication Date: December 2008
- Pages: 184
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Book Review: The Photographer
The Photographer: Into War-Torn Afghanistan with Doctors Without Borders
by Emmanuel Guibert, Frederic Lemercier and Didier Lefevre
267 Pages
Memoir Graphic Novel/Photography
Published by First Second
My Rating of The Photographer: 90/100
Didier Lefevre, a photographer from France joins in with the physicians working through Doctors Without Borders. He left his home, Paris, after packing up his apartment and settling everything before heading out on this expedition. Once in Afghanistan his mission has begun, he follows the MSF (or Doctors Without Borders) taking pictures of their journeys through the rural villages setting up clinics and working on patients. When he sets out, it is obvious that he has no idea what toll this expedition will take on him emotionally and physically. He is very naive at times, he gets bored easy, and when he hears the MSF are going to take a different route back in order to treat some other villages, he can't handle the extra wait in getting back to the city, and essentially back home. When Didier decides to leave the comforts and safety of the MSF group and head back on schedule, it is 
not until they are gone that he begins to understand what is so important about having a good understanding of the native language and established relationships- he has neither. Death is more likely the outcome of this choice than survival.
This is an outstanding graphic novel, filled with photos taken while Didier Lefevre paired with the art excellence of Emmanuel Guibert. The Photographer continues to recieve notice around the world, for an inside view of a desperate war-related experience. What most amazed me was how naive Didier was when he got on the plane leaving Paris, and the growth that is shown by the end of the book. He is a fighter, and when in the beginning he thinks he is setting out for an adventure, in the end that same adventure is what is making him fight for his life.
I have never read a book like this one, since I love photography and I love art it was sure to be a hit. What I enjoyed even more was the honesty, the way Lefevre displays his stupidity, and how he chooses to place himself in circumstances that are really bad. It is through just this honesty that he is more real, more alive and just more human. I could relate to his feelings of desperation, loneliness and sadness, it was easy to follow him on this journey and somehow know that it would have been possible for me to make those same choices. He is driven to get the best shots possible, even if it does mean a risk. If you like graphic novels, this is a great one, the photos making it even more interesting- it is photo journalism at its best along with a desperation for life, and to life to tell the tale. I highly recommend this book, it is still making me think.
What is the cost of adventure?
If a story is not fought for with your very life, is it much of a story to tell?
Book Review: Don’t Let’s Go to the Dogs Tonight
Don't Let's Go to the Dogs Tonight
An African Childhood
by Alexandra Fuller
315 Pages
Childhood Memoir Zimbabwe
Random House
Published 2001
In a land not her own, but not really being connected to anywhere else is how little Alexandra Fuller grew up. Living in Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe), enduring the war and racial turmoil, Alexandra (aka Bobo) grew up almost raising her parents as she raised herself. Her mother was mentally unstable after loosing several of her children in childbirth or shortly after, and very maniacal in her pleasures and hatreds. Her father worked most of the time, and when not working he joined up with the white side of the government in the Rhodesian Civil War. They allowed (I could even go so far as to say encouraged) their daughters at a very young age to drink alcohol and smoke. The only rule was that they didn't get caught smoking at boarding school or they would be kicked out.
This is a book of what it would be like to grow up in a country where you don't fit, where you parents express racism outwardly, where you have to live in a gated home and go away to boarding school from very early on. Also a place where schools are segregated into A Schools, B Schools and so on depending on your race and skin tone. What shocked me the most was the racism of her parents, but more than that was how Bobo somehow managed to not embrace it herself. There are several key moments in the book where you realise that she is going to end up just fine, that almost in spite of her parents ideology and beliefs, she will be different than them.
I loved reading Don't Let's Go to the Dogs Tonight (actually listened to it). Alexandra Fuller skillfully tells her story, and when she does, even the horrors of it all seem to have a tinge of hope. I don't like downer and gloomy books, and this is not one of those, but she isn't cheery for no purpose, I would say just optimistic. I loved Bobo as a young girl, and the older she got the more I felt like I knew her. She is an excellent writer, storyteller and lived an extreme life, I am so glad that she told her story, I am a better person for having met her, if only through her book.I don't even love memoirs and I loved this read! So if you are a non-fiction buff or love memoirs you would probably enjoy it all the more!
Don't Let's Go to the Dogs Tonight gets my special best books prize, the "Stellar Five Chicken Award" because chickens are so much better than stars, it really is just that good!
Author Website: Alexandra Fuller
If you enjoyed Don't Let's Go to the Dogs Tonight you should check out The Glass Castle
How have you changed your story? Would you say when you are in the midst of tough situations you are optimistic or pessimistic?
The Mighty Queens of Freeville
The Mighty Queens of Freeville: A Mother, A Daughter and the People Who Raised Them
by Amy Dickinson
240 Pages
Memoir
Hyperion (February 3, 2009)
Family relationships, values and friendships have always been important to Amy. While growing up she had especially strong bonds with the females in her life. Now that she is older she wonders if it is a curse or a blessing that all of the important people in her life are women. Even the women in her life, (her mother, most of her sisters, and her friends) can' t seem to hold onto the men in their lives at all. Her father just up and left when she was young, her brother doesn't speak to them, and her aunts (all but one) are divorced. Amy, seeing the doom is decidedly going to break the mold, determined that her marriage will be a success, it will be but not in the way she expects. The fruit of her attempt at marriage gives her a beautiful daughter, which she now gets to raise amongst the Mighty Queens of Freeville.
This is a memoir by Amy Dickinson, the author of the syndicated advice column ASK AMY and also an NPR contributor. The Mighty Queens of Freeville: A Mother, A Daughter and the People Who Raised Them is an interesting read, and I did like it, however I didn't love it. I think if I could have related more I would have enjoyed it more. I grew up with the stronger relationships in my family being male, I have a loving mother, but we just didn't have much in common. My brother was my ultimate soccer buddy, and we always had guy friends, now that I am older I see the value in female friendships, but for a long time I would have chosen a guy over a gal any day. Guys just made more sense to me, they fought it out, played it out and didn't play any manipulation games or talk about their feelings all the time (at least the ones I knew).
Yet, I did enjoy the community in this memoir, I loved reading of their weekly gatherings for breakfast at the same little diner, and their random spur of the moment gatherings which occurred almost daily. I love strong family ties, I think they keep people out of trouble, those who are most connected to loving families seem to know that they are loved and are secure. I found this in the Mighty Queens of Freeville. No matter what happened she had a sense of security that was beyond herself, it was the bonds of the mighty queens, who were always strong enough for the weakest link.
Did you grow up with strong family ties? Do those bonds still secure you in times when nothing else will? Maybe those same bonds at times felt smothering, why do you think that is?
Book Trailer for The Mighty Queens of Freeville:
A View of Jerusalem
Title: A View of Jerusalem
Author: Erin Sheely Tolman
Pages: 116
Publisher: worldclay
Genre: Memoir, collection of travel memories
Yearly Count: 3
Erin Sheely Tolman writes with excellence about her time at the BYU Jerusalem Center, in August of 2000. With determination she embarks on a journey to see as much as she can along with 172 other students. So excited is Erin about her new surroundings and the potential adventures lurking behind every corner that she does not see the dangers that are brewing in that part of the world. Will she get to carry her dreams of exploration and adventure all the way through her voyage or will the dark cloud of middle eastern conflict make traveling and touring a feat even too dangerous for Erin Sheely Tolman?
I completely enjoyed A View of Jerusalem, I read it in one sitting and could not get over the beautifully written descriptions of important religious places that Erin traveled to. Her sincerity in the disappointments of being in lockdown for different periods of the trip, as a safety precaution and other joys and sadnesses she endured made the personality burst through. Stunning illustrations by Steven Lee Elgan help depict the places Erin is visiting, and what she is seeing.
The visuals really helped me gain an even deeper understanding than just by words alone.
She not only explains the importance of each of the sites she tours, but she fills the page with more than surface level descriptions. Going beyond the physical experience to retell her personal feelings, what she learned, and how it changed her forever.
Any reader who is a traveler, or a traveler through reading about other peoples voyages will enjoy this read. It is short and very sweet. I understood and could relate on many different levels, I share the desire Erin Tolman does to explore, as well as experience life in its fullest. I get that. I also can relate to being far away from family and feeling blessed by having them, but miss them all the same. If you read this book you are sure to fall in love with Erin Sheely Tolman.
I just had to share some pictures with you that Erin took on her trip, Jerusalem is a place of beauty, romance, and mystery to me. Enjoy her photos:
fire in the old city
the temple mount
galilee at sunset
garden tomb
the western wallIf you could travel to any place in the world where would you go?
Home Girl
Title: Home Girl: Building a Dream House on a Lawless Block
Author: Judith Matloff
Pages: 290
Genre: Memoir, Travel, Home Repair, Urban Living
Yearly Count:6
Starting off as a travel memoir Home Girl really captured my attention in the beginning. Judith is a traveling world journalist who has been at it for 20 years and loves the whole deal. I couldn't help but relate to her gypsyish dreams of travel and adventure. A time comes though, when life's goals change and it is time for Judith to move into the dreams of family, consistency and not living each day in extreme danger. She and her hubby decide to purchase a house. They have no idea that their adventures overseas only were the tip of the iceberg!
I could relate to the desire to travel, to see things, experience and to live all over. Half way into the home-remodel Home Girl just lost interest for me, I tried to enjoy the rest but it was just too much detail on the freaky street that they chose to buy on and not enough about the little details that make the story relatable. I do see though how many others could relate to this story better than I did. After the initial couple chapters I just didn't feel that strong of a connection because she was so much different than me, in a different stage of life and searching for different things.
Why were Judith and her hubby there in the first place? I don't get it. There are so many, SO MANY, much better places to live than across the street of the crack capitol of the whole east coast!!! Seriously, I willed them to move so many times. What would you do if you found out after buying your home that it was the mecca of drugs and dealers??
It was very amusing though, how she and her husband John paid the drug dealers off the streets to help them renovate their home. I found most of those encounters very touching, humorous and to me they seemed pretty realistic. Judith and her husband kept rooting for these guys to get out of their situations, and it showed just how embedded they were that even after being given chances and time they still often felt the need to scurry back to what they knew and where they were comfortable. I get wanting to be someplace familiar, not even caring what it looks like, familiar makes me happy too. I got it.
All in all it was interesting, but not really my type of book, I just couldn't relate. But, if you are middle aged, just settling down, dealing with miscarriages or into remodeling homes...this could be perfect for you!
Have you ever dreamed of living somewhere to move there and find out you just couldn't wait to get out? Did it grow on you or did you flee like cat thrown in water?
Did you read this too?
They did:
Wife in the North
Author: Judith o' Reilly
Pages:352
Publisher: PublicAffairs
Genre: memoir
Yearly Count b:92
So many times we mothers are faced with the decision of being honest about our daily struggles or pretending that we have it all together so that our friends will think better of us. haha, all my friends know I am the freak mom that has chickens in her backyard and lets her kids get really (REALLY) dirty, life is too short! In Wife in the North, her fears, her doubts and her temper tantrums are all laid bare as a release. Judith began documenting her struggles in the form of a daily diary on her blog, Wife in the North and soon it took off, took off into a book contract for the book named by her blog title, Wife in the North.
Judith is a mother, a wife and a city girl who will have to adapt to living in the country for a set period of time. At least she has that, that after the alloted time period the family will make the choice to stay in the northern far-and-away town with no good shopping, or they will embrace the chaos and business of city life by moving back to London. Judith in this memoir is not into sugar coating anything, she hates it. She lives daily in loathing of where she is at and wishing that her husband would come home from his business trips and stay with them for a while. Judith speaks of loneliness, loss and the desire to fit in and at the same time not fit in because that would alter her London city girl image.
I enjoyed this read, I did find it a tad bit negative, but really if I had my inner thoughts written on paper they would be slightly to extremely negative depending on what was being asked of me. More than anything I eat up honesty and Wife in the North is filled with it. I could feel her grief, her loss, her loneliness and feelings of not belonging, not fitting, and that her kids were driving her crazy. It was extremely personable. If you enjoy memoirs, read this one and tell me what you think!
I will soon have an author interview and a giveaway for your own copy of Wife In the North, so stay tuned 
In the mean time, answer me this: What kind of mom or dad are you? Do you let your kids practice the 10 second rule (in our house it is more like the minute rule!)? Do you scrub everything bare with disinfectant and essential oils? What does your day look like as a parent?
Here is her blog, it is really funny, take a look: Wife In The North
Dewey
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Tim Gallagher/Sioux City Journal
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Title: Dewey: The Small-Town Library Cat Who Touched the World
Author: Vicky Myron
Pages: 288
Yearly Count b: 88
Dewey was a little cat that had been placed in the night deposit book box at the Spencer Library in Iowa, on the coldest night of the year. This is a true story! The library staff nursed him back to health and he was forever grateful, his whole life he lived to please people because these people were the ones that saved him.
Vicky Myron writes about her adopted cat friend Dewey (short for Dewey Readmore Books).It is the story of one cat, not just any cat, but a cat who believed in he was there to change Spencer Iowa. This is the story of how he touched not just those in Spencer folks from around the world. He proved himself to not be just any cat, but a cat who deserved all the attention he received.
I enjoyed listening to this book from Hachette audiobooks, in the winter when I have tons of Christmas projects to finish I enjoy multi-tasking by listening to a book and knitting or sewing little gifts for my family at the same time. Dewey was a read cute for sure. However I would recommend to you only if you are even a little of an animal lover, but for sure if you hate them this book will be a little much. If you can't get enough of your pets and other people's furry friends, and think they are talking to you and asking you for things....this is for sure the book for you! It was great!
Check out his personal page on the library's website: Dewey Readmore Books
Or you can check him out on Facebook as well at Dewey's Facebook Page
How-a-bout a Dewey look-alike contest with prizes!? There is one! Dewey's look alikes
