Good Husbandry: Growing Food, Love, and Family on Essex Farm by Kristin Kimball.

2/5 rating. 294 pages.

Book #43 of 2022. Read November 28, 2022.

This book is about Kristin’s life on her family farm in upstate New York.

I first picked this book up because their farm is located just across the lake from Charlotte, VT (a town with friends in it that is like 20 minutes south of me). I thought that a lot of the book wasn’t bad: it talked a lot about the highs and lows of farming. Unfortunately, I think that Kristin’s tone was a bit much for me. She often is at ends and arguing with her husband and seems rather unsure of herself and her place in her life. Some of this obviously is natural with the weight of the farm and her children on her, but it tipped over into complaining some which I wasn’t big on.

I did like the below quotes:

– “The idea of a farm is so simple: catch the sunlight, hold it where it fell, and use it to meet human needs.”

– “Maybe this time of year was not for avoiding the dark and difficulty but for embracing it, finding the hush in its depths.”

– “Farms teach you that when everything is overwhelming – when you look out at a huge field of weedy vegetables on a hundred-degree day – you must simply pick a row and start.”

Overall, I just wasn’t a big fan of this book. With all of the farming books and memoirs out there, I would choose a different one.

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