Farm Memoir

Farming has been in John Connell's family for generations, but he never intended to follow in his father's footsteps. Until, one winter, after more than a decade away, he finds himself back on the farm. Connell records the hypnotic rhythm of the farming day - cleaning the barns, caring for the herd, tending to sickly lambs, helping the cows give birth. Alongside the routine events, there are the unforeseen moments when things go wrong: when a calf fails to thrive, when a sheep goes missing, when an argument between father and son erupts and things are said that cannot be unsaid.

It was supposed to be a pleasant evening out; a break from the stress of the hard-working week they had both endured. A bite to eat in one of their favorite restaurants and then, if there was time, a movie at the cinema opposite. It had been - her husband - Sam's choice; an impromptu date. Yet his day had been one cock-up after another. Meetings had gone on longer than they should have, his phone had run out of battery, and every single traffic light seemed to be working against him.

Deep River uncovers layers of history - both personal and regional - that have accumulated on a river-bottom farm in west-central Missouri. It traces generations of Native Americans, frontiersmen, settlers, and farmers over the past two centuries. While the family story remains central, slavery and the Civil War in the 19th century, and Native American history in the centuries before that become major themes as well. The resulting portrait is both personal memoir and informal history, brought up from layers of time, the compound of which forms an emblematic American story.

Today he is known as Dr. Q, an internationally renowned neurosurgeon and neuroscientist who leads cutting-edge research to cure brain cancer. But not too long ago, he was Freddy, a 19-year-old undocumented migrant worker toiling in the fields of Central California. Alfredo Quiñones-Hinojosa tells his amazing life story - from his impoverished childhood in the tiny village of Palaco, Mexico, to his harrowing border crossing and his transformation from illegal immigrant to American citizen and gifted student at the University of California at Berkeley and at Harvard Medical School.

Now raising their four-year-old daughter, Indiana, alone, after Joey’s passing, Rory Feek digs deeper into the soil of his life and the unusual choices he and his wife, Joey, made together and the ones he’s making now to lead his family into the future. When Feek and his older daughters moved into a run-down farmhouse almost 20 years ago, he had no idea of the almost fairy-tale love story that was going to unfold on that small piece of Tennessee land. He takes listeners on his incredible journey from heartbreak to hope and, ultimately, the kind of healing that comes only through faith.

Born and raised in Zimbabwe, Douglas Rogers is the son of White farmers living through that country's long and tense transition from postcolonial rule. He escaped the dull future mapped out for him by his parents for one of adventure and excitement in Europe and the United States. But when Zimbabwe's President Robert Mugabe launched his violent program to reclaim White-owned land and Rogers' parents were caught in the cross fire, everything changed.

Belle Gunness was a farmer, a mother, and a murderer who lured victims to her Indiana farm with promises of love and opportunity. But behind the idyllic rural façade lay a gruesome reality—a farm where dreams were shattered, lives were stolen, and secrets were buried. Dubbed the "Black Widow of La Porte," Belle’s chilling crimes have haunted history for over a century. Whispers from the Murder Farm peels back the layers of this twisted case, exploring Belle’s calculated methods, the psychology behind her crimes, and the failures of law enforcement that allowed her to evade justice.

This is the story of Miss White, a woman who lived in the author’s village 80 years ago, a pioneer who realised her ambition to become a farmer during the Second World War, and how she worked to become accepted within this community. Nicola Chester, too, dreamed of becoming a farmer but working with horses was the only path open to her. Was it easier for women to become farmers in the 1940s than it is now?

Packed with fresh anecdotes and astonishing new detail, this emotional journey to the foothills of the Pennines brings the Cannon Hall Farm story bang up to date. In their own words, the very personal story of the ups and downs of the Nicholson family at Cannon Hall farm spanning almost 70 years. From the death of Roger’s beloved dad Charlie to the daily struggle for survival amid farming’s rapidly changing landscape, the Nicholsons have weathered storm after storm. They came perilously close to losing it all as a lifetime of farming tradition seemed to slip through their fingers.

Are you are ready to start the path to healing and understanding your life experiences? Then quit the rapids of denial and distraction and take this journey with Tom Igou. If you are looking to heal from past trauma or have a child undergoing difficult times and want to help, you are welcome here. Join Tom on his journey of reflection and let Nick of Time help guide you on your own path.

Suzy Lowry Geno walks the hills and creek side of Old Field Farm seeking a simpler peace-filled life like those of her grandparents and great-grandparents, who worked those acres before her. But as she finally began to rest in the true joys of faith, family, and slower living, she was forced back into the realities of the world of technology in the struggle to save her husband's life. Join her in Simple Times at Old Field Farm as she emerges triumphantly on the mountainside "keeping her hands busy and her heart open."

Celebrated journalist Lauren St. John "bears witness to a remarkable story" ( Publishers Weekly) in this striking memoir of her African childhood. In the 1970s St. John lived on a Rhodesian farm that should have been paradise. But the specter of war hung over the land, filling every day with peril and uncertainty.

Jimmy's Farm turns 20 years old in 2022. From starting out with rare breed pigs and a farm shop, Jimmy and his wife, Michaela, have grown the business over the years and the farm is now licensed to operate as a wildlife park. Tales from Jimmy's Farm follows a year in the life of the farm. The narrative traces the seasons as Jimmy documents what it means to live on a farm and what each day holds for him, his wife and four young daughters, the land he is farming and the animals in his care.

Jo McDougall brings a poet's sensibility to memoir. Recounting five generations of Delta rice farmers, through family archives and oral histories, she traces how the clan made their way into the fabric of America, beginning with her Belgian-immigrant grandfather, a pioneer rice farmer on the Arkansas Delta at the turn of the 20th century. As John Grisham has for a 1950s Arkansas cotton farm, McDougall illuminates an Arkansas rice farm in the 1930s and 1940s.

As a teenage Mennonite girl, Amanda lives with her close-knit family in south central Pennsylvania. Life revolves around hard work, faith, and commitment to the family. She doesn't question the daily routine; it's the only life she's known. Her father talks about buying a farm out west with a lot of land in one block. Not only will the family farm there together, but the parents hope to begin a new Mennonite community. To a 15-year-old girl, this move begins as an exciting adventure.

A touching memoir filled with food, friendships, and scenes of Italy, Pinch Me is ultimately a celebration of love, of learning to see the world, as well as oneself, through a different window, and of the powerful joy that comes from building a dream.

When Kelvin and Liz Fletcher left their happy home in Oldham for a 120-acre farm in the Peak District, they were totally unaware of the surprises that lay in store. Come along for the ride as they navigate the Mishaps, like shearing sheep in a way that costs more than the price for the wool; the Lessons, such as never turn your back on a flock of sheep—or, put simply, ‘always close the gate!'—and the Adventures, going from self-professed ‘townies’ to farmhands overnight. In Fletchers on the Farm, childhood sweethearts Kelvin and Liz reflect on their history.

My book is the story of my life. On the Sidelines of History: My Life's Journey from the Farm House to the White House and Back contains extensive information about a Kansas farm boy and his experiences and over 90 years of life. These experiences include a 22-year career in the United States Air Force, a three-and-a-half-year tour as the deputy commander of the White House Communications Agency in Washington, DC, extensive public service with the state of Kansas including secretary of agriculture, secretary of commerce, and more.

Farms have fences. People have boundaries. Mine began crumbling the day I knelt behind a male sheep, reached between his legs, and squeezed his testicles. This took place one blustery November day when I joined other shepherd-wannabes for a class on the basics of raising sheep. I was there with my partner Melissa, the woman I'd lived with for 12 years, because we were going to start a farm.

Tom Rivers, a reporter for The Daily News in Batavia, wrote a first-person series about farm work in 2008 that won state and national awards. Now the series, with more background and other information, has been compiled in a newly released audiobook, Farm Hands: Hard Work and Hard Lessons from Western New York Fields. Rivers worked at a dozen farms in Orleans and Genesee counties, trying to find out why so few local residents are willing to work on farms. He discovered the work requires many skills, enormous willpower and physical strength.