A book about the end of an old way of living and the beginning of a new life. The beginning of this book was strikingly... sensuous? and really swept me away, but the book covered less chronological ground overall than I'd hoped. ( )

Wonderful and captivating. Seductive, almost. You can feel the earth in your hands, see the land and the produce it yields. And you care about the author and her husband as their story unfurls. It also has one of the best wedding stories I've read in a long time. ( )

Funny, delightful autobiography. ( )

I’ve lived most of my adult life in farming communities and many of my friends are farmers, so while I’ve never farmed, I know enough about the way they talk. And it ain’t like this. Seriously, I enjoyed this book and leaned a lot about organic farming, but I couldn’t help but laugh as I listened (I had the audio version of “The Dirty Life”) to Kimball’s poetic descriptions of the agrarian life. Much of it sounded more like an English literature PhD dissertation than a memoir about farming a la Amish style. And how often has a distressed cow had The New Yorker read to her the way Kimball did. And who would possibly see Sandra Cisneros in the face of another cow. Well, Kimball did. The wedding scene near the end of the books was a cross between Woodstock Hippie and Fifth Avenue Chic. After all, don’t we all have guests “coming from Europe”? Enough snark. Kimball is really an excellent writer. It just mixes a little strangely with the…dirt. ( )

Really liked the writing. It was hard for this vegetarian to read the animal slaughter scenes, but I must say I respect people who kill their own food A LOT. If all food could be raised the way these people do it the world would be a better place. ( )