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Books about Agriculture
The Omnivore's Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals
by Michael Pollan
Exploration of the modern food chain, examining the impact of food choices on our health and the environment.
What should we have for dinner? The question has confronted us since man discovered fire, but according to Michael Pollan, the bestselling author of The Botany of Desire , how we answer it today, at ... (Goodreads)
The Good Earth
by Pearl S. Buck
A story of humble farmers facing the struggles of poverty and the upheaval of social change.
The story begins on Wang Lung 's wedding day and follows the rise and fall of his fortunes. The House of Hwang, a family of wealthy landowners, lives in the nearby town, where Wang Lung's future ... (Wikipedia)
Food Rules: An Eater's Manual
by Michael Pollan
A guide to mindful eating, exploring the connection between health, environment and culture.
A DEFINITIVE COMPENDIUM OF FOOD WISDOM Eating doesn't have to be so complicated. In this age of ever-more elaborate diets and conflicting health advice, Food Rules brings a welcome simplicity to our ... (Goodreads)
Jayber Crow
by Wendell Berry
An exploration of life and faith, set in a small Kentucky town.
"This is a book about Heaven," says Jayber Crow, "but I must say too that . . . I have wondered sometimes if it would not finally turn out to be a book about Hell." It is 1932 and he has returned to ... (Goodreads)
The Worst Hard Time: The Untold Story of Those Who Survived the Great American Dust Bowl
by Timothy Egan
A gripping account of the Dust Bowl, its causes, and the people who survived it. A tale of human resilience in the face of environmental disaster.
The dust storms that terrorized the High Plains in the darkest years of the Depression were like nothing ever seen before or since. Timothy Egan's critically acclaimed account rescues this iconic ... (Goodreads)
Hannah Coulter
by Wendell Berry
A rural family's struggles to survive both the trials of life and the destruction of their beloved land.
Hannah Coulter is Wendell Berry’s seventh novel and his first to employ the voice of a woman character in its telling. Hannah, the now–elderly narrator, recounts the love she has for the land and for ... (Barnes & Noble)
The Drunken Botanist: The Plants That Create the World's Great Drinks
by Amy Stewart
A fascinating exploration of the plants that make up our favorite alcoholic drinks, from the history of their cultivation to their modern-day uses in mixology.
The Essential,, New York Times,–Bestselling Guide to Botany and Booze, “A book that makes familiar drinks seem new again . . . Through this horticultural lens, a mixed drink becomes a cornucopia of ... (Barnes & Noble)
Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year of Food Life
by Barbara Kingsolver
A family's journey to eat locally grown, sustainable food.
Author Barbara Kingsolver and her family abandoned the industrial-food pipeline to live a rural life—vowing that, for one year, they'd only buy food raised in their own neighborhood, grow it ... (Goodreads)
Farmer Boy
by Laura Ingalls Wilder
Story of a young boy's life on a farm in 19th century America.
The novel is based on the childhood of Wilder's husband, Almanzo Wilder , who grew up in the 1860s near the town of Malone, New York . It covers roughly one year of his life, beginning just before ... (Wikipedia)
Growth of the Soil
by Knut Hamsun
A story of a man's life in rural Norway, his struggles, and his relationship with the land.
The novel begins by following the story of Isak, a Norwegian man, who finally settled upon a patch of land which he deemed fit for farming. He began creating earthen sheds in which he housed several ... (Wikipedia)
The Third Plate: Field Notes on the Future of Food
by Dan Barber
A chef's journey to create a sustainable food system, exploring the relationship between agriculture, ecology, and cuisine.
Barber explores the evolution of American food from the 'first plate,' or industrially-produced, meat-heavy dishes, to the 'second plate' of grass-fed meat and organic greens, and says that both of ... (Goodreads)
The One-Straw Revolution
by Masanobu Fukuoka
A revolutionary approach to farming that emphasizes natural processes and minimal intervention.
Fukuoka demonstrates how the way we look at farming influences the way we look at health, the school, nature, nutrition, spiritual health and life itself. He joins the healing of the land to the ... (Goodreads)
Tops & Bottoms
by Janet Stevens
A clever hare outwits a lazy bear by making a deal to split the crops, taking the tops or bottoms depending on the season.
Hare solves his family’s problems by tricking rich and lazy Bear in this funny, energetic version of an old slave story. With roots in American slave tales, Tops & Bottoms celebrates the trickster ... (Goodreads)
Father and I Were Ranchers
by Ralph Moody
A boy's coming-of-age story, learning the values of hard work and perseverance while growing up on a ranch.
Ralph Moody was eight years old in 1906 when his family moved from New Hampshire to a Colorado ranch. Through his eyes we experience the pleasures and perils of ranching there early in the twentieth ... (Barnes & Noble)
Strawberry Girl
by Lois Lenski
A young girl and her family face the challenges of living on a rural farm in the 1940s.
The land was theirs, but so were its hardships Strawberries – big, ripe, and juicy. Ten-year-old Birdie Boyer can hardly wait to start picking them. But her family has just moved to the Florida ... (Goodreads)
All New Square Foot Gardening
by Mel Bartholomew
A guide to creating a productive garden in a small space, using a unique square foot method. Perfect for urban gardeners or those with limited space.
In, All New Square Food Gardening, 3rd Edition, the best-selling gardening book in North America is relaunched and updated for the next generation of gardeners and beyond. Since Square Foot Gardening ... (Barnes & Noble)
The Solace of Open Spaces
by Gretel Ehrlich
A collection of essays exploring the beauty and harshness of the American West, and the people who call it home.
A stunning collection of personal observations that uses images of the American West to probe larger concerns in lyrical, evocative prose that is a true celebration of the region. ... (Goodreads)
Texas, Volume I
by James A. Michener
Epic saga of the Lone Star state, weaving together the histories of its numerous settlers.
Spanning four and a half centuries, James A. Michener’s monumental saga chronicles the epic history of Texas, from its Spanish roots in the age of the conquistadors to its current reputation as one ... (Goodreads)
Cooked: A Natural History of Transformation
by Michael Pollan
An exploration of the power of cooking and the four classical elements to transform food.
In Cooked , Michael Pollan explores the previously uncharted territory of his own kitchen. Here, he discovers the enduring power of the four classical elements - fire, water, air, and earth - to ... (Goodreads)
O Pioneers!
by Willa Cather
A tale of a family's struggles and triumphs, as they pioneer a new life in a changing landscape.
The book is divided into five parts, each of which has numerous chapters. On a windy January day in Hanover, Nebraska, Alexandra Bergson is with her five-year-old brother Emil, whose little kitten ... (Wikipedia)
Salmon Fishing in the Yemen
by Paul Torday
A wealthy sheikh's dream of introducing salmon fishing to the Yemeni desert becomes a political and personal challenge for a British fisheries expert.
What does it take to make us believe in the impossible? For Dr. Alfred Jones, life is a quiet mixture of civil service at the National Centre for Fisheries Excellence and marriage to Mary—an ... (Goodreads)
Food Inc.: A Participant Guide: How Industrial Food is Making Us Sicker, Fatter, and Poorer-And What You Can Do About It
by Karl Weber
An eye-opening guide to the food industry, revealing the hidden costs of cheap food and offering solutions for a healthier and more sustainable future.
Food, Inc. is guaranteed to shake up our perceptions of what we eat. This powerful documentary deconstructing the corporate food industry in America was hailed by Entertainment Weekly as “more than a ... (Goodreads)
The Shepherd's Life: A People's History of the Lake District
by James Rebanks
A chronicle of life in the Lake District of England, exploring the traditional way of life of shepherds.
Some people's lives are entirely their own creations. James Rebanks' isn't. The first son of a shepherd, who was the first son of a shepherd himself, he and his family have lived and worked in and ... (Goodreads)
The Dorito Effect: The Surprising New Truth About Food and Flavor
by Mark Schatzker
Investigating the science behind flavor, this book explores how modern food has lost its taste and nutrition, and how to reclaim it.
A lively and important argument from an award-winning journalist proving that the key to reversing America's health crisis lies in the overlooked link between nutrition and flavor. In The Dorito ... (Goodreads)
The Botany of Desire: A Plant's-Eye View of the World
by Michael Pollan
A fascinating exploration of the co-evolutionary relationship between humans and plants, and how plants have shaped human desires.
Every schoolchild learns about the mutually beneficial dance of honeybees and flowers: The bee collects nectar and pollen to make honey and, in the process, spreads the flowers’ genes far and wide. ... (Goodreads)
The Dirty Life: On Farming, Food, and Love
by Kristin Kimball
A woman's journey of self-discovery, finding purpose and love in the farming life.
From a “graceful, luminous writer with an eye for detail” (,Minneapolis Star Tribune,), this riveting memoir explores a year on a sustainable farm. When Kristin Kimball left New York City to ... (Barnes & Noble)
Some Luck
by Jane Smiley
A saga tracing five generations of a farming family in midwestern America.
On their farm in Denby, Iowa, Rosanna and Walter Langdon abide by time-honored values that they pass on to their five wildly different yet equally remarkable children: Frank, the brilliant, stubborn ... (Goodreads)
All Over Creation
by Ruth Ozeki
A family's struggle to save their farm and the world from genetically modified crops. A story of love, loss, and the power of activism.
A warm and witty saga about agribusiness, environmental activism, and community—from the celebrated author of My Year of Meats and A Tale for the Time Being . Yumi Fuller hasn’t set foot in her ... (Goodreads)
Food Matters: A Guide to Conscious Eating with More Than 75 Recipes
by Mark Bittman
A guide to conscious eating, with recipes that promote health and sustainability. Emphasizes the importance of food choices in personal and global well-being.
From the award-winning champion of culinary simplicity who gave us the bestselling How to Cook Everything and How to Cook Everything Vegetarian comes Food Matters , a plan for responsible eating ... (Barnes & Noble)
Dark Emu
by Bruce Pascoe
A groundbreaking work that challenges the colonial myth of Indigenous Australians as hunter-gatherers, revealing their sophisticated agricultural practices.
Dark Emu puts forward an argument for a reconsideration of the hunter-gatherer tag for precolonial Aboriginal Australians. The evidence insists that Aboriginal people right across the continent were ... (Goodreads)
Second Nature: A Gardener's Education
by Michael Pollan
A memoir of the author's journey from a novice gardener to a seasoned one, exploring the relationship between humans and nature.
In his articles and in best-selling books such as The Botany of Desire , Michael Pollan has established himself as one of our most important and beloved writers on modern man's place in the natural ... (Goodreads)
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