This was a most amazing book! When it came in the mail, I wasn’t sure I would get through the whole book. It was thick and had small print! I started in with high hopes and was pleasantly surprised to find that I really liked it! It almost makes me want to plant a vegetable garden next summer and can and preserve as much as I am able to! Almost.

Animal, Vegetable, Miracle was our October book club choice. It is the story of how one family ate local for one year. They either grew it on their farm, or it came from a local source (with in a couple hours).

Novelist Barbara Kingsolver once wrote, “If we can’t, as artists, improve on real life, we should put down our pencils and go bake bread.” In Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, she manages to do both, applying her literary skills to a new food environment. In her seamless diary narrative, Kingsolver tells how she and her family relocated to southern Appalachia after suffering through years of drought in Arizona. The purpose of the move was The Kingsolvers sought to “live in a place that could feed us” by growing their own food and living among a community of local organic growers.

They did just that – grew their own food. They preserved and butchered and had a ton of fun in the meantime. The chapters in the book are listed as months of the year which I thought made it more understandable. It talks about the food the ate or grew in each month. Obviously the winter months included all the food they had preserved and the animals they butchered.

The book is written by Barbara Kingsolver along with her husband Steven Hopp and daughter Camille Kingsolver. Lily was the younger daughter that was in on the project. Everyone seemed to be a good sport about it. I kept trying to figure out how my family would react if I decided we were going local and everything homegrown right down to the cheese we used. I’m pretty certain it wouldn’t go over so well. Although, if I could turn the year into a book that was a bestseller I’m sure my husband would be on board!!

If you are interested in the homesteading movement this book would be a great one for you to try out. Gardening is not a first love of mine, but this book made it all sound fun and frugal and enriching.

There are a lot of recipes throughout the book. Truthfuly, some of them looked odd, but I would be game to try them. At our book club meeting we had the Zuccchini Chocolate Cookies and they were delcious. Everyone needs a way to get rid of zucchini!

I’m discussing dinnertime, the cornerstone of our family’s mental health!

Barbara Kingsolver in Animal, Vegetable, Miracle

Have you read this book? And the bigger question – would you consider eating local for a year? Keep a journal if you do. It may be a bestseller!

-Eva