A Call to Farms: Reconnecting to Nature, Food, and Community in a Modern World

When the COVID pandemic began, journalist Grayson (Unlatched) was living in Los Angeles and hosting Uncivilize, the podcast in which she interviewed survivalists and contemplated the demise of civilization. During the lockdown, she and her husband moved their family to Oregon, where she fortuitously entered a farm internship program that changed her ideas about food and farming. She introduces readers to a range of small farms and farm organizations while highlighting some of the issues that small farmers, especially marginalized people, face. Her chatty (and sometimes snarky) writing style and tour takes readers to a homesteading school, a small cheesemaking operation, an organization of Black women growing food together, the Jewish Farmer Network, and a pricey neighborhood with a farm at its core. This book extolls the benefits of being outdoors and growing one’s own food, and it points out the difficulties new farmers face, the most critical one being the limited availability of affordable, fertile land.