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Arwen Donahue has a story to tell. And she tells it in words, of course. But she also tells it in pen and ink and watercolor. This is one beautiful book.
Donahue and her husband, David, live on a 200-acre farm in Nicholas County, Kentucky, land that’s half timber and half crop and grazing land, land adjoining the place that David’s great-great-great grandparents once farmed. They do CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) deliveries to 50-some shareholders, who receive a half-bushel basket of in-season produce for half of the year. They raise goats and cows and chickens. Some days, their daughter, Phoebe, helps. Some days, she doesn’t. In between plowing and weeding and harvesting and repairing fences, David plays music, and Arwen paints and writes and wonders what the next day will bring.
There’s nothing romanticized in the telling: bridges wash out and crops founder; laundry doesn’t dry for a week and animals wander away. Donahue tells the truth straight-on, both in what she chooses to tell and how she tells it: “The lettuce shoots the moon, the kale grows buggy and bitter, weeds swallow whole sections of the garden.” The illustration for this entry? Arwen and David asleep at the kitchen table. “’Toil, misery, and great food,’ he says after we eat, just before his head goes down.”
With an introduction by Barbara Kingsolver, who grew up in the same “obscure corner of the world,” “Landings” is a book that reads just plain honest, both verbally and visually. Follow the year artfully, and watch the pen-and-ink drawing of the winter entries bloom with watercolor as the days lengthen. Or follow it narratively, reading Donahue’s honest entries with surprise and respect. Either way, it’s a gem.
Landings: A Crooked Farm Year by Arwen Donahue. Hub City Press, 2022. 257 pp.
The story above first appeared in our March / April 2023 issue.
