One Small Farm: Photographs of a Wisconsin Way of Life by Craig Schreiner

It's difficult to travel anywhere in this state with out seeing farm buildings beautifully gracing the gorgeous Wisconsin countryside. These farms are much of what this great state is built on. One Small Farm: Photographs of a Wisconsin Way of Life is the perfect illustration of a small Wisconsin farm, where the rhythms and routines of daily farm life keep the Lamberty family grounded. Milking cows in the morning and at night, plowing the fields, planting crops, baling hay, cleaning the barn, and helping birth a calf are just part of daily life on a farm.

Photographer Craig Schreiner perfectly captures a typical day, through the course of all four seasons, on the Lamberty farm near Pine Bluff, Wisconsin, while capturing the exceptional moments of a calf standing on its legs for the first time and corn just peeking through the ground for the first time in spring. While Schreiner's thoughtful photos illustrate farm life, he also helps shed light on the growing concern of disappearing small family farms, the rural way of life, and ultimately Wisconsin traditions.

Some Luck by Jame Smiley

Jane Smiley’s newest novel is the first in The Last Hundred Years trilogy.  The Pulitzer prize winning author intends to cover 100 years in the life of an Iowa farm family and the first novel, Some Luck, covers the years 1920-1953.  Smiley follows the Langdon family of Denby, Iowa through childbirth, death, the Great Depression and World War II in a unique fashion.  Not only does the author write from many of the different characters points of view, but each chapter itself represents one year. 

We begin with Walter, the 25 year-old father and owner of the farm.  His wife Rosanna is about to give birth to their first child, Frank, and he is ruminating on all of the things that farmers think about: which crops to plant this year, how many animals are there to take care of and can I really afford to farm all of this land? As the years move forward, Smiley introduces us to all of the Langdon children: Frank, Joe, Mary Elizabeth, Lillian, Henry and Claire and their unique personalities.  We see Walter struggle with changing technologies (horses vs. tractors) and Rosanna has her own challenges with loss and religion. 

Each of the Langdon children is different than the last, and we hear a lot from the point of view of Frank, the handsomest and, arguably, the most cunning Langdon child.  When the US gets involved in World War II, he joins the army and becomes a sniper while his sensitive younger brother Joe stays home on a II-A deferment and takes care of the family farm.  Lillian falls in love with a handsome stranger and Henry devours books as fast as he can get his hands on them.  The reader is quickly absorbed into the world that Smiley creates and is soon laughing and crying along with the family. 

Some Luck has been shortlisted for the National Book Award and is a profound family saga.

Shotgun Lovesongs by Nickolas Butler

In Butler’s debut novel, we find the tale of a small town called Little Wing in rural Wisconsin.  The story is told by a group of life-long friends and alternates between five points of view: Hank (the nice guy who stayed to take over the family farm), Lee (the now ridiculously successful rock star who always comes back to Wisconsin to recharge), Kip (the friend who never really felt at home in Little Wing who has now moved back from Chicago in an attempt to resurrect a decrepit local business), Ronny (a former professional rodeo who is now a bit slower than normal after an unfortunate alcohol induced accident) and Beth (Hank’s wife and friend to Lee, Kip and Ronny).  As the book unfolds, we find that Lee has returned home early from an international tour in order to sing at Kip’s wedding.  But old habits die hard and soon the group of friends is wondering why they were ever close to begin with. 

Shotgun Lovesongs is as much a love song in honor of Wisconsin as it is a tale of friends who struggle to stay close years after they go their separate ways in life.  Descriptions of the land and seasons connect all of the stories in a way that almost makes the thread appear stronger than the fabric it is sewn onto.  Butler’s love for Wisconsin is clearly channeled through that of Lee’s character; his prose lush and inviting.  A longtime fan of Kent Haruf’s depictions of small town life in the Colorado plains, this book invoked for me a similar heartfelt ode to Wisconsin in its treatment of people and place.  Those looking for a book about life in a small Midwestern town or even a story about life-long friends will find plenty to enjoy in Wisconsin novelist Nickolas Butler’s Shotgun Lovesongs.