Subtitle: How I lost my job, buried a marriage and found my way by keeping chickens, foraging, preserving, bartering and eating locally (all on forty dollars a week)

Mather was a food writer and critic for several publications over a long period and the book is essentially a story about her return to contentment after a horror week that involved her husband announcing that he wanted to divorce and being made redundant from her role at the Chicago Tribune.

She doesn’t dwell on the miserable and looks to find the good, even in the little things. Thoughtfully written and thought provoking. My takeaway lesson from the book is that I need to buy local more, grow more and eat more seasonably. Unless I get a glasshouse, it’s not OK to have salads in August.

Author blog (which hasn’t been updated in a while, TBH) : http://thefeastnearbywordpress.com and there’s a Q&A session here: http://www.domenicacooks.com/2011/06/q-a-with-robin-mather-author-of-the-feast-nearby/

Also it’s well worth perusing the blog and book for the recipes included – several have a long family history. You know those will become favourites!