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Plowed Fields #1-3
Plowed Fields
A family you won’t forget …
Infused with warmth, heart and hope …
Glazed with the sorrow of a devastating truth.
It’s December 1960, and a cold wind is blowing a rare white Christmas toward the Baker farm in South Georgia. Joe Baker, an intense young man hell-bent on achievement and responsibility, finds himself torn between his own desire and ambition and his loyalty and responsibility to his family. The oldest of six children, Joe can be counted on to make all the right moves, but what happens when his instincts fail him?
Plowed Fields is a family saga, played out between the turbulent years of 1960 and 1970. It’s the story of people coming together and falling apart, relying on God and losing faith, and pushing forward and fighting back in times of crisis.
Besides Joe, Plowed Fields features a cast of characters searching for a place to belong as they confront the hardships of their time. The Baker family is anchored by patriarch Sam, whose pirate’s appearance disguises a gentle giant of goodness, and his son, Matt, who is capable of strength and force when necessary but unafraid of tenderness when the moment requires a softer touch. Matt’s wife is Caroline, a practical woman whose pride occasionally gets the best of her Christian values.
Plowed Fields also features Lucas and Beauty Bartholomew, a young black man and woman struggling to build a better life for their family; Bobby Taylor, the epitome of a racist Southerner and then some; and Paul Berrien, a banker turned sheriff who has a shadow hanging over his aristocratic birthright.
Framed within that white Christmas, the Baker family seems poised on the brink of a grand experience. As the decade unfolds, however, the Bakers and their friends move from the tobacco field to the battlefield, from main street to city lights, from the church door to the gates of Hell. They face fire and famine, war and peace, good and evil—all leading up to a startling chain of events that unleashes the unthinkable and leaves them desperate to understand its shattering consequences.
In his debut novel, Jim Barber has captured a time and place in Americana with lyrical precision and stunning beauty. Amid the darkness and evil, he has infused this story with warmth, heart and hope as promising as a newly plowed field.
Infused with warmth, heart and hope …
Glazed with the sorrow of a devastating truth.
It’s December 1960, and a cold wind is blowing a rare white Christmas toward the Baker farm in South Georgia. Joe Baker, an intense young man hell-bent on achievement and responsibility, finds himself torn between his own desire and ambition and his loyalty and responsibility to his family. The oldest of six children, Joe can be counted on to make all the right moves, but what happens when his instincts fail him?
Plowed Fields is a family saga, played out between the turbulent years of 1960 and 1970. It’s the story of people coming together and falling apart, relying on God and losing faith, and pushing forward and fighting back in times of crisis.
Besides Joe, Plowed Fields features a cast of characters searching for a place to belong as they confront the hardships of their time. The Baker family is anchored by patriarch Sam, whose pirate’s appearance disguises a gentle giant of goodness, and his son, Matt, who is capable of strength and force when necessary but unafraid of tenderness when the moment requires a softer touch. Matt’s wife is Caroline, a practical woman whose pride occasionally gets the best of her Christian values.
Plowed Fields also features Lucas and Beauty Bartholomew, a young black man and woman struggling to build a better life for their family; Bobby Taylor, the epitome of a racist Southerner and then some; and Paul Berrien, a banker turned sheriff who has a shadow hanging over his aristocratic birthright.
Framed within that white Christmas, the Baker family seems poised on the brink of a grand experience. As the decade unfolds, however, the Bakers and their friends move from the tobacco field to the battlefield, from main street to city lights, from the church door to the gates of Hell. They face fire and famine, war and peace, good and evil—all leading up to a startling chain of events that unleashes the unthinkable and leaves them desperate to understand its shattering consequences.
In his debut novel, Jim Barber has captured a time and place in Americana with lyrical precision and stunning beauty. Amid the darkness and evil, he has infused this story with warmth, heart and hope as promising as a newly plowed field.
796 pages, Paperback
Published March 7, 2019
11 people are currently reading
17 people want to read
About the author
Jim Barber
6 books11 followersJim Barber grew up in South Georgia, helping his family raise hogs and working on his uncles’ tobacco farms while pursuing his dream to become a newspaper reporter. His first “public” job came at age sixteen, covering sports for his county newspaper, The Berrien Press. Jim spent the bulk of his newspaper career with United Press International’s Atlanta bureau before a short stint with the New York Daily News led him to transfer to the world of corporate journalism and a twenty-five-year career with Georgia Power and Southern Company, one of the nation’s largest utilities.
A state and national award winner for his writing in both phases of his career, Jim previously co-edited three published books: Atlanta Women Speak, a collection of speeches from notable women such as Jane Fonda, Atlanta Mayor Shirley Franklin and author Pearl Cleage, as well as Journey of Faith and Art From Our Hearts, both church histories.
While his work on the family farms is a distant memory, Jim does enjoy raising gardens in his backyard, especially tomatoes for his wife of nearly thirty-five years. Jim doesn’t eat tomatoes, but he does play a lot of tennis and works part-time as the administrator of his church. He and Becky live in Atlanta near Stone Mountain, which he climbs faithfully almost every day. They have three grown daughters, one son-in-law (soon to be two), and three grand dogs.
A state and national award winner for his writing in both phases of his career, Jim previously co-edited three published books: Atlanta Women Speak, a collection of speeches from notable women such as Jane Fonda, Atlanta Mayor Shirley Franklin and author Pearl Cleage, as well as Journey of Faith and Art From Our Hearts, both church histories.
While his work on the family farms is a distant memory, Jim does enjoy raising gardens in his backyard, especially tomatoes for his wife of nearly thirty-five years. Jim doesn’t eat tomatoes, but he does play a lot of tennis and works part-time as the administrator of his church. He and Becky live in Atlanta near Stone Mountain, which he climbs faithfully almost every day. They have three grown daughters, one son-in-law (soon to be two), and three grand dogs.
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
September 12, 2020
Great storytelling! This brought back many memories of my childhood growing up in South Georgia. I spent many summers picking tobacco and bailing hay. To me this book is more a retelling of my year’s growing up than a book of fiction.
July 2, 2019
Jim Barber’s Plowed Fields has earned a spot on my “favorite books of all time” list, alongside Betty Smith’s A Tree Grows in Brooklyn. Starting Barber’s book was a bit intimidating because of its length, but I was hooked before the end of chapter 1. Plowed Fields is an emotionally satisfying novel that follows the Baker family through the tumultuous 1960s. With Barber’s gift for storytelling and character development, I feel like I know the Bakers (especially Joe), the Taylors (who frighten me) and the Carters (with their charming and brave son Tom). I cried, got mad and experienced great joy as I read the book. The climax threw me for a loop, and, as with all my favorite novels, I was worried I would be disappointed in the resolution, but Barber delivered. I was reminded of when I read Kathryn Stockett’s The Help and Khaled Hosseini’s The Kite Runner and kept telling myself, “Just one more chapter, and I’ll take a break.” Plowed Fields is a rewarding page-turner that, like the other debut novels mentioned here, is sure to become an American classic.
May 18, 2019
Imagine a family like TV’s The Waltons living and loving on a tobacco farm in South Georgia during the 1960s, and you will have a strong sense of Plowed Fields. The story certainly has a wholesome quality—some might even say sentimental—but it’s also “glazed with the sorrow of a devastating truth.” Jim Barber has captured a time and place with exquisite detail and superb storytelling. Plowed Fields will break your heart, but it’s the warmth and tenderness of the people and their stories that will stay with you.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews