What do you think?
Rate this book
Driven Back to Eden
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
August 28, 2016
If you love the land and secretly dream of ditching city life and moving your family to the country you just might like this book. Or if you love country life and enjoy stories of a "father knows best" kind of dad instructing his family how to make the most of their new farmland you might like this book too. It's not a masterpiece, but I enjoyed it in part because of the agriculture theme and in part because it's nice to read about a family who is happy working together.
December 6, 2020
Father decides to ditch his office job and become a farmer. I wish he'd bought the metaphorical farm instead of a real one.
E. P. Roe was of those clergyman authors who sold a lot of books in middle America back in the day. He obviously meant well but this is one of the most boring books I have ever read. I'm all for extolling the virtues of hard work but it shouldn't be such hard work to read about it.
The fledgling farmer does extremely well considering he simultaneously grows just about every type f fruit and vegetable known to man. Problems involve weeds and a lightening strike which destroys the barn. A fiery neighbour and his unruly brood are subdued and rehabilitated just like shelling peas.
The children willingly chip in on the farm. Or maybe the Christian father's tendancy to apply the birch or tie them to a chair when they so much as raise their voices had something to do with their compliance. This conversation with his young son made me laugh though:
"O papa," he faltered, and his eyes were moist, "did you say a gun?"
"Yes, a breech-loading shot-gun on one condition—that you'll not smoke till after you are twenty-one. A growing boy can't smoke in safety."
Duller than paradise.
E. P. Roe was of those clergyman authors who sold a lot of books in middle America back in the day. He obviously meant well but this is one of the most boring books I have ever read. I'm all for extolling the virtues of hard work but it shouldn't be such hard work to read about it.
The fledgling farmer does extremely well considering he simultaneously grows just about every type f fruit and vegetable known to man. Problems involve weeds and a lightening strike which destroys the barn. A fiery neighbour and his unruly brood are subdued and rehabilitated just like shelling peas.
The children willingly chip in on the farm. Or maybe the Christian father's tendancy to apply the birch or tie them to a chair when they so much as raise their voices had something to do with their compliance. This conversation with his young son made me laugh though:
"O papa," he faltered, and his eyes were moist, "did you say a gun?"
"Yes, a breech-loading shot-gun on one condition—that you'll not smoke till after you are twenty-one. A growing boy can't smoke in safety."
Duller than paradise.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews