Gene Everlasting: A Contrary Farmer’s Thoughts on Living Forever

Dryly humorous, intelligently original, and at times poetic, Logsdon (A Sanctuary of Trees) muses and wisecracks about cycles of life and death, nature’s resilience, and humanity’s follies from the rolling hills and changing seasons of his farm in Sandusky, Ohio, just steps from where he grew up, as he finds himself still alive after a bout with cancer. The themes of these short essays vary widely: the hypocrisy of money-lending and compound interest; the need for “secret crying places”; the breathtaking but “awesomely eerie” wonder of buzzards: “nothing symbolizes better the reality of farm and garden, bustling with life but always near to death,” he writes. Logsdon seems to have taken to heart the lessons he’s gleaned from parsnips: “cultivate an independent kind of ornery reliability…, develop a distinctive personality… appreciated by the few rather than the many…, don’t try to look too pretty… you’ll be asked to head up a fund-raiser.” Great bedtime reading, these succinct, thought-provoking, life-affirming essays are a perfect gift for your favorite gardener, nature lover, philosopher, or curmudgeon. (Jan. 20)