Hi! I've never posted in this part of Permies before, so please forgive and correct me if I'm doing this wrong.
It looks like most
books posted about here are instructional.
Heaven and Earth isn't, per se: it's literary fiction. But in addition to being a very engrossing and entertaining book, one that really pulled me into the lives lived, it also takes place mostly on an old farm in Puglia that a group of young people transform into a food forest and homestead. Most of the
trees -- olive, fig, mulberry, a holly oak, etc. -- are already there when they begin, which is handy. ETA: They're obsessed with
One Straw Revolution!
The young people are quite radical and participate in "actions" to do things like free horses about to be slaughtered, try to keep trees from being cut down, etc. I don't want to give away too much, because I want you all to read it! It does deal with some difficult and/or controversial subjects, everything from sex with multiple partners to difficulty conceiving, having family members in prison or on the run, trying to find refuge in the Anthropocene, etc., but I think it does so in a very sensitive and authentic way.
I think some of you might really like it. I certainly did.
Here are the details:
English translation by Anne Milano Appel
Published July 21st 2020 by Pamela Dorman Books (first published May 4th 2018)
Original Title:
Divorare il cielo
ISBN: 1984877313 (ISBN13: 9781984877314)
I read the hardcover edition, which has 404 pages.