Book Review: Field Days, a Year of Farming, Eating and Drinking Wine in California

Author Jonah Raskin labored on an organic farm in Sonoma, California, to write his new book Field Days: A Year of Farming, Eating, and Drinking Wine in California. He commingles his reporter's notes with personal memoir in this quest for "health, harmony, and a sense of place." The journey transforms him into a slimmer, near-vegetarian locavore. He comes to understand that the key to sustainability is to eat food raised close to home and grown organically.

Raskin says, "I did not intend this book to be about politics or economics." That is a concept so quaint as to be humorous. The only thing more political than the issues of farming, organic food production and environmental sustainability is Karl Rove's Blackberry. No matter how delicately Raskin wants to tiptoe around politics or economics, he is discussing Mexican farm labor within 22 pages, California land value within 31 pages and soon thereafter, farm collectives, food co-ops, agribusiness, Community Supported Agriculture (CSA), the Department of Homeland Security, labor raids, pesticides and other such socio-economic considerations. Raskin is no stranger to political topics. He reported extensively on California's marijuana cultivation business throughout the 1970s and he has written books on such incendiary figures as Abbie Hoffman and Alan Ginsberg. In spite of Raskin's non-political intent, he states (at least twice) throughout his book, "I believe that the hands on the hoes in the fields are connected to the hand on the knives and the forks at the dinner table." Not exactly destined for a bumper sticker, however it does capsulate a world view.

In Field Days, Raskin presents himself as a skilled note taker rather than a brilliant wordsmith. He knows his strengths and weaknesses. He displays no false modesty when he says, "I never do know how to use the terms that wine writers use, though I have written about wine and wineries for magazines since the 1980s." He demonstrates the point by rather feebly describing a boutique Zinfandel as "amazing" and moving on. Raskin's book reads like assiduous notes more or less randomly fleshed out. There is no unifying narrative thread to follow, no dramatic arc to travel. The many Somona residents who populate Field Days have personalities, but we learn too little about them to have an emotional stake in their outcome. We are still being introduced to new people on the fourth to last page. This is a bit of a ramble, but rambles can be enjoyable.

Raskin frequently is possessed to describe the clothing of his interview subjects and the impulse is entirely baffling, as the attire is never more remarkable than jeans, t-shirt and a baseball cap. Unless your subject is wearing leotards, a cape and a mask, it probably isn't worth mentioning. While this type of empty calorie detail is served, we are often left begging for more nourishing information at other passages in the book. For example, Raskin interviewed a farmer who "kept a record of the compost he added to the soil, and about compost he spoke rapturously. From the way he described its texture, color, smell, and weight, you might think compost was the food of the gods." And that's it. Nothing more about that rapturous description. Just nouns, the bare bones. No adjectives, no similes, no spice. How would we think compost was the food of the gods with nothing more to incite our imagination? Come on, give us something to develop that manna-like texture, color, smell and weight. We can take it.

On a substantive level, Raskin may be a bit light-headed and heavy-handed on the topic of locally grown and consumed produce. The most glaring example is his approach to the Whole Foods market chain. We are told that Whole Foods is an evil corporate giant to be shunned. However, we are never actually told why. From his interviews, the employees seem happy, the executives seem committed. Raskin is given access to all aspects of the Sonoma Whole Foods store with the exception of the kitchen for safety considerations, but for that hindrance Raskin insists Whole Foods is not to be trusted. He appears to have forgotten mentioning 200 pages earlier that Whole Foods loaned a Sonoma organic farmer $50,000, with which she installed an elaborate underground irrigation system, as part of the company's "program to rely less on distant suppliers and generate more produce from local farmers." This doesn't sound the least bit evil or corporate. In fact, it sounds quite compatable with Raskin's "hands on the hoes" sensibility. Yet, we are told absolutely nothing more about this sponsorship program. Remember, this is a personal quest and not investigative journalism. Field Days is best appreciated when held to this less demanding standard.

Raskin's personal quest is what is important here. "Going back to the soil--planting, harvesting, weeding, and cultivating--changed what I prepared in my kitchen and how I prepared it," he observes. "Farming changed my feelings about food any my rituals of eating, whether by myself or with friends." If it takes a ramble to reach this most admirable end, so be it. Enjoy the ramble.

Field Days: A Year of Farming, Eating, and Drinking Wine in California
By Jonah Raskin
University of California Press, 329 pages, $24.95 hardcover