＊本书获得2009年Times Literary Supplement以及Globe and Mail的年度好书，以及2009年的 Writers’ Trust Canadian Non-Fiction Prize奖

“Brett's wise and witty meditation on farm life makes a compelling case for a simpler existence in a rural world.”—Globe & Mail

作者与诗人Brian Brett在书中回述了他在Salt Spring Island的一个小岛农场上的日子。这个农场另名为创伤农场，而在回忆的同时，作者穿插入许多关于农场生活的自然历史。不论是地球上的哪一个国家，最核心的产业就是农产业，但现代人越来越脱离农场生活，也不懂农夫们的辛苦贡献。

作者照顾着家畜、家禽、果园、花园、机械以及田地，同时也需要顾及周围的复杂的乡村社交关系。在这本书的最高潮，他在奇妙的农场田地里，银色月光照亮满地，遇见了一匹雄伟的鹿。作者服从民间传说以及严苛的科学来探讨如何养出最完美的一颗鸡蛋以及最理想的土壤，同时也批判了现代的农业综合企业以及屠杀场的残酷性质。不论是讨论农场围栏的存在意义、种子的能量或者他与家人、雇农几邻居的相处广西，他从不忘记农场生活每天所亲眼经历的生与死，生命的轮回。

关于作者：

Brian Brett是一位文学作者及诗人。

好评：

"Trauma Farm is a touching and tender memoir, at once humorous and profound, filled with wonderful insights about life as a poet and accidental farmer in what will always be, for Brian Brett especially, the gentle rainforests of home." -Wade Davis

"Brett hangs meditations of farm life, observations on biology and botany, and musings about the modern world on this Joycean structure. His writing is so vivid, the observations so telling, that a reader can virtually feel the smooth heft of a collected egg in the palm of a hand or hear the goofy, honking dawn call of the peacock." -Globe & Mail

"Brett neither champions the rural, pastoral cliches nor flinches in the face of the brutality of the natural world. Instead, he simply offers a deeply personal meditation on life on his small mixed farm . . . he leads the reader on a joyful, shocking, funny and absurdist journey that revels in the beauty of the smallest events." -Canadian Geographic

"Brett successfully maintains a delicate balance between broader, abstract issues: the global and historic context, and personal anecdote: the concrete, day-to-day details of operating a small farm on Saltspring Island, BC." -Geist

"Brett's wit and giddy ambivalence makes this account a stretch more provocative than similar rural memoirs, and an altogether compelling read." -Publisher's Weekly

"In this gloriously detailed memoir, Brett brings us into life on his small working farm on Saltspring Island. A gorgeously thoughtful meditation on the natural world." -Vancouver Sun

"It's easy to sympathize with Brett's world view. He represents the David of small farms against the Goliath of corporate agriculture." -Winnipeg Free Press

"Luxurious prose, striking imagery, and a sampling of his poems add to the tone and flavour of his book, thus making it eminently deserving of the 2010 Bill Duthie Booksellers' Choice Award (BC Book Prizes)." -Subterrain Magazine

"The work was hard, the pay was lousy, it was utter chaos, and I loved it. Brett would call that farming. Trauma Farm is a memoir and a natural history of small farms, rural life, biology, barnyards and botany set on an 18-year-long day. It begins and ends with Brett biblically and literally naked in the dark in the garden and poetically zigzags through time and place." -The Tyee

"You can taste the food he describes, feel the cool morning air on naked skin, smell the dogs and feel the mud. Brett reads almost as an invitation, a provocation, to make the natural, rooted, harmonious existence our own in whatever small ways we can." -Montreal Gazette

"Trauma Farm is a passionate memoir of life on a small farm. Brian Brett rants and raves, bringing us his own version of guns and roses in the guise of wisdom and wit. A great book that asks the reader to read it and then joyfully read it again." -Patrick Lane