New Complete Self-sufficiency: The Classic Guide for Realists and Dreamers

By: John Seymour

Make the break, realize the dream and start living "the good life". Packed with comprehensive information on all the practical details, from ploughing fields to milking cows, as well as information on how to create an urban organic garden and harness natural energy, this second edition aims to be a useful handbook for realists and dreamers alike.

Well - it is brilliant and a 'must have' The original inspired me many years ago and this edition still inspires. It's not so much the technical information as the underlying faith that you can do it and have a better life.

 Vegetable Growing Month by Month

By: John Harrison

OK, I'll come clean and declare my interest! I wrote this and I'm a bit biased. Well extemely proud of it to be truthful and it is a bestseller.

It's aimed firstly at the new vegetable grower but there are tips and tricks that I think will help even more experienced gardeners. It's not a coffee table book, no full colour photographs or exotic ideas, just basic advice I'd give to another grower on the allotment.

For a full chapter list and to buy a signed copy direct, click this Vegetable Growing Month by Month or for a discount follow the Amazon link to the right.

Go on - it's not expensive and you won't be sorry! At 256 pages it's just over 2p a page!

 Low-Cost Living: Live better, spend less

By: John Harrison

I originally wanted to call this "Self Sufficiency in the Suburbs" but the marketing men got involved! Anyway, it's about living a 'good life' for real in an ordinary house. There's no daft stuff about knitting your own muesli or saving the planet by living in a yurt.

It's our practical tips and philosophy for a greener, lower cost life. You can find out more and get a signed copy from the site - Low Cost Living

 Urban Dreams Rural Realities: In Pursuit of the Good Life

By: Daniel Butler, Bel Crewe

Told in contrasting voices by each of the pair in turn, this is a humorous account of a couple's first year in the wilds of Wales, for which they had left London in pursuit of a rural idyll. It juxtaposes the fantasy and the reality of an attempt to live "The Good Life".

Really is a funny book - both of us read it and loved it. A laugh a page as well as some more serious points hidden in there

 Scenes from a Smallholding

By: Charles Quentin Griffin

I've read Chas Griffin's column in the HDRA magazine for years and it was with joy that I saw he'd finally written a book.

Chas Griffin has a style of writing that immediately puts you at ease and a sense of humour that is apparent from the opening line of "As many as two people (possibly three) have recently suggested that I should consider publishing a collection of articles". Yet hidden away in the text are nuggets of sensible advice and proven strategies for those who might wish to up sticks and head off into the depths of darkest Wales (or anywhere else for that matter) in search of the Good Life.

 How to Build Animal Housing: 60 Plans for Coops, Hutches, Barns, Sheds, Pens, Nest Boxes, Feeders, S

By: Carol Ekarius

Cows and horses, donkeys and mules, sheep and goats, pigs and fowl, even Ilamas are living on small farms and in backyard barnyards, but how and where are these animals being housed?

Author Carol Ekarius knows. In How To Build Animal Housing, she provides dozens of plans - with illustrated, step-by-step instructions - for species-specific shelters that are well ventilated, safe, appropriate for the animals, appealing, convenient, and a solid value for their owners. The book is essential reading for anyone interested in animal health and welfare.

It includes complete plans and step-by-step, illustrated instructions for sheds, coops, hutches, multipurpose barns, and economical easy-to-build wind-breaks and shade structures. Ekarius covers new high-tech, portable structures made of plastics and fabrics, as well as more traditional alternatives, such as straw-bale structures. Ekarius wisely emphasizes the importance of careful planning, choosing an appropriate housing site, pest control and basic housing maintenance. How To Build Animal Housing is the most comprehensive and useful guide of its kind.

 Hobby Farm

By: Willy Newlands

Subtitled "Ideas for the New Countryside" this highly readable offering from journalist Willy Newlands is just that. It's not aimed at the serious smallholder, struggling to wrest a living from a patch of land half way up a Welsh mountain or any of us looking for the good life on a budget.

This is aimed squarely at those with the money to buy 10 acres and the income to play with them. It's a blueprint for a different way of using the countryside, improving the ecology whilst making a few pounds to defray the expense of living the good life without drawbacks.

Most of the ideas are covered in enough depth to help you decide if it worth looking into further or a non-starter for you, which is really useful.  I thoroughly enjoyed reading it and it would make a great gift for anyone, especially someone living in the city, with an interest in moving out to the countryside. All I need now is the right lottery ticket!

 The Self Sufficient-ish Bible

By: Andy and Dave Hamilton

It's strange how a book can point up the generation gap. I read John Seymour's "Complete Self Sufficiency" in my 20's and it had a massive influence on my life and views.

This book is nothing like it. It doesn't advocate moving to the country and living the good life on a smallholding. It's more for those of us without half a million pounds to buy a dream piece of land but who want to live a more self-sufficient life where we are now.

I wasn't too keen on the style of the book, too much graphic design and full colour photos for me but my daughter, who is in her twenties, loved it. The generation gap.

That reservation aside, this is a book I would recommend. It's full of ideas, some great, some not so great but all interesting and thought provoking at least. It's a book that everyone will get something out of. As the blurb says "An eco living guide for the 21^st Century"