Bought this for my mother-in-law, and she absolutely loved it. The stories brought back memories of her own childhood. Wish I could give this ten stars for her!

a great read, sort of like an updated Little House for the adult reader. Details about farm life including recipes & the like, but full of antics and stories of family life as well. overall, the author seems too disgruntled with her upbringing and almost makes that the overtone of the book. a fun book though.

Little Heathens by Millie Kalish is a wonderful book about the author's life on an Iowa farm in the 1930's. She makes the setting and times come alive and I especially enjoyed getting a glimpse of my parent's generation and what their childhood might have been like.

The values she was taught as a child enabled her to become a member of the armed forces, go to college and become a college professor. Her family offered love and support to its members in times that were very challenging. This proves that it doesn't take a lot of money to become a succesful member of society as an adult.

Some of the remedys for first aid I remember hearing from my parents and their siblings.

It is truly worth your time to buy and read.

My wife borrowed a copy of Little Heathens from our daughter, read it, and said I might like to read it. I did, and thoroughly enjoyed it. It's very well-written, humorous, heart-warming, and. . .a reminder of how life can be lived, and enjoyed, even in very difficult times. I'm sure it will be especially interesting to those who, like me, grew up in the Depression.

It would be a mistake to read this book through the lens of nostalgia. Certainly the childhood Kalish describes is very appealing, particularly her commentaries on how her family fostered thrift and independence. It's always tempting to think that the past is somehow a better place. However few of us, I suspect, would wish to return to a time when a failed marriage could mark a woman for life (and Kalish is clear about the effect of this on her mother) or when one measure of a woman's worth was the degree of shine on her windowpanes (and Kalish is clear about her disdain for that particular preoccupation). It's also important to remember that this memoir is just one view of the Depression years; Steinbeck's "The Grapes of Wrath" (1939), which is based on his firsthand observations of California migrants, tells a very different story. I'm a teacher, and I read this book with a group of high school seniors, for whom the book was a revelation, particularly in its descriptions of how little Kalish's family relied on purchased goods and how much she and her siblings relied on imagination, not expensive sports equipment, in creating their own fun. For them (and for me) the book is interesting not because it evokes a better time and place but because it suggests that life on a Depression-era Iowa farm might teach us a few things relevant to our present circumstances, economic ones included.

I read aloud so many parts of this great book to my husband that he just had to read the whole thing for himself - brought back many, many memories - funny how hard times can be remembered so favorably! We highly recommend anyone reading "Little Heathens" who grew up on a farm, in the country or in a small town, or wish they had. Kudos to the author!!

This is like listening to your grandma (or that old lady in the Titanic movie) telling in a gentle, slow-cadenced voice, about the "old days." Among the topics covered: thrift, medicine, chores, farm food, gathering food, and wash day. The book starts off mildly entertaining, but just like grandma (or grandpa), it gets long-winded. You start to feel bored and restless and wonder how much more you can sit through before you make the move for your coat. You might decide that the next time she repeats, "waste not, want not," you'll excuse yourself and head for the door. But if you stick with this book through the dragging middle, you get to the best parts, the chapters called "animal tales," "racoons and other critters," and "me." She tells how the kids in the family tamed racoons (the racoons slept in bed with them!) The middle part drags in part because of obsolete practices that she describes. It's hard to picture what she's talking about when she tells of the oat shocking procedure, the mechanics of their laundry routine, and the windmill. Parts of these sections read like how-to manuals, including how to propare various meals. Her chapter called "me" is the best, as it has the most human interest, telling a little bit about how she went to college, joined the coast guard, got married, etc. What is ridiculous is that she puts this chapter as an epilogue! Like she's so modest, she can't have a place in the book, it has to be tagged at the end? Like, here's a tiny bit about little ol' me if you care to know...Yeah, thanks, that's why I picked up this book in the first place!

Certainly not an earth shaking book, but interesting and fun. After I read it for a book club, I bought this copy for my mother, who is the same generation and spent a great deal of time being raised by her older sister and brother in law on their farm in Illinois. She loved it.

I grew up on a farm in southern Idaho, homesteaded by my grandparents in 1903, The stories are very@simular to the way@we lived, but with the addition of electrcity, I think I shall write a book. But most of all I am reading it om m y Kindle| Marilyn Dakan. Ruidoso, NM

I am sooooo glad that this book was mentioned to me. My husband loves it as he learned a good trick: he wears expensive leather work gloves, the right hand ALWAYS wore out first, he had 9 left handed gloves laying around. The book told the story of a family that 'made do' with what they had during hard times. Turn the left hand glove inside out and you have a right hander. So many little things that this family did, I can still turn a shirt collar like my gramma taught me. A great and fine story during the Great Depression of an Iowa farm family with several children. I can remember polishing my little Patent leather shoes with Vaseline etc. I can see myself reading this again later on. It is a joy to read.

I know everyone loved this book. The New York Times Book Review named it one of the 10 best books of 2007. I just don't get it. There are chapters on frugality and outhouse pranks and nut gathering. Cold winters and back-breaking chores abound, but none of it held my interest. Despite the slimness of the volume, I struggled to finish. This memoir reads like an disjointed collection of encyclopedia entries pertaining to country life rather than a living, breathing experience.

This book was so comforting to read. I'd fix a cupof tea, grab the book and go hide in a quiet room to read. With all the hardships she faced on the farm, I still am envious. What a wonderful way to remember your childhood. I'd recommend this to anyone!

To me this well written book was so enjoyable from beginning to the end; it is the way it was and I almost found myself envying this family. It took me back to basics and a time I remembered so well and identified with their way of life.

This book was a disappointment. There were some good moments but overall the whole thing felt very thin-- strangely lacking in analysis and perspective. Nearly every chapter ends with a rhetorical question whose only purpose is to demonstrate how wonderful things were "back then." For example the chapter about gardening ends this way "Do you need to be told, that with the addition of a marrow bone, Mama produced a magnificent soup. ..? Need I add that I adopted this final gathering routine right down to making a great soup in my own gardening days?" Unfortunately, by this point in the book, Kalish certainly doesn't need to tell us these things. This rhetorical strategy was exceedingly annoying throughout.

Yes, Kalish succeeds in describing how hard everyone worked back then, and that there were advantages to living so close to the natural world (her penultimate chapter on the family pets is one of the best). But too much of the book takes on the tone of a cranky old relative spinning out only half-believable stories in a scolding tone. She often asks the reader "Can you imagine children of today doing such a task?" Of course the only possible answer Kalish can imagine is No.

There are no other real characters in this book other than Kalish herself. Early on she writes about a charming maiden aunt named Belle, but other than Belle nobody else comes to life. Her brothers and sisters, even her mother are strangely flat--we are given no sense of them at all. Skip this one, and go rent a few episodes of the Waltons instead. You'll get more character development, better writing, and fewer lectures.

My wife read all nine volumes of the Little House series by Laura Ingalls Wilder (b. 1867) to our children, but if that's a stretch for your busy schedule, then Mildred Kalish's (b. 1922) best seller is a fine substitute. Kalish does for the Depression years what Wilder did for the American frontier, which is to give a nostalgic but realistic first person account of a place and time that is now lost to most people. Except for her epilogue, Kalish recounts her early childhood years on her grandparents' 240-acre farm in rural Iowa. As you would expect, her people epitomized the thrift, self-reliance, industry and independence of a family for whom "land was plentiful but money was almost non-existent." Individual chapters describe farm life, daily chores, a typical Thanksgiving that took two weeks to prepare, church life, wash day, the farm windmill, the outhouse, food (complete with many recipes), and more. As a young girl Kalish could skin a rabbit, butcher a live chicken, and fry a snapping turtle. But there were limits. She was not allowed to see her uncle wield a sledge hammer to slay a hog or use the butcher knife to severe its head.

Kalish acknowledges that not all people loved those years like she does even today. Her sister Avis refuses to talk about it at all. Nor does she gloss over negative aspects of her upbringing. She lived with her mother's parents because when she was about five her father was banished forever from the family and community for some unspoken misdeed, and his name was, quite literally, never mentioned again in her presence. She doesn't even know when he died. Her people were stern and emotionally reserved. They could be proud and moralistic. Any and all talk about sex education was strictly forbidden. Still, Kalish describes her upbringing as a "gift" for which she remains grateful, and in her telling it's easy to see why. A dozen or so original photos enhance the reading. The New York Times named this memoir one of the "Ten Best Books of 2007."

i think the book could have gone through one more review period/editing, but for the most part it was full of entertaining stories. i dont want to pick it apart for its redundancies, but sometimes the author got carried away with using certain manners of speech, puns, etc. over and over again. also, there was a random chapter full of recipes that didnt seem to fit in with the rest of the narratives.

i dont know if this book would make my top 10 list for the year, but maybe the new york times looks for qualities that i dont appreciate as much.

I grew up on an Iowa farm in the early 60s so I could relate
to some of the items this author wrote about. Good book.

This book was a veryveryvery good summer read. Mildred Armstrong Kalish recounts her years on an Iowa farm, when times were hard and money was scarce. The joy of hard work on a farm. The descriptions of the food for large family dinners makes your mouth water. The work to make the meal is amazing. I could feel the hot summer nights, reminding me of my own childhood. Filled with stories of a large country family that has grown close out of the Depression, this book is filled with cousins, aunts, uncles, grampas and grammas, the rural community is splendidly interwoven.

I loved this book my Mom grew up on a farm and told similar stories.The home remedies are great and creative sometimes. The book makes me yearn for simpler times when fun could be had by tipping over outhouses.

I loved this book. The account of life on an Iowa farm in the depression 1930s was both stunning and compelling. It's a way of life unknown to so many people in our country today, yet not far in the past at all. I know only vestiges of it, such as seeing my mother use a wringer washing machine, but mostly from hearing my parents tell about the way they grew up. While reading it, I was torn between wishing I could go back and live in that time and place, and being so very glad I can go to a supermarket and get excellent chicken without having to behead, gut, and singe the feathers off, then cut it all up myself! But the thread running through is the learning of self-sufficiency, pulling together, rising above, the building of good character, all of which is a huge help to one through life's hills and valleys. It's well worth going back to have a look at this way of life and what we've gained and lost.

I read this from the library, then purchased a copy for my father-in-law, who lived through the depression. The writing style is straightforward with lovely language. Even though I've never lived in the midwest nor experienced depression living, it kept me interested. Wonderful anecdotes of kid sneakiness are described.

This book brought back a host of memories from my own Midwestern childhood, although mine took place nearly fifty years after hers. The author's simple, unadorned voice echoes the simplicity of her upbringing, and the effect is entirely charming. She has created quite a treasure that -- were it not for thorough first-hand accounts like this -- might be lost forever.

I had a feeling when I looked over the cover and liner notes of "Little Heathens" that I was in for a special treat. Luckily, my instinct was right. I am so glad I read this book. My wife and son read it right after me and also enjoyed it.

The book has the feel of a beloved relative talking about the "old days", except that the story is told with the literary sure hand of a retired English professor. Not only is Mildred Kalish's style wonderfully readable, I found her choices of subjects to be interesting.

I did sort of skim over the recipes in the book, but there was one that caught my eye: the "apple cream pie". My wife baked it the other night, and it is pretty darn good. Beware though: there are a lot of apples in it!

I think the value in this book are the lessons it teaches, and how it teaches those lessons without being preachy or judgemental about the current state of society. The values are some we could use more of today: self-reliance, respect for our family, the satisfaction of hard work, and bearing our trials with dignity. Sadly, when Ms. Kalish's generation have all passed away, these values are in danger of becoming some sort of antiquated curiosity. This book can also be therapeutic, allowing us to put the annoyances and challenges of life today in proper perspective. Maybe it's not so bad after all that the line at Starbuck's is long. Maybe our kids can learn that there are other ways to have fun than video games and text messaging. Maybe we can all just slow down a little, and be happy with what we have.

The most telling passage is at the very end. She could have complained about the hard times, the poverty, and the back-breaking farm work. Instead, she is grateful. A lesson for us all.

Highly recommended.

I'm the daughter of parents who grew up during the depression so many of these stories are familiar. My parents also read the book and were equally pleased with the stories. It doesn't quite delve into how difficult it was however, and stays on the light reading side. Great gift for anyone who's been to the midwest, grew up in that era, or just someone who appreciates the simpler times.

Even though I'm young enough to be the author's granddaughter, I remember so much of what she writes about --- picking wild plums, grapes, raspberries, elderberries and mulberries and making preserves. Harvesting black walnuts before the squirrels could get them all. Searching out morels before the deer ate them. As I read this book I relived my childhood growing up in a small town in Iowa. My grandparents lived very much like the author and they taught us very similar lessons. Wonderful read!

Will you enjoy LITTLE HEATHENS? Let's see: did your parents or grandparents ever you one of these names: scamp, rascal, dickens, devil, tomboy, hellion, smart-aleck, monkey, rapscallion? If so, I think you'll delight in HEATHENS. These somewhat dated terms of semi-endearment capture the tone of the book and its era, a time when children were expected to know their place and keep to it, a time when affection was delivered sideways, more often with a swat on the bottom than with a hug or kiss.

HEATHENS is, in short, a book of nostalgia. Organized topically, its chapters recreate in abundant and convincing detail such essentials of Depression farm life as food, church, school, chores, recreation, animals, family gatherings, and much more. The tone is fond without being sentimental, appreciative but alert to ironies--the voice of a woman who lived through it all and is aware of how fully her own success and character were determined by the lessons taught and learned in those hard times.

HEATHENS is a great book to read just before turning out the light at bedtime. It would be a fine companion on a plane trip, a excellent addition to a lazy afternoon at the beach or a rainy weekend in the cabin. It would make an appropriate gift for anyone who lived through the Depression, or who grew up on a small farm and cherishes the memories. And it would surely be an eye-opener to anyone who has no idea about what it feels like to eat potatoes and turnips you have grown, drink and bathe in water you have pumped or carried, warm yourself before a fire you built in a fireplace from wood you chopped with your own grimy little hands.

Mildred Kalish's book was named by the New York Times Book Review as one of the ten best books of 2007. Read it, and you will know why.

"I have had the good fortune to have absorbed the events that transpired during my childhood years into my very being, as if no boundary exists between then and now, as if the past has not really past."

The epiphany above is the secret to the pleasure of reading Mildred Kalish's "Little Heathens". Kalish is able to recount the routines and rhythms of Depression era farm life with such precision that it hovers in the mind's eye like a nostalgic dream.

What made the farmhouse hum back then was a serious devotion to doing each task well. It was a life that required hard work and "elbow grease", but the rewards seemed to be sharpened senses and enjoyment of a close-knit family and oneness with Nature. Martha Stewart and her "Good Things" philosophy pales by comparison.

Still, without admitting to irony, Kalish confesses that she was fortunate to escape this plain, P. Buckley-Moss picture of simplicity to pursue her adult life. Times change, but hard-won wisdom remains.

Enjoyed the book after it was recommended by my stepson. Even though I may not agree with her religious beliefs, the book was a stroll down memory lane and quite enjoyable. I purchased it for a cousin living in Iowa.

This well written book shares memories of a woman who grew up in a small town in Iowa during the depression

Wonderful book. So full of the real side of life that is sorely missing in today's culture. Would love for my grandchildren to read it.

As you might expect of a former English professor and school teacher,
the book is easy to read and is well-written. The author's reminiscences about growing up on an Iowa farm are interesting because her formative
years were the difficult years of the Great Depression, when economy and making do with what one had were important virtues. She demonstrates the way in which the family was extraordinarily thrifty in saving and making use of every scrap of food, piece of clothing and spare bit of thread.
Like a number of the books that have been written about people's lives in
more exotic locations, like "A Year in Provence" or "Under the Tuscan Sun", the author also provides some recipes that she particularly enjoyed when she lived on the farm in addition to when she prepared meals for a
family. The variety of home remedies are also fun to take a look at. On the whole, it is an entertaining book as well as a lesson in how times of thrift and privation needn't be unhappy.

Little Heathens is a near anthropological survey of life on a small family farm in Iowa during the 1930's, when there was no electricity, running water, bathrooms and very few if any "store bought" goods. It is today a world foreign in this age of convenience and Millie laments the loss of the "rich store of knowledge that had been bestowed on us by life on that simple farm," and the self-confidence and self-reliance it fostered. It's odd that this simple little memoir - nothing more than an elder grandparent retelling what life was like "when I was young" - has struck a chord with so many readers, it is one of the New York Times 10 most notable books of 2007. The Times attributes its success in part because so many memoirs today are about unsavory people doing scandalous things, it is a relief to read about a real person going about a "normal" life (if such a thing exists), someone you'd like to have as a relative or friend, or even to walk in her shoes (when she wore any). Partly it is Millie herself who is humble, sincere and likable.

But it is also, I believe, about bigger current day issues: Global Warming, Peak Oil, Recessions, high food prices and other man-made slow motion train wrecks have many questioning if society is on the right track and naturally many are looking back to the past for answers. A return to the country, simplicity, slow pace of life, the values of thrift, honor and tradition are finding wides audiences in modern forms, such as organics, slow food, alternative energy. They say when you reach a certain age "everything old is new again" and Millies account of the 1930s is finding a lot of interest in these times. It's a beautiful book of substance and simplicity, I recommend it highly.

Haven't finished this book yet, but so far every page is a delight (except for a few swear words and sexual terms my grandparents never used!). Can't wait to share with my mother, esp. the description of the old stove. Such a buoyant spirit to come out of hard times (no father, raised by a depressed mother and strict grandparents, etc.) Wonderfully descriptive, full of detail. Highly recommended. Especially for anyone with midwestern farm roots, and who heard stories of the old days from their grandparents.