Back to Basics: A Complete Guide to Traditional Skills, Third Edition

Back to Basics is a wonderful manual on how to live a life free of all the modern distractions. How many people want to return to a time when things were different: people felt good about working hard, living in close connection the the seasons, and worked with the environment instead of trying to conquer it? How many people have tried this way of life, but failed? Here, in one simple book, you have all the information you need to succeed. The book includes how to choose land, build a house and out buildings, create energy, raise your own food, preserve foodstuff, crafts for the home, and a section on old time recreation. The writing is clear and instructions easy to follow. There are plenty of pictures to help you create your own bit of paradise. As a child, I had an earlier version of this book. It was a big, heavy, hard cover book and I spent hours mulling over how different life use to be like. Life was so much more work, but in many ways easier. This book nurtured the simple thought that we could recapture some if not all of that life. Maybe if we adopted some of these ideas then we could find a place for ourselves in the world. If I had to choose just one, I would say this is the most influential book of my youth. So, you can imagine my surprise to see this available for my Kindle. I thought, "This is a book about getting away from technology and living a life full of pre-electronic traditions. What's it doing as an e-book?" My curiosity peaked, I downloaded this and started reading. I have to say, I LOVE it! The book takes full advantage of the Kindle format. The pictures, and there are a lot of pictures, show up clearly on my Kindle 3. They are in colour when I read the book on my PC. Although, the huge number of pictures makes this book really slow to download. The index is interactive, the sections are easily navigable via the 5-way controller.

I bought this book based off the recommendation of a You Tube video. This book was in a list of book recommended. I bought this first because of the high reviews and it is something that I am interested in. If you are looking to buy a book and become an expert in all or any of the topics that this book covers, this book is not for you. This book is not small, has plenty of pictures, and does cover the topics quite nicely. This book looks to give you a general idea about a lot of topics that any one of them could be a series of books on their own. This book did give a decent amount of information on each topic that gave you a general idea on how something was done and allowed you to make a decision if it was something you wanted to research further. As I read through the book I found myself think I would love to learn to do that, and that, and that. I come to the realization that if for some reason all of our modern conveniences were taken away, no one person would be able to master all the things that would need to be done in a community. After reading through this it started to make since to me why people chose a profession and stayed in that profession. Generation after generation in the same family would take up the family trade and keep learning and expanding the trade. As said before, if you are getting this book in hopes of becoming an expert in traditional basic skill you will be disappointed. I took this book at what it was and now I am interested in even more things than I was before.

I think you could pretty much live "off the grid" with this one book. If you ever really think about how you and your family could live self-sufficiently in the event you moved to that cabin, or if you think beyond 72 hour kits for emergency preparedness, this book should be in your home library. If you really needed to be self-sufficient for months or even years this book would keep you alive. The book is in six parts: Part One: Land and buildings. Building with logs, adobe, and stone. Part Two: Energy - From windmills to do-it-yourself water heaters and methane digesters. Part Three: Gardens and Livestock - The usual, plus things like bee-keeping,butchering, and shearing. Part Four: Preserving, curing, and storing the harvest. LOTS of info on cheesemaking, a good bit about smoking and preserving meats, and even maple sugaring. Part Five: Skills and Crafts - Natural dyes and dyeing, carding and spinning, weaving (but not building the loom), rug-making, curing leather, making shoes, furniture making, metalworking, soapmaking and natural cleansers, candle making,and basket weaving. Part Six: Recreation - traditional games and holiday crafts, but also orienteering, foraging and snare-making,a little bit on raft making, and basic first aid. I hope this gives you enough information to see if the book is really what you want. This isn't a "cutesy" Country Mama kind of book. This is the real thing. The instructions are concise. The illustrations are mostly drawings (good ones). You'd probably have some trial and error following them, but you'd have enough to get started and to know what NOT to do. I highly recommend the book, if only for peace of mind, knowing you could take care of yourself and your loved ones.

excellent book :: must have

If I was left alone on an island and could only bring one book, this would be it. It has great, easy to understand instructions for how to live off the land, with nice illustrations as well. I bought this book for my son (12 years old), after admiring the older, out of print edition at the library for many years. We had been watching the BBC series Life on a Victoria Farm, and he was inspired to learn more about traditional ways of life. We haven't raised our own chickens yet, but we have talked about making our own cheese, and we've learned to knit and sew. This book really makes you appreciate all the work behind things we take for granted. Highly recommended.

An excellent book and covers more than I would ever need. Very well written and compiled with clear descriptions, proper easy to follow instructions for the many projects. If you ever find youself in a situation where you no longer have access to our modern conveniences this book is probably all you'll need to help you build a house, grow food, make furniture and entertain your neighbours! Very interesting to read and I look forward to practising and learning these near forgotten skills. I also bought a copy for my Dad and he loves the book too.

This book is a beautifull product of printing and binding. Inside is a wealth of info on off-grid sustainable living. Also a great gift if you want other people to start thinking about moving to a more sustainable living arangement.

Loved this book when it was the Readers Digest version back in the 80's. This is a nominally updated edition (not sure why the original editors are not cited, but...). There are fresh sections on Solar and a couple of other things, but the basics are still there. The big change is the modern photographs rather than the moustachioed 70's men (hot as they were!), and more photos replacing some of the illustrations. Still great info, although I haven't used much of it yet (maybe in another 30 years!).