Farm: The Making of a Climate Activist

Journalist Harvey debuts with an instructive if plodding memoir that explores the relationship between agribusiness and the climate crisis. After experiencing a miscarriage and souring on city life, Harvey decamped with her husband from Sydney, Australia, in 2018 to rear calves on a farm in her native New Zealand. Far from providing an idyllic escape, however, the decision embroiled Harvey in hot-button questions about environmentally friendly farming. Seeking answers, she set out to interview figures inside and outside the agriculture industry. Harvey’s father and uncle, both “conventional” (as opposed to organic) New Zealand farmers, opined that shifting environmental regulations are shortsighted and unduly punitive; her vegetarian niece shared that her “flexitarian” peers have opted for a less hard-line, more reduction-based approach to conscious consumption than their activist predecessors; and a Maori dairy farmer explained how his Indigenous background informed his approach to farming-as-land-stewardship. With each interaction, Harvey more deeply interrogated her own farming practice, examined her relationship to her homeland, and reconsidered her ideas about what it means to protect the planet. Though rigorous and informative, Harvey’s account repeats its key questions and takeaways so often that the narrative stalls out. All but the most invested of readers may find that the nuggets of wisdom aren’t worth the slog. (Oct.)