SMALL ACREAGES

A Southern writer’s astute collection of observances and reflections.

In Stamper’s third collection of essays, the author and former English and theater teacher recounts her experiences as a native rural Kentuckian. The anthology, comprising 58 essays, focuses on family, the art of homemaking, personal opinions, and stories about the selfless acts of good people and daily life in bucolic Owen County in northern Kentucky. Greatly influenced and defined by place and “the culture as it has shifted around me,” Stamper writes candidly about the “wise country people who raised me.” She escorts readers to sprawling annual family reunion potlucks and introduces them to Uncle Murf, a resilient World War I military veteran who survived a mustard gas attack in the field and lived well into his 90s. The author mourns her beloved grandfather, who died on Father’s Day when she was 9, and her mother, who passed from ovarian cancer after a Christmas Eve dinner. In a section devoted to domestic life, Stamper ponders underappreciated wonders like hominy, a proper table setting, philodendrons, and an ingredients-only recipe for her Anna Mae’s Jam Cake (unfortunately, the instructions vanished over time). Stamper remains an honest observer and commentator throughout, even when the stories put her in a less-than-flattering light, like when she “overstepped…adult boundaries.” The author is particularly witty in anecdotes about raising her three daughters, being a grandmother, growing up on a tobacco farm, and Queen Elizabeth.

Some of the best entries are also the most intimate, like when Stamper finds profundity in everyday objects, like a quilt fashioned by her husband’s late grandmother stricken with Parkinson’s disease or her great-grandmother Hudson’s delicate dessert dishes. What begins as a funny conversational essay on getting older ends up imparting sage, seasoned takeaways about better living: “I don’t know about you, but I’ve spent most of my adult life wandering through a forest of very tall trees without a map—not exactly lost, but unsure of my way through. I assumed other people had the map. Now I’m not so sure they did.” Stamper closes with impressively researched history about the two free Black enclaves that thrived near the family farm prior to the Civil War. As in previous volumes, the author, a seventh-generation Kentuckian, eloquently limns the ebb and flow of Southern life through a range of situations, moods, and perspectives. In their own way, each story imparts a gentle reminder on the importance of cherishing family, faith, and one’s roots. Having been raised by a farmer father who loved to read and a science teacher mother (both “keepers of stories”), Stamper became a natural raconteur brimming with anecdotes of her life and the idyllic ways of the Natlee region. With an enjoyable sense of humility, she contributes a wealth of knowledge and wisdom on aging, love, family, tradition, generational nurturing, and living a good, honest (Southern) life. Sentimental but never mawkish, Stamper’s insightful, heartfelt anecdotes about “what it means to be human” will resonate with readers. A wonderful conclusion to Stamper’s trilogy.

Insightful, clever, and amusing ruminations on the joys of home and family.