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“Jerry Nelson's column comes from the true heart of the Midwest. He has the true voice, the slow twang. He knows wheat from barley. He knows hardware, he knows vegetation, he knows people.”—Garrison Keillor In the tradition of Mark Twain and Jean Shepherd, Dave Barry and Garrison Keillor, Jerry Nelson is a humorist whose beat is the American heartland, a small-town world of pickup trucks and Sunday night pancake dinners, dropping in on neighbors and complaining about the county agent. His depictions of daily life, from the point of view of an ex-dairy farmer and taciturn husband with a twinkle in his eye, are read by 250,000 people a week—and occasionally woven into Prairie Home Companion scripts. These are stories of courtship; childbirth—he offers the delivery room doctor the use of his calf puller; family; neighbors; chores; and the duties of a father—why is it that a man who spends his days in cow manure can't change a baby's diaper? Knee-slappingly funny one moment, poignant the next, it's a very special look at a distinctly American way of life.

The author of Don't Whiz on an Electric Fence and When I Am an Old Coot spreads some down-home, hard-won, gut-busting facts. Dishing out witty one-liners and old-fashioned country logic the same way an old camp cook dishes out beans and biscuits, Roy English's Advice from a Country Farmer is simply this—no-nonsense humor and wisdom from a country gentleman schooled in common sense and kindness. “Most farmers work only half a day; the other twelve hours they do other stuff.”“When you wallow with pigs, expect to get dirty.”“Don't skinny dip with snapping turtles.” “Horsepower is no substitute for horse sense.”“The only farmers who sleep late are in the cemetery.” “Nobody works harder than a farmer, except maybe a farmer's wife.”