Possum Living: How to Live Well Without a Job and with (Almost) No Money (Revised Edition)

Dolly Freed

Tin House Books, Jan 12, 2010 - House & Home - 224 pages

After being out of print for decades, Possum Living: How to Live Well Without a Job and (Almost) No Money is being reissued with an afterword by an older and wiser Dolly Freed.

In the late seventies, at the age of eighteen and with a seventh-grade education, Dolly Freed wrote Possum Livingabout the five years she and her father lived off the land on a half-acre lot outside of Philadelphia. At the time of its publication in 1978, Possum Living became an instant classic, known for its plucky narration and no-nonsense practical advice on how to quit the rat race and live frugally. In her delightful, straightforward, and irreverent style, Freed guides readers on how to buy and maintain a home, dress well, cope with the law, stay healthy, save money, and be lazy, proud, miserly, and honest, all while enjoying leisure and keeping up a middle-class façade. Thirty years later, Freed's philosophy is world-renowned andPossum Living remains as fascinating, inspirational, and pertinent as it was upon its original publication. This updated edition includes new reflections, insights, and life lessons from an older and wiser Dolly Freed, whose knowledge of how to live like a possum has given her financial security and the confidence to try new ventures.

What people are saying

LibraryThing Review

User Review  - satyridae - LibraryThing

Undue emphasis on moonshine, says me, but full of interesting tips and tricks for getting by without cash. It's dated (I'd certainly never have the balls to go without health insurance these days) but there's a good deal of sound advice within. It's amusingly written too.

LibraryThing Review

User Review  - paperloverevolution - LibraryThing

This book is charming, and it's refreshing to read a book on urban homesteading aimed at poor people rather than middle-class foodies, but it's not particularly helpful. Good for a breezy evening read.

About the author

Following her success as an author, Dolly Freed grew up to be a NASA aerospace engineer. She put herself through college after she aced the SATs with an education she received from the public library. She has also been an environmental educator, business owner, and college professor. She lives in Texas with her husband and two children.

Bibliographic information

• Title: Possum Living: How to Live Well Without a Job and with (Almost) No Money (Revised Edition)
• Author: Dolly Freed
• Contributor: David Gates
• Edition: revised
• Publisher: Tin House Books, 2010
• ISBN: 0982504853, 9780982504857
• Length: 224 pages
• Subjects: House & Home / Sustainable Living