Total Loss Farm in Guilford, Vermont, was and is a wordy place. Its hilly acres and flimsy buildings provided a refuge from a riven country, a place to grow paragraphs and stanzas, among the tilled rows of the market garden. Peter Gould's first novel Burnt Toast was a youthful exploration of this mythic turf. Peter left the farm to pursue love and work. In Horse-Drawn Yogurt, Peter returns to offer his take on how we lived in times that seem exotic, yet oddly familiar, in this second edition, with three new stories and an introduction by Vermont author Bill Schubart. Gould is eloquent, whimsical, critical, musical, magical, and tender. The new stories in this second edtion are gems with additional line drawings by the author.

Author Bill Schubart brings to life the friends and characters of his native Lamoille County where in the late '50s and early '60s life was lived close to the earth and often against the grain. Schubart's collection of 22 stories captures a Vermont in transition from an enclave of hill farms and small towns where everyone knew your grandfather to a Valhalla for urban expats seeking chairlifts or rural renewal. Schubart's full-hearted and compassionate evocation of this Vermont is by turns poignant, funny and savory. The stories give readers a good excuse to stay up late to discover how Wyvis will circumvent the new prohibition on having more than three junk yards in your yard or what bait Pete Trepanier trolls with inside Mer-Lu's bar in Hardwick on a Saturday night. This thoroughly enjoyable collection is as finely etched as the frost ferns on your winter window panes.

Bill Schubart is the author of the best-selling short story collection THE LAMOILLE STORIES, set in the Vermont county where he grew up. FAT PEOPLE is his second collection of tales. In it, he tackles the difficult subject of people and their relationship with food. For most of us, food is a source of sustenance and pleasure. But for some, it is their only friend and main source of comfort, and it may become their addictive nemesis. Bill Schubart, a man of girth, is a keen and sympathetic observer of those whose lives become defined by their obesity. FAT PEOPLE adds to our understanding of how easily food can overwhelm a life. The fourteen stories Schubart tells are by turns poignant and evocative. They touch on all facets of obesity-addictive behavior, the pressure of prejudice, how food comes to rule a life, and the intimate psychological development of people for whom food becomes both companionship and family. The best fiction not only entertains, it touches a reader's heart. This is true of FAT PEOPLE. Readers come away with a better understanding of food compulsions.