Wild Apples: Field Notes from a River Farm marks Wayne Curtis's return to the embrace of home and the colourful lives of the people who inspire him. Simple pleasures like fishing on the Miramichi River and chores like cutting wood, planting beans, and picking crabapples take on new depths of meaning in the telling. The birth of his sister at Christmastime, the story of his mother in her own words, and a memorable trip to the circus recall unexpected moments of family love.

These personal essays are a poetic blend of fiction and biography, rich in imagery and uncompromising in their emotional honesty. Taken together, they reveal the bittersweet story of a childhood both blessed and burdened with family tradition and obligations, of dizzying love and loss, and of a young man's struggle to change the patterns of the past.