A Good House

A Good House is a chronicle of the year in which Manning set out to build his house and rebuild his life. Combining entertaining tales of the cast of characters who helped him build; practical information about wiring, roofing, and plumbing; and meditations on the struggle to integrate environmental and spiritual values into everyday life, this is a book about creating a solid foundation and building up from there—in a hosue, in a family, in living a good life.A Good HouseA Notion
Water
Money
Tools
Dirt
Concrete
Wood
Filth
Power
Light
Art
The Coming of the Cold
Sources"A practical, philosophical, conscientious, and richly generous version of what it takes to put together a thoughtful house, a thoughtful life."
—Louise Erdrich

"Richard Manning set out to build an aesthetically pleasing and environmentally responsible house in which to center his life with his new wife. A Good House is his story of the work, thick with information, splendidly told, solid and good like his house, and a fine read."
—William Kittredge

"An honest and winning, even profound little book. Even if you have never taken a hammer, utility knife and square in hand to install drywall … there is much to enjoy and learn from here."
—The Washington Post Book World

Richard Manning is the author of Grassland, A Good House, and Last Stand, a finalist for the Sigurd F. Olson Nature Writing Award. He worked as a reporter for fifteen years, including four years at the Missoulian. A recipient of a John S. Knight Fellowship at Stanford University and a three-time winner of the Seattle Times C.B. Blethen Award for Investigative Journalism, he has also won the Audubon Society Journalism Award and the first Richard J. Margolis Award for environmental reporting. His work has appeared in a variety of magazines and newspapers, including Harper's, Audubon, Outside, Sierra, E, High Country News, and the Bloomsbury Review. Richard Manning lives in the house he built with his wife in Lolo, Montana.