In the beginning...

...there were The Flyaways, a family who traveled in their miraculous flying machine having daring adventures with Goldilocks and Cinderella. The first in the 3-book series by Alice Dale Hardy was published by Grosset and Dunlap in 1925 and copies are almost extinct. Few people remember Ma and Pa, Tommy and Susie Flyaway now.

I became acquainted with them on my grandfather's lap, my dear Grandpa Baker who read and read and read to me every evening for as many years as I can remember. I would hold my breath as each chapter ending neared, hoping he would not stop. I would keep begging for "just one more" chapter until his voice got so hoarse I would have to run to his room to get his throat lozenges.

Over the years we covered all of Uncle Wiggly and Honey Bunch, the Bobbsey Twins, the Five Little Peppers, the Wind in the Willow series, some of them more than once. He read to me until long after I could read everything for myself, until I was into Beverly Gray, Trixie Belden, Nancy Drew and The Hardy Boys. I was safe and happy snuggled up on the couch with him and that feeling has never left me. I still read and read and read, and it still makes me feel safe and happy.

Monday, July 4, 2011

June 28

Anna Mayhew has written a rich novel about a white Southern family with a black nanny which is reminiscent of The Help. Race relations, family relations, coming of age and death. It is a page turner, dramatic and readable and emotional. Oh, the title – The Dry Grass of August.

I am fascinated with hoarding and enjoyed Jessie Sholl’s memoir called Dirty Secret, A Daughter Comes Clean about Her Mother’s Compulsive Hoarding. Found Jessie pretty annoying.

Robert Parker, I love you, and I love the new character Zebulon Sixkill in the book of that name. Sixkill seems to be filling in for Hawk who is off on a mission someplace. Wonder if someone will take over writing Spenser now that Parker is gone. Haven’t heard anything.

O.J.’s DA Marcia Clarke is turning her hand to writing fiction and this legal thriller is obviously well researched as DA Rachel Knight investigates the murder of her pal and associate Jake Pahlmeyer in Guilt by Association. Not exactly a page turner, but worth a read.

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