Cindy (summerlady46) -
Helpful Score: 4
I think this book was written for young adults, but this old adult loved it!! Part of its charm is that the setting is life in the slow lane...simple people, simple living...no batteries required! While Grandma is gruff, she is wise and loving in her own way. This is just fun, easy reading without violence, cussing or sex!
Sheryl O. (Everett-Reader) reviewed A Long Way From Chicago: A Novel in Stories (Grandma Dowdel, Bk 1) on + 216 more book reviews
Helpful Score: 3
Newberry honor book - really enjoyable.
ANNOTATION
A boy recounts his annual summer trips to rural Illinois with his sister during the Great Depression to visit their larger-than-life grandmother.
FROM THE PUBLISHER
What happens when Joey and his sister, Mary Alice -- two city slickers from Chicago -- make their annual summer visits to Grandma Dowdel's seemingly sleepy Illinois town? August 1929: They see their first corpse, and he isn't resting easy.
August 1930: The Cowgill boys terrorize the town, and Grandma fights back. August 1931: Joey and Mary Alice help Grandma trespass, poach, catch the sheriff in his underwear, and feed the hungry -- all in one day. And there's more, as Joey and Mary Alice make seven summer trips to Grandma's -- each one funnier than the year before -- in self-contained chapters that readers can enjoy as short stories or take together for a rollicking good novel. In the tradition of American humorists from Mark Twain to Flannery O'Connor, popular author Richard Peck has created a memorable world filled with characters who, like Grandma herself, are larger than life and twice as entertaining.
ANNOTATION
A boy recounts his annual summer trips to rural Illinois with his sister during the Great Depression to visit their larger-than-life grandmother.
FROM THE PUBLISHER
What happens when Joey and his sister, Mary Alice -- two city slickers from Chicago -- make their annual summer visits to Grandma Dowdel's seemingly sleepy Illinois town? August 1929: They see their first corpse, and he isn't resting easy.
August 1930: The Cowgill boys terrorize the town, and Grandma fights back. August 1931: Joey and Mary Alice help Grandma trespass, poach, catch the sheriff in his underwear, and feed the hungry -- all in one day. And there's more, as Joey and Mary Alice make seven summer trips to Grandma's -- each one funnier than the year before -- in self-contained chapters that readers can enjoy as short stories or take together for a rollicking good novel. In the tradition of American humorists from Mark Twain to Flannery O'Connor, popular author Richard Peck has created a memorable world filled with characters who, like Grandma herself, are larger than life and twice as entertaining.
Erin C. (brandinsp) reviewed A Long Way From Chicago: A Novel in Stories (Grandma Dowdel, Bk 1) on + 113 more book reviews
Helpful Score: 2
Read this one, then follow it with "A Year Down Yonder". Wonderful stories - for kids and adults alike. Have re-read both books many times.
Helpful Score: 2
This is one of my favorite books, it will make you laugh so hard you'll end up in tears.
Dawn B. (kokyread) reviewed A Long Way From Chicago: A Novel in Stories (Grandma Dowdel, Bk 1) on + 15 more book reviews
Helpful Score: 1
This was such an enjoyable book to read with my son---we thoroughly enjoyed this light summer read
