A Long Way From Chicago: A Novel in Stories
by:
Richard Peck (author)
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...
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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.
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Format: paperback
ISBN:
9780141303529 (0141303522)
Publish date: October 1st 2000
Publisher: Puffin
Pages no: 176
Edition language: English
Series: A Long Way from Chicago (#1)
This was a forced read for me. I needed a middlegrade book with an unusual narrative structure for a lecture I’m working on, and my mentor suggested this one. I had never heard of it before. Honestly, I groaned when I looked it up online because I have a love/hate relationship with middlegrade ficti...
9/2012: I still love this book, and Grandma Dowdel still puts me in mind of my own irascible grandmother who gets more legendary the longer she's been dead. I like the episodic form of this book, though I think the sequel is better. 2000ish: I adored this book. My own grandmother has much in common ...
I really like this book. The narrative voice is clear and believable and all of the characters are interesting and very well developed in a fairly short time. The historical bits feel real and unforced as elements of the story, and there is a realism to the book that is very enjoyable.
I enjoyed every moment of this book. Reading it was like listening to my grandparents and great-aunts and uncles sitting around telling their stories. Their tales may not be as outlandish as the ones in this book, but the flavor and character of peoples' lives is just the same. Richard Peck cleverly...
One of my favorite middle-grade novels. I adore Richard Peck, having been at a conference where he was speaker. He is humble, brilliant, and well-spoken. This is a story about a couple of kids who spend the summers with their grandmother. Some of the antics they get involved with - and with their gr...
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