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A Christmas Memory -- December 2006 Book Pick |
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Just in time for the holidays, A Christmas Memory, by Truman Capote, is the December 2006 Reader's Ink book of the month. Perhaps best known for his creative non-fiction work In Cold Blood, the true tale of a mass murder, Capote's work in A Christmas Memory is an autobiographical tale about Captoe's childhood in Alabama.
School Library Journal Review
This tiny gem of a holiday story, although a memory, is told in the
present tense, which gives it a certain immediacy. Written by Capote as
if a backward glance at his childhood while in college, the story
traces a month of pre-Christmas doings in his parentless, poor
household. The seven-year-old and his ``friend,'' a distant, eccentric,
and in those times elderly (mid-sixties), cousin prepare several dozen
fruitcakes and mail them to people they admire. Gathering the pecans
from those left behind in the harvest, buying illegally made whiskey
for soaking the cakes, getting a little tipsy on the leftovers, cutting
their own tree, and decorating it with homemade ornaments are some of
the adventures the two share. The outside world barely intrudes on this
portrayal of a loving friendship which wraps readers in coziness like
the worn scrap quilt warms the old woman. Reminiscent of Lisbeth
Zwerger, Peck's watercolor-and-ink full-page illustrations greatly
enhance the text. Her use of lighter shades, tawny colors, and fine
lines plus a background wash which suggests rather than delineates
detail is perfect for this holiday memory of Christmas celebrated in
rural Alabama in the early 1930s. --Susan Hepler, Arlington Public
Library, VACopyright 1989 Cahners Business Information, Inc.
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Last Updated ( Thursday, 25 January 2007 )
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