(Review) The Librarian of Boone’s Hollow by Kim Vogel Sawyer

October 8, 2020 / Annette / Leave a comment

Publisher and Publication Date: WaterBrook Press. September 15, 2020.
Genre: Historical fiction. Christian fiction.
Pages: 368.
Source: I received a complimentary eBook NetGalley copy, I was not required to write a positive review.
Audience: Reader’s of Christian fiction.
Rating: Okay.

Amazon link

Summary:
1936. The Great Depression.
Addie Cowherd is a college student getting ready for final exams. She is summoned to the school office and is subsequently expelled for lack of funds. Addie is shocked her parents have not paid tuition. She returns home to find out her father lost his job and their home. Addie’s life has abruptly changed.
Addie takes a job with the WPA program delivering library books to the rural people of Boone’s Hollow, Kentucky.
Emmett Tharp has just graduated from college. He returns home to Boone’s Hollow and is unable to find a job with his degree. He first works in a coal mine. He then is able to work for the WPA program as a librarian.

My Thoughts:
It isn’t that I don’t like this story. I do. But not enough to give it a good rating.

I’ve written this statement before and I probably will again. Sometimes secondary characters are more interesting to me than the main characters. I want to know more about the secondary character. I want that person to be further developed. To be fleshed out and breathing. The secondary character in this story is a young woman named Bettina Webber. Bettina was born and raised in this hollow. She has her “cap” set on marrying Emmett. Her mother died. She doesn’t have siblings. She has an abusive father. She is lucky to have a good job as a rider on horseback delivering library books to her people. Now, my question is does Bettina want to marry Emmett because she feels he is her savior from her “world?” Possibly. He is a person who is safe and secure. Does the idea of marrying Emmett give her hope? Does the idea of marrying Emmett give her mind somewhere to go besides the stark reality of her own life? All these are interesting questions for further development.
Bettina is the person who is in trouble. She is the person who desperately needs help. She is the person who is in a dire situation.
Whereas, Addie Cowherd has a college background. She has supportive parents. She has experience working in a library. She has the promise of life beyond the hollow and Kentucky.
While reading the story I felt an investment in Bettina and not so much Addie.
Emmett seems more like a bookend to hold up a part of the story. To me he is expendable.
One of the things I love about this story is the environment of the hollow. I love the descriptions of the land and the town. I love the culture of the people. I love the added background story of Nanny Fay. The people don’t understand her. When people don’t understand something or someone they can turn it into fear. This too is an idea to be explored in-depth.

The Librarian of Boone’s Hollow is Christian fiction. Some of the themes are faith and trust in God, being kind to people who are not kind, bravery, courage, and perseverance.

To read more about the WPA program: History.com.

(Review) A Square Meal: A Culinary History OF The Great Depression by Jane Ziegelman and Andrew Coe

July 9, 2018July 6, 2018 / Annette / 1 Comment

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Publisher and Publication Date: HarperCollins. August 16, 2016.
Genre: Nonfiction. History of eating during the Great Depression.
Pages: 336.
Source: Library.
Rating: Good.

Amazon

This is the first book I’ve read about a history of eating!
The Great Depression is one of my favorite topics to read. A book about eating during the Great Depression is something I had to read. My parents were children during this era. I’ve heard their stories about growing, preparing, cooking, baking, and storing foods. I wanted to hear how other American people ate.

In the front inside flap of the book, A Square Meal is explained as a history of eating during the Great Depression. Yes, the book covers this topic. However, the book begins with World War I and how the American soldiers ate on the battlefield. Additional surprises about this book is in the late 1800s nutrition in food was studied. By 1907, scientists were studying how deficient diets caused diseases like scurvy and rickets. Vitamin research was studied which led to an understanding of how Vitamins A and B can help people have a “healthy life.”
Chapter 3 moves on to the Great Depression years. In this chapter, the history of breadlines and the birth of the School Lunch Movement.

For many students, lunch was their only meal of the day; parents counted on it, not only for the sake of the child, but with one meal covered by the lunchroom, more food was left for the rest of the family. Page 79.

Schools not only provided food but clothing. Lunch meals were often cooked in Homemaking classrooms. On pages 80-81, a meal schedule is given as an example of what was fed to the students in “the New York school system.”
After the stock market crash in 1929, breadlines grew sharply in NYC. In 1931, there were 82 breadlines, feeding 85,000 meals a day. I was interested to learn it was single women who were apprehensive about taking food from a breadline. Women in this culture still were expected to be taken care of by a male figure. Single working women were frowned upon.
Other noted interests in this book: the history of Betty Crocker, casseroles, frozen foods; and the history of sharecropper farmers in rural areas.
I enjoyed reading this book. I’ve heard other reviewers remark-the book is not just about eating during the Great Depression, but I found the additional information about eating in the early 20th century fascinating. For readers who have an interest in the Great Depression this book is a beneficial!

(Review) The Forgotten Man: A New History of the Great Depression by Amity Shlaes

May 24, 2018 / Annette / Leave a comment

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Publisher and Publication Date: Harper Perennial. May 2008.
Genre: Nonfiction.
Pages: 512.
Source: Self-purchase.
Rating: Good.

Amazon

From Goodreads, a bio on Amy Shlaes.

On page 7, Shlaes explains what caused the Great Depression: the stock market crash, problems in the Federal Reserve, deflation, international trade, the Dust Bowl, severe floods, and insecurity about the stock market.
For my grandparents, they knew or understood little of what was going on in politics and the marketplace. They only understood they needed to work to feed their families.
The Great Depression is one of my favorite periods in history to read. My parents grew up during the Depression years. They are considered the Greatest Generation. Dad shared many stories of his childhood. Often, he was the wage earner for the family. My grandfather who was a cement finisher did not have much work. Dad built a little wagon and walked the streets of his home town in search of scrap iron to sell. He delivered the newspaper. He carried suitcases for the people disembarking from the train. There was a sugar bowl in the kitchen of my dad’s home. He placed his hard earned money in the bowl. That money was only for him and his mother to use. Dad said they always had a house to live in, and they always had a garden to eat from. Things like coats and shoes were scarce.
Back to the book.
Amity Shlaes is a respected economic commentator. She is branded as a conservative. I know little about her background except what is shown on the back cover and the Goodreads bio.
I didn’t see the book as a hateful piece against Roosevelt and his policies. But I didn’t read the book with the mindset he was a perfect president. And the author mentions this same belief. Personally, I believe he was the right president for that era. He made good decisions and bad decisions, just as we all do. His speeches encouraged and comforted an anxious nation. My grandparents and parents loved him. He was their hero.
At the beginning of each chapter a few things are noted: the date, average unemployment percentage and the Dow Jones number. I loved this, it set the chapter.
The unemployment is a significant factor for Shlaes. She feels “to little has been paid” to this information. In the book, this is one of her strong themes: unemployment, what was done to help this, and it did not become strong till the war.
The Forgotten Man looks at the failures of the New Deal, but it also looks at the positives.
A historical story I did not expect in the book is the severe floods during this era. The Mississippi flood of 1927. Yes, this is pre-stock market crash event, but was an important part carrying over in to the Depression years.
The next chapters preceded the birth pangs of the overcorrection of the stock market and the crash.
By chapter six we learn about the Tennessee Valley, which was one of the poorest areas in America. The TVA or Tennessee Valley Authority was the New Deal’s biggest project.
People like Father Divine, Paul Mellon, Dorothea Lange, and Wendell Willkie are shown by the work they took part in or created during the Depression years. Before reading this book I’d only known of Dorothea Lange, so this was beneficial to me to read about the other historical figures.
What I did not like about the book is it’s big on facts and figures. For a person who is not strong on nonfiction, this book might be a turn-off. I love nonfiction history books, but I still struggled at times, becoming bogged down with the minutia of information.
The book does not share stories from the common people of this time period. I had hoped to read about the people who were really living and surviving during the Great Depression.