From Swamp Yankee to Desert Rat

From Swamp Yankee to Desert RatThe author manages to break all the "rules" of memoir writing in recounting in humorous fashion lessons learned from the small things in life: From selling fiddler crabs and quahogs as a youth in Wickford, RI., to ending up with an odd shaped Christmas tree taken from the mountains outside Omak, Wash., to eluding rattlesnakes and bears as a (supposed) adult in Arizona. There is a clerk who won't sell him three comic books for 30 cents because he

The author manages to break all the "rules" of memoir writing in recounting in humorous fashion lessons learned from the small things in life: From selling fiddler crabs and quahogs as a youth in Wickford, RI., to ending up with an odd-shaped Christmas tree taken from the mountains outside Omak, Wash., to eluding rattlesnakes and bears as a (supposed) adult in Arizona. There is a clerk who won't sell him three comic books for 30 cents because he doesn't have a penny for the tax, a wonderful jar of peanut butter (with no peanut butter in it) for a Christmas present, a difficult Latin teacher at La Salle Academy, a true humorist publisher at the Omak Chronicle. Eventually he concludes that he spent four years earning a journalism degree to achieve the newspaper gold standard: writing at the sixth grade level. As a newsman of three decades, he discovers how orchardists magically produce three apple crops a year. And he is sent out to interview an actor he has never heard of -- Jeff Bridges. A fun read.