If this book of short stories does not make a former Tar Heel homesick, then I have not a clue as to what would... it made me want to go home immediately. The stories are funny, sad, and range in levels from wonderful to great. A librarian friend gave me this book and it is one of the best gifts I have ever received. I plan to purchase several to give as gifts. My home is now in California, but my heart will always be down home in North Carolina.

I'm ordering what must be my fourth or fifth copy of this terrific little book. It's a comforting, warm, fuzzy, and sometimes funny set of recollections sure to regenerate the reader's own rememberances of home. I try to keep a copy beside the bed in my guest room, but alas, my guests are always so taken with what they've read before turning out the light that I always have to say "Just take my copy along with you. I'll get another." I've also given it to friends in the process of fighting terrible illnesses. They find peace in the authors' accounts, conjuring up their own memories of home.

I read this coming-of-age story more than twenty years ago, when I was coming of age. It has left vivid images of life on what we would now call the nerdly fringes of adolescent society in a mid-Southern university town. I remember a boy walking along railroad tracks, thinking about his worn corduroy pants and deciding that he was above caring what the unenlightened might think of him. I remember an out-of-touch mother who found creative outlet in designing eccentric dresses for her daughters to wear on their first day of school in a new town. Being too close in development to the subjects at the time, the book's meaning washed over me, but its images have come to me from time-to-time as memories of a strange encounter. It is a powerful portrayal of adolescence.